Don't misconstrue silence as safety
There's an explosion inside of me.
- Assemblage 23
Rhyanon kicks at the back of the pew in front of her. Her mother places a gentle hand over hers. She looks up and squirms away from the disappointed frown. She doesn't mean to be bad, but the Chantry is boring. She's been here forever. She stops kicking, and snuggles up against Mama's side. Mama shifts enough to hug her close, with her arm around her, warm and comfortable. Rhyanon falls into a happy kind of stillness, lulled by the warmth and the gentle repetition of soft voices speaking the language she only hears here. She doesn't know what it means, any of it, but she can wrap her mouth around the words enough to pronounce most of them when Mama does, and that earns her a smile that fills her with pride like a kind of bright-light glow.
"Wake up, little one."
"'m not asleep," Rhyanon protests. She scrambles to her feet, but stays close to Mama. The grownups are talking with loud, angry voices. Da is too. She tries to ignore them and pulls on Mama's hand, leading her to the pretty colored windows so that she can watch the bright sunlight spill through them and leave their patterns on the shiny tile floor. She dances there, watching the colors shift over her skin and the smooth fabric of her dress. It makes her giggle.
"Stop that!" Da barks. "It's disrespectful."
Rhyanon freezes and clings to Mama's dress, but this time she is pushed away. She has to act like a young lady, not a baby. She is nearly seven, after all. Rhyanon crosses her arms across her chest and scuffs her feet across the Chantry floor, taking care to stay out of Da's way. "Why is he mad at me?" she asks Mama. Her voice sounds a little bit whiny, but she doesn't care.
Mama doesn't answer, not until they're out on the slippery steps leading into the Hightown streets. Rhyanon shivers as the cold rain lashes down, soaking her through. Mama grabs her hand roughly and pulls her into the carriage. Da rides up front, with the driver. "He's not mad at you," Mama promises. But she says it mostly to the seat of the carriage, not looking at Rhyanon.
"I didn't do anything," Rhyanon demands, in a huff.
"I know you didn't. He isn't mad at you."
"Who's he mad at?"
"Shh, dear heart. Don't ask so many questions."
Rhyanon sighs and squirms and kicks her leg against her seat. Mama frowns, but doesn't make her stop. She tries to see what's going on outside the carriage, but mostly all she can see is rain and clouds. The streets are nearly empty, the shopkeepers huddled under their roofs. When the carriage arrives at their estate, Rhyanon jumps out, landing in a puddle of water. It splashes up onto her dress, some of it even if splatters onto her face. Her legs are coated in thick mud, up to the knee. She grins, until she sees the look on Mama's face, which makes her duck her head and mumble an apology. Mama sends her with Abigail, her nanny, who is old and strict and no fun at all. She scrubs the mud away roughly and puts Rhyanon in a new dress that is even more uncomfortable than the last one, with a stern look and orders not to get it dirty. Rhyanon squirms and promises that she won't.
"Go on to your lessons, then."
"I don't want to," Rhyanon whines. As usual, Abigail doesn't care a whit for what she wants.
"Go on," she insists, pushing Rhyanon out into the hall with a click of her tongue.
Rhyanon scowls and grumbles as she tromps through the wide halls of the estate toward the library where her brother will be waiting with their boring tutor. The pounding rain outside means she cannot go outside to the market or even to see the horses. She's stuck here. With her seventh year fast approaching, the adults have begun insisting that she spend her morning hours stuck with Damion, who is mean to her, and jealous because she doesn't have to learn writing and sums and history the way he does. Because she's only still six, and a girl. But she has to learn the Chant, and that is boring enough. At least she doesn't have to learn it in arcanum, the way Damion does. That comes later. And it means she'll be able to follow the songs and sermons of Chantry services, instead of simply recognizing those few words that stay the same.
Her new dress is itchy and annoying, and the library is cold even with the fire blazing in the corner. Damion is sitting at the small table in the corner, and he sticks his tongue out at her when she walks in. She sticks her tongue out at him, but that's when Ser Brenton turns around and sees. Damion snickers, thinking he's just gotten his baby sister in trouble. But the tutor isn't mad at her. He's failing to hide his smile, in fact. Rhyanon grins triumphantly at Damion, who scowls. Ser Brenton clears his throat and asks her if she remembers the lesson from yesterday. She does, because she has a good memory, and the Chant is easy because everyone knows it. You can hear it all the time, if you're listening. Mama recites pieces sometimes, before Rhyanon falls asleep. The servants pray. And she gets dragged to services almost every morning.
She stands in a recitation pose, close to the fireplace so that she's not as cold, and she manages to stay mostly still as she talks because she knows that Ser Brenton is watching her. It makes her feel a little nervous. She licks her lip and pretends he isn't there, and reminds herself that she does know the words. "These are the truths the Maker has revealed to me," she announces. "As there is but one world, one life, one death, there is but one god, and He is our Maker. They are sinners who have given their love to false gods."
She struggles to remember what comes next, but her older brother keeps the words going, and she starts to remember. Her voice overlaps with his. "Magic exists to serve man, and never to rule over him. Foul and corrupt are they who have taken His gift and turned it against His children. They shall be named Ma... Mal..." she stops again, struggling with the unfamiliar word.
"Maleficar," Damion supplies, before she loses her place completely. Except...
"What's that mean?" she interrupts.
"It means a mage. Don't be dumb!"
"I'm not dumb!"
"Children!" Ser Brenton demands. Rhyanon glances up at him. He's still not angry, but he also doesn't let them get away with much when they're supposed to be studying. "Finish the recitation."
"They shall be named Maleficar, accursed ones," Damion finishes, by himself, because Rhyanon is still sulking. "They shall find no rest in this world, or beyond."
Rhyanon takes a slate pencil and starts drawing lines and squares and circles. They are shaky and lopsided, but she keeps trying. The rain patters heavily on the window.
That night, she wakes up screaming. She didn't know she was screaming, but when she opens her eyes, Abigail is staring at her with a familiar look that is equal parts worry and exasperation. Rhyanon reaches for her favorite blanket, but her shaking hands cannot disentangle it from the twisted nest of sheets at the bottom of her bed, kicked there while she fought and struggled in her sleep.
"Let me help you, girl," her nanny says. She sits down on the bed and does not protest when Rhyanon crawls into her lap. "Bad dreams again?" Rhyanon nods. Always. Well, almost always. Even when she doesn't remember the dreams and isn't scared enough to wake up, in the morning she often finds her blankets thrown to the floor, lost when she'd thrashed around without noticing. She sticks her thumb into her mouth and sucks on it. In the middle of the night, she gets away with a lot of things that would mean a scolding in the daytime. "What about?" Abigail asks, as she brushes the tears away from the little girl's face. She begins gently combing Rhyanon's hair with her fingers and working it into a loose braid. Rhyanon stares up at her. It must be almost time for the sun to come up, if she's bothering. Almost time to go to the Chantry. She pulls away slightly, and Abigail frowns. "It's just a dream, you know," she reminds Rhyanon. "You don't have to be scared."
"I'm not scared," Rhyanon lies. It's not exactly a lie. She is scared sometimes, because she hears really scary voices that she doesn't understand. They speak in a mix of common and arcanum and something else completely, hisses and screams that pull at her until she knows that she has to get away, and then she runs. And wakes up crying. But mixed in with the scary parts are really awesome things. Trees like none she's ever seen in Kirkwall, castles, animals that talk. And an awareness that this is her world, not the boring gray everyday-same of Kirkwall. When she touches the air in the dream world she can feel the light. It wraps herself around her and she feels stronger, like she can do anything. She makes things happen in her dreams without trying. She changes the color of the sky. Plants grow and change around her. Sometimes she can trace lights or fire with her fingers, they ebb and flow with an ease and confidence that her stumbling attempts at drawing real-life pictures never come close to touching. The dream-place is filled with music and color that makes her feel happy and unafraid in a familiar sort of way; and she somehow knows, but only while she's here, that this is what the Chantry is trying to recreate with their painted glass windows and organ songs. Like the shaky lines on her slate, it is a frustratingly limited interpretation.
This morning when she sits in her familiar place between mother and Damion, Rhyanon does work hard to listen to the Reverend Mother's sermon and prayers. She doesn't listen all the way, of course - she can't, because she still doesn't know arcanum. She looks around while she's listening, at the light streaming in through the windows on this sunny day, at the templars with fire and swords painted on their armor. Some of them have real swords, the ones that are here to guard, not just pray. Those men have helmets on, and they stand around the room, in shadowed corners. Rhyanon twists around to see one of them, and when his gaze meets hers, she can feel it, even though he's got a helmet on. It feels like something is crawling on the back of her neck. She spins back around and ducks her head. Da sees, and glares at her, an admonition without words that she needs to sit still. The Reverend Mother is still speaking, and Rhyanon hears maleficarum, that same big scary word again. It gets almost-lost in all the rest of the arcanum she doesn't know, but she does recognize the fact that the Reverend Mother's voice has gotten louder and angrier. She squirms and tries to hide, but this time her mother does not hug her.
"Stop being such a baby!" Damion hisses. Rhyanon wants to snap at him, but Da is giving her a Look, and Mama is not being helpful right now. Rhyanon wraps her arms around her knees and settles back against the hard wooden seat. There's a lump in her throat that makes her feel like she's about to start crying, and she doesn't even know why. She stays still and silent for the rest of the service. When it's time for lessons, she gets the recitation perfect, which makes Ser Brenton smile and Damion call her a show-off. She starts learning the next part: "All men are the work of our Maker's hands, from the lowest slaves to the highest kings." She frowns. There aren't any slaves anymore, and Kirkwall doesn't have a king.
"Who cares?" Damion whines, when she points this out. "It's just the words."
"All men are the work of our Maker's hands, from the lowest slaves to the highest kings," Rhyanon repeats. "Those who bring harm without...
"Provocation," Ser Brenton eventually fills in.
"Provocation. What's that?"
"It means a good reason," the tutor explains.
"Oh. Those who bring harm without provocation to the least of His children are hated and accursed by the Maker." Ser Brenton nods, pleased with her quick memory.
"What's a good reason?" she asks, as he turns to work with Damion, who is barely focused on an old map of the Free Marches laid out on the table.
"What?"
"What's a good reason? To bring harm to children?"
"It's just words," Damion snaps, again. Ser Brenton looks startled, but doesn't answer the question.
Rhyanon stops listening. She squirms and sighs, wriggling and looking longingly out the window and the cold gray Kirkwall winter that keeps her stuck in here. The sun is already nearly set. She has been in the library for hours, trying unsuccessfully to fight off boredom. She sticks her thumb into her mouth and watches the fire. The flames in the fireplace leap and dance, sending out warmth and crackling sparks through the small room. Rhyanon stares at the fire, tracing its patterns. She watches the colors of the flames shift and change, watches the wood burn away to ash. And as the fire dies away, leaving only glowing embers, she reaches out and kindles her own spark. The flames rush to new life, and she smiles, filled with a resonant warmth and a surge of excitement. She plays, and the flickering sparks respond to her command. She holds them in her hand and shapes them with her thoughts. It's easy, and gets easier with practice, until she's laughing as she weaves firelight through her fingers.
Then, Damion pushes her, hard. The retaliation is so sudden that she falls out of her chair, and loses control of the fire, which laps quickly at the rug beneath her, consuming it beyond all hope of control. She cries as the smoke begins to thicken and wrap itself around her, but she is choked far more quickly by her own panic.
Water splashes over her as Ser Brenton dumps the pail kept near the fireplace. Smoke and steam linger in the air, and the scent of scorched fabric is overwhelming. But the fire is drowned.
"You're such a freak, Rhyanon!" Damion yells.
"Are you hurt, child?" the teacher asks. Rhyanon shakes her head. He nods, and takes her by the hand, to go and find her parents.
"I didn't mean it," Rhyanon whines, as Mama picks her up and holds her, even though she hasn't done that in years. The little girl's protests nearly drown out the soft but harsh whispers exchanged between her teacher and her father.
"I know," her mother whispers soothingly.
"I'm sorry. I won't do it again!"
"I know," her mother repeats. She plants a gentle kiss on Rhyanon's forehead. "I'm not mad at you, baby." She carries Rhyanon to her darkened bedroom and wraps her arms around her daughter, holding her close.
"Mama, why are you crying?" Rhyanon asks. She reaches up to brush away the cold tears from her mother's face. Her mother shakes her head but doesn't answer, which Rhyanon has already learned is bad. She rests her head in Mama's lap, and lets her comb out her tangled hair with gentle fingers. Eventually, she falls asleep.
The colors in her dreams are brighter, the voices louder. They sound like her father, and Damion. They are angry and yelling. She wakes up, though it is still many hours from morning. There is a coldness like ice in the pit of her belly. She shivers and coughs, unable to shake the impression that the smoke of her accidental fire is still clinging to her. She slips out of bed, afraid to be alone and unable to sit still. She creeps through the halls, alert for any of the servants who might send her to back to bed. She freezes when she hears the yelling coming from downstairs.
"That girl is an abomination! I will not have her in this house. Do you have any idea-?"
"Do you? I will not send my only daughter to the Gallows!"
Rhyanon sucks in a great big breath. They're talking about her. She creeps forward slowly, carefully. She wraps her hands tightly around the banister and pushes herself up onto her tiptoes, so that she can almost see Mama and Da below her - the tops of their heads, at least.
They're standing in the foyer, and Rhyanon almost can't see them in the dark. But she can feel the tension between them, strong enough to make her cry. She pops her thumb into her mouth and stays perfectly still, knowing somehow that if they see her, if they know that she's spying on them while they talk about her, it will only make things worse.
She knows about the Gallows, obviously. Everybody does. It's the big scary prison in the middle of the harbor where the mages are. The squirming sickness in her stomach gets worse, and cold, heavy fear drops over her, like a blanket. Mages are bad guys, evil and scary. Hated and cursed. Maleficarum. That's not her. She's just a kid.
She wraps her arms tightly around herself and makes a promise to the Maker that she'll never ever do that fire thing again. She'll forget she even knows how to do it.
"She can't stay here," Da demands.
Rhyanon waits, for Mama to say something, to tell him he's wrong. But she doesn't. "I'll find... a solution," she says instead.
"You'd better," Da mutters darkly. He stalks away, leaving Mama alone in the room.
"You can come down here, Rhyanon," she says, after several long heartbeats. "You heard that, didn't you?"
Rhyanon nods, knowing it's not really a question. "You're gonna send me to the Gallows!" she yells. It turns into a broken, terrified cry. Her parents have managed to carefully avoid acknowledging that island's existence, but every Kirkwall child uses it as both threat and dare. She's trailed behind Damion and his friends as they snuck onto rooftops to get a better look at the old prison; with its twisted, haunted statues that feel dark and scary. The boys mimicked those ancient tortures and gladiatorial matches, laughing as they teased each other with horribly gruesome facial expressions as the waves crashed below them in the deepening twilight. It was better when there was actually something real to see: the templars dragging in a captured mage, sometimes a hanging. Glorious violence that kept them entertained for days while Damion teased Rhyanon mercilessly, whispering about demons and monsters.
"Rhyanon, I'm not," Mama whispers. She repeats the words over and over again, until she's certain her daughter is listening. "I love you. I'm not going to send you to the Gallows."
"You think I'm an abomination."
"No, I don't."
"Da does," Rhyanon retorts stubbornly.
Mama sighs. "I know," she finally says. "He's wrong." She kisses her daughter on the top of the head, and rubs her back in slow circles until Rhyanon relaxes enough to rest against her shoulder. "I promise, I will keep you safe, my darling. I promise."
Rhyanon nods sleepily. Her eyes drift closed.
Morning dawns, clear and bright, the kind of day that she would normally spend outdoors, running away from the servants and weaving through the narrow alleys between the stalls at the market, tromping through the stables without caring at all about getting her expensive clothes dirty. But today, she curls up in bed and sucks her thumb and doesn't move. She pretends to be asleep, and pretends to be sick. Actually, her stomach does hurt, so maybe it's not pretending. And nobody comes to see her, not even Abigail.
Eventually, just before midday, after several hours of lonely half-sleeping, Mama comes in. She holds Rhyanon, kisses her several times, helps her dress, combs and braids her hair. She doesn't speak, as if afraid to break the secretive quiet. Rhyanon doesn't squirm or protest or chatter either, which maybe more than anything proves how much is wrong. The room is flooded with their fragile silence.
Questions roll around in Rhyanon's head, but for the first time in her life, she is afraid to ask them. Instead, she rests her head on Mama's shoulder and lets herself be carried downstairs and outside. She tries to pretend she can't see the looks of shock and disgust and fear on the servants' faces, or hear their whispers.
The sunlight hurts her eyes after the dim shadows of inside. The shouts and footsteps of the Kirkwall streets seem far too loud. Mama sets her down, near the front gate of the estate. Da is waiting there, speaking softly to a group of three templars, with their armor and swords. Rhyanon watches them cautiously. She pulls on Mama's hand, trying to get her attention, but unsure of what she wants.
Mama kneels down, so she can look Rhyanon in the eye. She holds her daughter's hands in her own, and leans in close. Her words are meant for Rhyanon only. She reaches up and brushes a stray lock of Rhyanon's hair behind her ear. Rhyanon squirms, uncomfortable with the direct eye contact and Mama's firm insistence that she doesn't pull away. "Rhyanon, listen to me," she says softly. "These men are going to take you somewhere safe."
Rhyanon freezes. The betrayal squeezes tightly around her heart, until it hurts. "But you promised," she cries.
Mama hugs her tightly. "Baby, you can't stay here," she whispers. Her voice breaks slightly, and Rhyanon can feel her trembling. "Be a big girl, okay? In Ferelden, they'll teach you. They'll take care of you." As she speaks, tears begin to slide down her cheeks, but Rhyanon ignores them and shoves her way out of her mother's grasp.
"I hate you!" she yells.
Mama doesn't even get angry when Rhyanon crosses her arms over her chest and stamps her feet. She's too busy crying to care. One of the templars takes a few slow steps toward them, stopping just out of reach.
"Go with him," Mama says, and now there is a hint of command in her voice. She will not accept argument. Normally, Rhyanon recognizes this and concedes, even if she grumbles under her breath or inside her head while she does it. But most of the time, Mama tells her to sit like a lady, or eat her vegetables, or go to bed. This is different.
"I won't go!" she screams, flailing and yelling. Her fists pummel her mother's leg. "I won't and you can't make me!"
The templar grabs for her arm, but Rhyanon jerks it away. She runs away, but the grown-ups outnumber her, and at least one of the templars seems to have been expecting that reaction. He grabs her before she can dodge him, and holds her tightly. His fingers dig into her arms, and the pressure only grows stronger when she tries to wriggle out of his grasp. "Be still, little one," he says. His voice is gentle, but firm, slightly warped by the metal helmet he is wearing. Rhyanon leans her head back, trying to look up and see something of his face, but this is clearly an impossibility. She doesn't stop struggling, but her protests grow weaker and she squirms only every now and then. But the man still does not let go of her.
"I'm not a mage," she tells him. She doesn't whine or scream this time, she's just telling a fact. One of the other templars, who isn't wearing a helmet, scowls down at her.
"Hush, girl."
"I'm not!" she repeats, her voice growing higher in pitch. Why won't anybody listen to her? The templars ignore her protests. The one holding onto her relaxes his grip a tiny bit, pushing her toward his horse.
She stops a few feet shy of the big, snorting animal. The horse stamps its feet and lets out a strangled whinny. Rhyanon watches it hesitantly. This horse is big and angry, a war beast, not the docile animals she knows and plays with in the stables. And this horse doesn't like her.
The templar ignores her concern, and the horse's. He lifts her up onto the saddle with rough, purposeful movements and holds her tightly as much to prevent her escape as to keep her from falling. Rhyanon shifts and twists and tries to look back over her shoulder. She wants to yell to Mama, to apologize for saying "I hate you," to hear "I love you" back. Except she isn't sure she doesn't hate Mama for breaking her promise. And she isn't sure Mama loves her. Because if she did, she wouldn't lie to her and she wouldn't send her away. Her words get choked up in her throat.
"Stop that, wouldja?" the templar growls. Rhyanon stops moving. She stops trying to look behind her. Instead, she looks down at the cobblestones beneath the horse's steady walk. It doesn't take long to get to the harbor, especially with the crowds reliably clearing a path for them. There are curses and jeers and people shouting encouragement to the templars, until one of them, riding on another horse behind Rhyanon, calls for silence. The citizens of Kirkwall mostly listen, though there is restive murmuring and tension, like water about to boil, and the conversation starts up before their horses move barely a few steps. They carry the uncomfortable quiet with them, like a bubble.
It follows them onto a modest ship filled mostly with Marchers: hard, angry-looking sailors that Rhyanon flinches away from. "You'll keep her in hand," the captain of the ship orders. His eye flicks over Rhyanon as though he barely sees her, and locks onto the templar holding Rhyanon, who is apparently the one in charge.
"We will," the templar agrees. He yanks her arm, hard, as if to prove his point.
The captain grunts, and nods toward the hold where they'll spend most of their time, out of the way of the ship's crew. The templar shoves Rhyanon ahead of him, into the darkness. Down here there is no way of knowing when they leave the city's docks, except that she can feel it. The uneasy motion makes her stomach hurt. It's barely noticeable at first, but it gets worse as the ship picks up speed, moving out into the open sea and its rough waters. She curls her knees up close to her chest and squeezes her eyes shut, but she can still hear the loud, chaotic shouting of the people all around her, and a tangle of unpleasant smells chokes her. Her head spins. She scrambles to her hands and knees in time to vomit, over and over again. She shakes and cries as her stomach empties itself.
"Little bitch!" the templar snaps. He yanks her up, and she realizes that some of her mess has ended up splashing onto his legs, because he was sitting so close to her.
"Leave her alone," someone else orders. Rhyanon looks up, to see another templar. This one has reddish hair, and a stern expression. It's the first time she's seen him with his helmet off. "She's just a child. Can't help it if she's not born for the sea."
"Who asked you?" There is a moment of tension, with the man's fingers still digging into her arm. But then, just as suddenly, he shoves her away from him, hard. "Clean it up," he demands angrily.
"I can't."
"Don't sass me, girl."
Rhyanon frowns. "I'm not. I don't -"
Before she can say anything else, the maybe-nice templar finds some rags in his pack, and cleans it up himself. He takes her hand, and leads her up the narrow staircase to the deck. He drops the soiled cloth into the water. Rhyanon watches it splash. Up here, with the wind blowing cold against her exposed skin, Rhyanon shivers, but she feels a little better.
"Drink this," the templar orders. He hands her a waterskin. She takes a few cautious sips. The water splashes over her chin and onto her clothes. "Better?"
"No," she demands stubbornly. Her breathing is ragged, and she feels like she's about to start crying again. Her lower lip trembles. Fear and anger and embarrassment swirl around inside her. The templar sighs.
"It'll be weeks before we reach Ferelden, child. Don't make things harder for yourself."
"I didn't do anything," she insists. She wipes her dirty sleeve across her face.
Water splashes against the side of the ship. Rhyanon watches the waves rise and fall. The templars mostly ignore her, but they're always there, looming and angry. They force her to eat every few hours. She sleeps in fitful bursts. And home gets farther away with every passing hour. The templar hadn't been exaggerating about the length of the voyage. As the days drag on, long and monotonous, she learns how to deal with her seasickness, though it never goes away completely. She also quickly learns to heed her temporary ally's advice, and not make things harder for herself.
At home, she'd often done things she'd known her parents wouldn't like, but more often than not, sneaking around the estate or coming home covered in mud or getting lost in the market just made them laugh and shake their heads. She and Damion fought all the time, he tormented her with vicious teasing, but he protected her without thought whenever somebody else threatened her even slightly. And the servants mostly stayed out of her way. When she cornered them, nagging with incessant questions, they rarely answered except with a polite and useless "Yes, Miss Amell" that told her immediately that they weren't actually listening. She'd follow them sometimes, the ones that she knew, but they only got on with their work while she watched and never let her help even when she tried to. Sometimes she could get treats from the kitchen, the cook liked her. But they never tried to tell her what to do, and she knew, even if it never applied in practice, that they had to do what she said.
The templars don't care what her name is. They expect obedience, even the nicer one. The commands they give are simple: usually variations of "stay put" and "shut up." She isn't allowed to wander on the ship. The third day, she couldn't ignore the restless energy inside her anymore. She was bored. So she started walking, crawling and climbing between the beams and barrels of the hold. She wasn't looking for anything specific, just exploring. But the ship's crew slept in their hammocks not far away, and their loud, drunken voices scared her, so she returned to the templars quickly. The mean one was waiting for her, and she could smell the alcohol on his breath, proof that the sailors weren't the only ones drinking. He grabbed her arm tightly and twisted it behind her back, then shoved her, hard, into the darkened corner where she slept in brief spurts through the seemingly neverending voyage. "Thought I told you not to wander off, girl," he snarls.
"I didn't go anywhere," she spits back.
"Willful brat. You'll learn to mind."
"I heard our orders same as you did, Ser," a familiar voice says, with quiet force. "We're to deliver her to the Knight Commander at Kinloch Hold. Unharmed."
"Are you suggesting, recruit, that I don't follow orders?"
"I'm not suggesting anything."
"This... softness of yours isn't doing anyone any favors. Not her, and not you either." He spins around and glares at Rhyanon, tucked into the corner, half shielded by a large crate. "You'll do what your told or you'll regret it, hear?" She nods. By the time they arrive in Ferelden, she has stopped speaking entirely.
The days on land pass in the same repetitive haze as the time at sea. They ride on forested trails and crowded roads, waking before the sun and rarely stopping. Her legs hurt. Her stomach aches. She eats what the templars give her: tough, stringy meat and hard bread. It's usually cold, and it's hard to swallow. And it's never enough to keep her full. They make her work, setting up camp each night: hauling firewood and water from nearby streams. Her hands crack and bleed, then blister. She's still wearing the same dress from Kirkwall, now dirty and torn beyond recognition or saving. The Ferelden winters are cold, and she shivers through the long nights. The field blanket they give her isn't enough to keep her warm. Her head hurts constantly, and after a two days, her nose runs nonstop. Eventually, she sees a tower looming on the horizon.
"That'll be your home, girl." That's the third templar, not her maybe-friend, or the mean drunk one. This one rarely speaks to the others, except when asked a direct question by the leader of their patrol. But he watches over her far more closely then the others, always with a frown, quick to tell her to hurry and always finding some chore for her to do. No matter how quickly she does it, it's never enough.
Mean templar spits a wad of spittle onto the hard ground. "Nice and safe and far away," he sneers. "'Fore long no one'll remember the Amell brat. Scandal all locked up and hidden, and Daddy'll take charge o' the city with no one the wiser. Fuckin' politics. Draggin' my ass halfway 'cross the world. We shoulda just thrown you in the Gallows."
Rhyanon listens to the words but doesn't protest. She's too tired to, and too scared. She sticks her thumb in her mouth and pretends to be asleep.
"How far now?"
"Day's ride, maybe," the red-haired templar replies, after a pause. He doesn't help her anymore, but he doesn't hurt her either. She falls asleep in the saddle, held tight to his chest. He nudges her awake when the afternoon light is fading. Rhyanon groans. Riding is torture to her stiff legs and exhausted muscles, but the thought of setting up another camp is enough to make tears spring to her eyes. They don't fall - she doesn't let them. She slides listlessly out of the saddle and waits. She tries to stay quiet, but she can't stop herself from coughing. To her surprise, the templar picks her up, carrying her in his arms like her father used to. That's when she looks around enough to realize that the forested trails have emptied into a clearing, in which has sprung up a small village. And just beyond that, sunlight sparkles off still water. A lake stretches out beyond the shallow sloping of the land. She can't see where the water ends. Maybe it doesn't.
And the tall tower is no longer far away. It reaches up to heaven. It swallows the sky.
The templar holds her even when they've sat down in a rickety ferry. It cuts its way across the water with a smooth ease that feels unsettling to Rhyanon after weeks on the back of a horse, or stuck in the hold of a ship tossed by rough waves. The water is close enough to touch, and a cold, stormy gray. It laps and splashes over the side of the rowboat to soak her feet periodically. After perhaps half an hour, the ferryman grunts and the boat slams against the shore. There is no dock on this side, only a little spit of sandy beach surrounded by rocks.
The templar doesn't carry her this time. She is forced to scramble up steep, water-slick steps made for people much larger than she is. She does it, pulling herself forward one step at a time, because she's too stubborn not to. And she doesn't want the other templars to get mad at her.
She hesitates just before the huge gate, opened and apparently waiting for them. A few more templars stand just on the other side of the threshold. Rhyanon looks around, trying to get an impression of this place. But all she feels is cold, and it doesn't go away even once they're inside, away from the biting winds. The gate slams behind them with a sudden, echoing crash. Mean-templar grabs hold of her shoulder again. A month ago, she would've kicked him, but she's already starting to forget what that Rhyanon was like.
"So this is the child from Kirkwall, then?" says one of the Ferelden templars, and his words sound strange to her. She glances up, and sees he's wearing armor she recognizes as Knight Commander's. She squirms, and looks at the floor.
"Safe and sound. Jus' like we promised."
An ironic smile flickers across the Knight Commander's face. "Indeed. No doubt the Maker will reward you well for your attention to your duty, Ser." The Kirkwall templar frowns, as if trying to decide whether or not he's being forward, but eventually, he nods. "You are, of course, welcome to stay the night here before beginning your trek home."
"We're grateful for that, Ser," nice-templar says. "Truly." The Knight Commander nods again, and the Kirkwall templars quickly disappear, leaving her to her fate.
The Ferelden Knight Commander actually kneels in front of her, and gently lifts her chin so that he can study her face. Rhyanon flinches away, but the man neither chastises her nor forces the issue. "I know you must be frightened," he says gently. "So far from home. But you are safe here, I promise. You will not be harmed."
Rhyanon lets herself believe it, until she feels a sharp pain lighting up her arm. She glances down to see her blood rapidly filling a glass vial the templar holds in his hand. The man closes the vial with a carefully fitted stopper and presses a strip of cloth to the shallow gash across her flesh. "I do apologize for that," he tells her. Rhyanon shrugs. She doesn't believe him anymore.
"Come, child," another man says. This one is wearing dark robes, and he has a thick beard. "Are you hungry?" She doesn't answer, but this mage doesn't just ignore her silence the way the templars did. "Speak," he tells her gently. She nods, slowly. And the mage rewards her with a genuine smile. "Very well. Let us see what we can find to eat. And then we will get you cleaned up, and tucked into a warm bed. I am First Enchanter Irving. You are my responsibility now. You needn't fear the templars. They will not hurt you here."
The old man - First Enchanter Irving - loads her plate with heaps of vegetables and several rolls, along with a very small bit of meat. She eats it hungrily, but slowly, one small bite at a time. The older mage raises an eyebrow. Rhyanon can feel him watching her; his attention is like a focused buzz at the back of her brain. She stops, with fork halfway to her mouth. Her eyes flicker toward his, and she sets the fork down, suddenly uncomfortable. The old man sighs. "Eat," he coaxes gently. Rhyanon takes a few more cautious bites, but her stomach still hurts. After several moments of not touching her plate, the First Enchanter removes it. Rhyanon sticks her thumb in her mouth, and watches him.
"What's your name, child?" he asks softly. She immediately takes her thumb out of her mouth and puts her hand in her lap.
"Rhyanon," she whispers. "Rhyanon Amell."
"Amell, yes... I had heard." Heard what? Rhyanon thinks, but he doesn't elaborate and she doesn't ask. "How old are you?"
"Six," she tells him, immediately, but she thinks about the many long days mixed together in her memory. "Or seven, maybe. I think it was my birthday."
The smile he gives her now is sad, and he rests his fingers between his eyes for a moment the way her father used to. "I am sorry," he mumbles, so quietly she can barely hear the words. She isn't even sure he's talking to her.
But the moment doesn't last. The First Enchanter hastily - and loudly - rinses off the plate she used in a huge bucket of lukewarm water waiting in the kitchen. He then begins to walk, back the way they came. He doesn't tell her to follow, but she does. She almost has to run to keep up with his grown-up steps. He leads her through halls that are dark and winding. They curve around and upward, spiraling tightly toward the top of the tower. Rhyanon quickly loses track of the number of closed doors they pass. She keeps her eyes open, searching and studying, trying to figure out what all these rooms are for.
Eventually, the First Enchanter stops, outside a small room with a bed in it, and a bookshelf, and not much else. "Wynne, could you take this one and get her cleaned up? And settled in the the apprentice dorms?"
"My name's Rhyanon," she insists. The woman the First Enchanter was talking to smiles, and leans down.
"Mine's Wynne," she says.
"Are you a mage?"
"I am. You are, too."
Rhyanon shakes her head emphatically. "No, I'm not!" she insists. Wynne picks her up, and brushes a lock of her dirty, tangled hair behind her ear. Rhyanon freezes. The casual ease of the action reminds her so much of her mother that she begins to cry, with great hiccuping sobs that she has no hope of controlling.
"Oh, my dear," Wynne whispers. She coos meaningless words of encouragement and rubs her hands in slow circles on the child's back. Wynne carries her to a bathroom, filled with smooth white tubs. Rhyanon watches in fascination as the woman casually manipulates ice and fire to fill the bath. A familiar calling song and twisted weaves of energy wrap themselves around Rhyanon. They make her feel warmer. Less alone. Wynne helps her to pull off her tattered and dirty dress, then deposits her into the tub of water. "There, you see," she says softly, as she washes Rhyanon's hair. "You do belong here."
The water in the bathtub grows dark with dirt, and Rhyanon hisses in protest as the soap stings the cuts covering her hands - and the long, straight-line gash on her arm where the Knight Commander had sliced her skin with his knife. Wynne traces that line gently and shakes her head.
"What'd he do that for?" Rhyanon asks. Wynne just smiles, although it's the kind of sad, fake "everything's going to be alright" smile grownups use when it isn't.
"It didn't hurt too badly, did it?" she asks.
Rhyanon shakes her head, although Wynne probably doesn't see it. The older mage is too busy concentrating. Rhyanon can feel the same stirring of energy gathering itself. The woman's fingers brush over her skin, trailing a cool blue light. The cut is shallow and takes only a few seconds to close. When Wynne removes her touch, there is no sign the wound was ever there at all. Rhyanon stares at her smooth, unmarked arm in wonder.
Wynne helps her dress as the water drains from the tub. The robes are worn and too large for her. The sleeves hang down for a couple of inches past her fingers, and she nearly trips over the bottom with every step. But they are warm and comfortable. After her Kirkwall dress, these clothes feel almost like a blanket wrapped around her. The heavy, humid air of the bathroom makes her eyelids droop. Wynne smiles reassuringly, and takes her hand. "Come on. Let's find you a bed."
The room Wynne leads her to is large and crowded with bunks, though only a few of them are occupied, with older children flipping through books or talking in hushed voices. Those voices grow suddenly quiet when Wynne enters the room. The Senior Enchanter smiles. "I'm not here to get anyone in trouble," she assures them.
"It's a new kid," one boy announces emotionlessly. Rhyanon clings to Wynne as the other apprentices glance her way, but most of them quickly return to their own concerns. No one speaks to her. She sticks her thumb into her mouth and crawls into the bed Wynne indicates, a lower bunk shoved into a corner near the door. When she looks up, the older woman is gone.
For alyssacousland, who got lucky in an impromptu conversation last night and reminded me that I like this story too much, it's too important, for me to leave it in the desktop graveyard. And for Suilven, who needs a pick-me-up. I promised her that anything I wrote today would be in her honor, and I think (or hope, anyway), that these characters are nearly as close to her as they are to me.