Chapter One: The Dragon's Eye
The sons of dreams outlive the sons of seed.
from "The Persian Boy", by Mary Renault
So this is what it is to fall from grace.
The Old God had once understood The Source. It had held it within itself, and even when debased and poisoned by taint had possessed a pale imitation of that state of grace. The Archdemon, after all, had been a being of one mind and many eyes, seeing all at once, processing it all, experiencing the many voices of the darkspawn. The shared consciousness had been a concert, an ebb and flow like water, a lull and thunder rising and falling as the droplets of taint sought to colonize the world.
Until now. The Old God who had once directed symphonies was blind. And deaf. For a brief, transient moment, RilianUrthemielTheArchitect had existed as a trinity. Now only Rilian remained.
There was a bright place and many voices then I fell into darkness it was an anti-birth I came out to find I was dead.
I think Oghren was there. He was with me he was with me he was
I remember.
Grey stone. The flare of torches. Dwarven shouts. Orlesian voices. Pounding feet. Marching. My hands hurt the most. Burned like Rylock's. Sarela didn't say much. Sigrun said a lot. No trees. No sunlight. Just old stone. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.
For a long time there was very little organized consciousness. Occasionally perception crystallized in a face she knew or words she understood, but for an immeasurable time there was only the loss of the Song, the ache of yearning and the listening for something that was like the sea's echo in a deep shell. But gradually - without any sense of how long she'd been gone - Rilian arrived at the sense of who and what she was. It was as if she had been coerced into identifying a corpse.
I had to ask what the month was, and the day. Ask the Orlesian Senior Mage Warden who only came up to my chin. The woman was afraid of me. Her dark eyes were watching, watching, watching.
All you need to become terrifying to everyone is not to have died when you should have.
The blue emptiness of sky was vast, terrifying. The part of her that had been born into a taint-stinking, filth-drowning brood cringed away from it. The other parts: the dragon that had once soared across stars and darkness - the Alienage Elf who had dreamed of doing so - were liberated. But all the same Rilian sought solitude and darkness as soon as they arrived at Redcliffe. She asked Sandal to create a worktable and tools to her specifications and set up her laboratory in what had been the Arlessa's dungeon. A single cell. No windows. Claustrophobia hardly mattered, since now she contained infinite space. She could assimilate anything. The prison and its echoes of capture was only a little more fear. Fear wasn't much, now.
Rilian posted guards to keep intruders away, but they came anyway. Sigrun sank down upon the cold stone, knees drawn up to her chest and muscular arms wrapped around them.
"It's not as bad down here as everyone says," the little Duster remarked, "It only smells a little worse than Dust Town. But you haven't slept for days. And Alistair keeps trying to see you. Have a drop of Oghren's finest - have a wash - and put him out of his misery."
Rilian stood - an abrupt, jerky movement - and cocked her head. Images of Alistair were ephemeral flickers above a vast emptiness. Her memory of him was compressed now. It inhabited a much smaller version of herself: a child version. Around the child version of herself were the other memories, the other voices. She was afraid that speaking to Alistair would send the child out into these unknown spaces - afraid the mote known as Rilian would not find her way back. But she had to see him. There were things he should know.
She refused to leave her vials of blood and the creation she had designed from memory - the Architect's memory. She met Alistair in the stone corridor outside the cell.
"Rilian," he breathed softly.
She stood still, out of time. Six months ago they had sat together upon the highest peak of Temple Mountain and he had given her a rose. They had faced demons and Broodmothers and irate nobles together and stood shoulder to shoulder. They had shared laughter and tears and loss. She had sat with her head resting on his shoulder and known him to be her future: her husband, no matter what his family - or hers - had to say about it.
For a long time, they stood opposite each other without speaking.
"You look different," she said at last. It was true. He had been a boy when she had betrayed him at the Landsmeet. Now he was a man. A Warden. But he was exhausted. His broad, blunt hands, half-reaching towards her, shook. His gold-flecked hazel eyes were wide and shocked. They never left hers.
"You know everything," he said.
"Yes. Morrigan told me everything." Words sprang from her mouth independent of her volition. They had momentarily incandescent meaning, then were gone. She wondered if she would meet them out there in the new spaces around the old life. "Why did you do it, Alistair?"
"I don't know. She…she…"
"Oh not that, for the Maker's sake! You did that because you're stupid. Because you were angry with me and let the witch fry your brains. I'm not interested in why you…"
But it wasn't that easy. She had trusted him. Loved him. He had betrayed her. It astonished her - jumped out at her suddenly, even though she had thought she had done with it very soon after Morrigan had told her.
"I mean: how could you turn your back on everything we fought for? You must have known any child that carried Urthemiel's spirit could be tainted again. Another Blight in less than twenty years. Why did you do it?"
Nothing. Just the horror of his stillness. His mouth working futilely, hands clenched. "I was afraid," he said, "Afraid of losing you." A whisper. Rilian watched him cry, as she had watched her father cry. Different. Cyrion had been a man crying, every tear grudged. Alistair's tears were a physical mechanism to which he remained oblivious. It was surprising to her, the way his eyes kept releasing tears, yet him unaware and completely still. "I told the Wardens of Montsimmard - Riordan and Guillaume Caron - everything. There's a representative from Weisshaupt here too - the Senior Mage Warden. They wanted to know how you survived and I told them you'd done everything you should have done - that the guilt was mine."
Rilian laughed dryly. She heard the sounds come out of her mouth and felt exhausted. Alien noises. The worn currency she was forced to use instead of the brilliant, incandescent Song.
"You told them the wrong story. Morrigan never came with me to the Deep Roads. I sent her away as soon as she told me the truth. You're going to be the father of Empress Celene's heir."
The words hit him like knives. Rilian saw him flinch. He seemed to shrink, visibly, as they spoke. His arms hung dead at his sides; his palms turned towards her. She saw the dull incomprehension of a trapped animal staring through the eyes of a man.
"I…I don't understand. How…"
"I meant to die - I leapt down upon the dragon's back to take the final blow - and he stopped me."
"Who stopped you?"
"The Architect. A descendant of Wardens. He was everything he could and should have been. He made the Ultimate Sacrifice, not me. And I was given a choice - between dying and remembering things the way they were. Or living and having everything different. I'm different."
Staring down at the silver snail-trails that gilded the stone, she realized she was in pain. A great empty pain she had never prepared for over all the preceding weeks.
He was seeing her for the first time. The new face - the new mind behind it. Very slowly, he lifted his left hand - the hand scarred by her blow at the Landsmeet. He reached for her stiff, dead fingers. Whispered: "Rilian. Rilian."
"The Rilian you knew was a Warden. Physically, I'm not."
"It doesn't matter. It's still you."
"Yes. I'm going to do what four hundred years of Wardens have failed to do. I'm going to cure the taint. You're the Warden-Commander of Ferelden, now."
It solidified the silence between them. It solidified and expanded it until Rilian realized she had walked away from him, backwards, towards her cell.
The Old God saw it all. The dragon within me floated free, looked down upon the man and woman. Then, while the echo of Urthemiel hovered, unseen by mortals, something disturbing happened.
The god who had become a woman looked into the eyes of the woman who had become a god. The god reeled at the raw emotion in the woman, the desolation and abandonment. The god felt exposed, violated.
With dire determination, the god resumed its rightful primacy. The last mote of the weak, feeling woman's thinking must cease.
I meant what I said to Alistair. I knew I was close to a cure when I used my blood to delay infection in Loghain and Rylock. Now that the Architect's brooch has accelerated my Calling until the Archdemon's death burned it away, who knows what my blood can do?
It's time to go to work.
Jowan's face was white, pinched, when Rilian brought him to her laboratory. His hands shook like pale flying creatures, distorted by erratic tremors. His dark eyes were haunted.
Ser Otto took Rilian aside.
"Rilian, you can't ask him to do this," the Templar Warden said quietly, "Work within the same cell where the Arlessa had him tortured - and with blood. That's like asking a lyrium addict to work with lyrium but touch none of it."
I suppose you should know. Rilian bit down on the waspish words, eating them. For no-one else would she have bothered.
"Can no-one see how important this work is! Doesn't anyone understand? If we can find a cure for taint we can end the Blights. I'd say that's worth the price of one man's soul."
"Nothing is worth that price…" Ser Otto began - in the same moment that Jowan said, wearily:
"I guess you're right." The dark, darting eyes were wistful. "Still, it's my soul - and I'd grown almost fond of it."
"I know I'm right." Rilian held out a clean syringe and vial. "I want you to take a sample of my blood."
Rylock comes often, blatantly official. Her hawk eyes sweep over everything - watching for the slightest trace of Blood Magic. I know if she finds it she'll run me through without hesitation. I wonder why I do not mind.
Perhaps because Rylock and Loghain are the only other people I know who have sacrificed soul, sanctity and sanity to protect what needs protecting. Perhaps because Rilian and Rylock have been friends ever since Rylock came from Kirkwall on the trail of a cabal of Tevinter slavers. That's how we met. Rilian was fifteen then - a Docker who had poked her nose where she shouldn't have and followed a shipment of phylacteries to an abandoned warehouse. She told Ser Otto - he told Rylock - and Rylock led him and Ser Tavish in the assault on the coven. Rylock's burns and Ser Otto's blindness bought the Alienage a peace we had for five years…until Loghain let the slavers back in - through the front door this time.
Even Ser Otto has removed his Templar regalia in favour of plain tunic and trousers - but not Rylock. Never mind that full plate is not the kindest thing on bones knit together by Wynne's magic and her own willpower. The Hurlock General's Stonefist has left her with a limp, a useless right hand, and pain that chastens her day and night. I know it: the marks are stamped on her, though she never says a word. On bad days she sits, chalk-faced, lips pressed tightly together as if to bite back a cry. On good days I detect nothing beyond her hand pressed to her ribs when she thinks I'm not looking.
Next time I send to Sandal for supplies I'm going to do something about that.
Rylock doesn't like small, dark cells any more than Jowan does. Rilian once asked Wynne what she thought Aeonar had been like for her and she answered it was said to be - unpleasant. The small pause told more than the word. And Rylock and Jowan fear each other the way a fox fears a net - the way a man fears plague. Rylock fears the Blood Magic that once raped her of body and mind. Jowan fears the Rite of Tranquility that promises the same. They watch each other like cats for any sign of weakness. Both would rather die than show any. Rylock's courage doesn't surprise me. Jowan's does. Since Ser Otto adopted him as a younger brother he's changed. He's finally stopped running. It's a dark, grim, galling test of endurance. And they endure. Because of me. Because of what I must do.
Jowan's hands are steady as he guides the needle into my arm - draws the blood into a syringe - deposits it into a vial and seals it. His face holds a withdrawn expression, showing neither yearning nor fear.
"Now," I say to the three of them. "I have something to show you. Rylock: I need Jowan to cast a spell. No Blood Magic - just a light spell."
I carefully deposit a small amount of my blood onto a glass slide.
"Jowan - I need you to illuminate the sample."
Jowan's long, elegant fingers move in a graceful dance. Light blooms from them like a flower. Then it dances in the air behind him as if enjoying the game.
"I think it's afraid of the dark," Jowan says apologetically.
Ser Otto laughs - earning him identical disapproving looks from me and Rylock. Jowan shrugs whimsically and directs the light where I want it to go. With the sample lit, I talk them through the strange contraption on my desk.
"I call this…I mean - The Architect called this - a microscope. He learned the principle from First Enchanter Remille."
Rylock scowls. "Not the best recommendation. Are you sure this isn't Blood Magic, Rilian?"
"The study of blood is no more Blood Magic than the study of bones. Or plants. It's medicine, nothing more." I run my hand caressingly over the glittering, tubular stem, the arcs and curves, the space where the slide fits like a glove and the glass eye of the lens. Staring into it is like looking through the eye of an insect - or a dragon. My blood is magnified into droplets that resemble the flesh-bags who once worshipped me. I remember the rites…the chant…the blood taken and the power given in return…
IamRilianIamRilianIamRilian
… "Here, look," I tell Rylock. Rylock pales and I smother a smile. Raw courage is her life's blood - yet when confronted by this alien device she reacts exactly like the gawky child whom Mother Leanna used to exercise her whip hand. She rises slowly, tight-lipped. Stepping forward, she extends a slow, determined hand. The flesh around her mouth whitens. Sweat beads on her lip. But she stares downward, through the lens. Then straightens like a soldier.
"And now - for my next trick…" I reach for another vial upon the makeshift shelves and wave it about with a flourish. I remember Rilian used to do the same when performing. Once, she put on a play in the Alienage based on the story of Andraste and Shartan's rebellion. There was a bit where she stood upon a wooden contraption meant to be a horse, daring the Tevinter magisters to cross to the other side of the river Minanter: "If you want him…come and have a go if you think you're hard enough!"
Concentrate asshole.
The new vial holds taint, black and poisonous. I place one drop beside my own red blood and wait to see what happens.
"See: no-one's yet made a microscope powerful enough to show the individual disease creatures. What we watch for is their effect - on healthy tissue. Or…the effect of healthy tissue on taint. Look here: this is the holiest thing you'll ever see."
Rylock obeys - and gasps as she watches my own blood not only resist the taint - but assimilate it.
"You've found the cure!"
I stare at her - and realize for the first time that Rylock is far more intelligent than I've given her credit for. Wynne likes to irritate Rylock by telling her that mages know everything and are allowed to do nothing, while Templars do everything and are allowed to know nothing. But in Rylock's case the spirit crushed beneath the doctrine still manages to find expression: as courage, as dead-pan sarcasm, as the clear, cold arguments that come from conviction not by rote.
"It's not that simple," I tell them. "Yes, my blood can resist taint - but I don't know what would happen if I gave it to someone untainted. For all I know, I could be equally infectious. It may be that this isn't a cure - but a means to destroy darkspawn. And if it does - what would its effects be on a Warden? One thing I do know…"
Pain rises to engulf me, but I was able to see it coming. It's as if I stood on a shore with my back to the sea but felt it rising up behind me, blotting out the pale flicker of magical light. Rylock's presence is a help, if only because the threat and promise of that sword of mercy forces me to be at least partly aware of her, like an ungainly grandfather clock that will not be ignored.
"…is that if The Architect and First Enchanter Remille had had their way and spread this "cure" to the masses it would have been the end of us. I'm sterile. If the chances of a woman Warden - a woman whose body is constantly fighting darkspawn infection - bearing a child are small, the chances of bearing one after the infection has been accelerated and run its course are zero."
I won't look at Ser Otto. I can't bear his sympathy. It's hard to look at Rylock, too: this woman who never wanted what I yearn for and can't have.
"The question is: what happens to the people I cure using my blood?"
"Rilian," Ser Otto says quietly, "If you need to test this on a Warden, I am glad to volunteer."
"No! Dammit, who do you think I am: Avernus? Though if he were still alive…I wouldn't have minded experimenting on him…" I see Rylock's expression and quickly add, "Kidding!"
Rylock is oddly silent - thoughtful. And I'm amazed when Ser Otto chooses that moment to say: "Jowan - let's see if Cyrion has any more of that Elven tea." Amazed that a blind man can see so much.
When they've gone Rylock says: "Loghain and I are, of course, the only two who've been infected by Blight sickness - and had its onset delayed by Warden blood. And I do not trust Loghain with this kind of research."
Her eyes are large, dark and steady: the eyes of a night hunter, circled by blue shadows of exhaustion. I meet the glittering darkness - the light behind them - and nod. I trusted Loghain with my life and my campaign - but I would not trust him here. Not after he let those filthy Tevinter slavers create a magical Elf-only plague.
"But if I let you do this, you must destroy the sample in front of me, before the Blood Mage gets back."
"Done."
Rylock fumbles at removing her right gauntlet, the air around her trembling with her impatience. I know better than to offer my help. Her sinewy, hard-muscled forearm is scarred, like mine, and her broken fingers look brittle as sticks. She glares at them as though they have personally offended her. I take a fresh syringe from the pack I found in Flemeth's hut and attach it to a needle. Rylock raises an eyebrow as I slap at the inside of her elbow to make the vein stand up.
"You seem…worryingly familiar with this procedure."
"Of course I am," I say scornfully, "I've tested hundreds in my experiments. I worked on all the Wardens I took from Ostagar…in the darkness beneath Ishal. I remember the chamber where I worked on Duncan. Shall I tell you how many tubes were attached to his body? Shall I recount the way his mouth moved - a gaping, shapeless hole - or the way he screamed when I turned his flesh to something not even an abomination could imagine? Shall I describe everything I did to him…"
Without meaning to, I rise. My hands make fierce scraping movements, tearing at the air in front of her like hungry claws. "I told him what I was doing was necessary…necessary…ah, Maker!" My voice scales upward in pitch, like the Litany with which I held Urthemiel, like the trio of voices that marked his ascension. It rises to a scream. "Oh Maker, Maker, help me, I remember everything I did to him!"
Somehow, I'm on the stone floor, my hands covering my face, with Rylock kneeling beside me. She pulls my hands away and forces me to look at her. There's a look on her face I can't begin to describe - but it isn't fear. Or blame.
"Sharing The Architect's memories does not make you guilty of his crimes. They are only memories. They cannot touch your choices, which are your own, or your soul, which belongs to the Maker. You are Rilian, not The Architect…and not - despite what your vanity may tell you - the Old God."
From my throat come sounds like a little girl locked in the dark. "How do you know that? How do you know - when I don't?"
Rylock looks back into an immeasurable distance. The picked-over quality of her words suggest memories too harsh to be shared easily. "Because it was the same for me when Remille's Blood Mage made me torture Ser Guy and then myself. I was the both of us. I felt my own pain - and at the same time I experienced his pleasure. They told me that six months in Aeonar was enough to guarantee that I was free from his influence. But I was still afraid when I returned to active duty that he could continue to act on me. Or worse - to act on the world through me. I soon realized my choices were my own. My mistakes also. What we remember of these other minds are just shadows - echoes. We are not clay in their hands - they are steel in our own. By our own choice, we can use them for good, not evil."
"And you did," I say, wiping away tears and snot with the back of my dirty hand. "Without you, I'd be a slave to a demon wearing Nelaros' face - and half my family would be slaves to Tevinter."
Rylock smiles - but there's a strange, abstracted look in her eyes. "Thank you, Rilian. I shall remember that. I like to think that I have saved more lives than I have ended. We are taught, in the Order, to think in terms of numbers. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. I wonder, though, whether the Maker would count a murdered fourteen year old boy as weighing less than the lives I saved."
I've heard this story from Wynne. I can see it very clearly. Rylock after the Blood Mage - after Aeonar - after Remille's uprising. Aneirin hitting her with a Mind Blast, to get away.
Rylock glances down at her right hand in distaste, as if it has betrayed her. Her words are distant, remote. "It was a strange thing. Watching myself run him through was like watching my blade turned on Ser Guy. Except that what controlled it was not the will of another, but my own fear. Knight Commander Greagoir was, rightly, furious. He had ordered me to bring the boy back with minimum force. He asked me what would happen the next time a mage child tossed a spell at me as a prank. He told me that what had happened had made me unfit for the Tower. I saw that he was right. That is why I volunteered for Kirkwall. There's something strange about that place. We call it "The Hot Zone" because the sheer number of demons and abominations suggest it's being magically poisoned somehow. I asked Knight Commander Guylian for all the most dangerous assignments - and never to be posted to the Gallows. Both he and Knight Commander Meredith were happy with that arrangement."
"You wouldn't have hurt the mage children. Just the fact that you were worried about it proves you would have been careful."
"Perhaps - but I could hardly use them as guinea-pigs to test that theory."
"Twenty years on the front lines. Couldn't they have posted you to guard relics, or something?"
"That's not something a mage-hunter is normally asked to do."
I stare blankly for a moment - and then I get it. I always imagined mage-hunters would be accorded the most respect within the Chantry. In a way, they are - but they're like Wardens. Or army Generals. Hangmen, undertakers, Death's Hatchetmen. Brought out when needed - but never in polite company.
Suddenly, I snort with amusement. Rylock eyes me with a sour expression, waiting for me to share the joke.
"Good luck leading the mages to the Temple of the Ashes."
Rylock sighs in resignation. "Believe me, I told Knight Commander Greagoir exactly what I thought of his decision. The trouble with arguing with a dying man is that he invariably has the last word."
I stare - my eyes open wide - and then I burst into laughter. I laugh and laugh - can't stop - holding my sides. After Sten's death, I thought nobody would be able to match the wonderful aridity of his humour. Rylock does - and I know this is the sense of humour I'll have to cultivate if I'm ever to hear myself laugh again. And Rylock's brand of honesty is where I must begin if I'm going to stay sane. In my current state, she's as good as it gets.
Rylock smiles, too. Then she holds out her forearm for the needle. Her plain, sombre face is remarkably peaceful. I'm not sure I could be that steady when being treated by someone who's just broken down and confessed to having committed medical atrocities. I vow to be worthy of her trust.
I test Rylock's untreated blood…and confirm what we both suspected. That the Warden blood mixed with lyrium I gave her and Loghain wasn't a cure at all - just a delay of the inevitable. Without further treatment, Rylock and Loghain would both have succumbed to Blight sickness within two years. I seem to remember the former Queen of Ferelden dying in similar fashion.
Then I inject Rylock with my blood. I test her blood again - but it's too soon to tell.
"Don't worry. If this doesn't cure you - and Loghain - I'll put you both through the Joining. Alistair's a Templar-Warden. I see no reason you can't be a Warden-Templar. If it does - well, I'd like to test your fertility, too. It may be my best chance to gauge…"
Rylock gives me an extremely odd look. "Rilian: I am forty years old, and have taken lyrium for over half my life."
"Oh. I…see." This is a shame. When using my blood to cure other women soldiers, I'll have to keep tabs on them over the next five years or so - see if any of them become pregnant. I can't spread a cure on a mass scale until I know what the long-term effects might be.
Which also begs the question: how, exactly, am I going to spread a cure based on my blood on a mass scale? I'd give every last drop - but that would kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. I stare at Rylock, wondering how best to frame my thoughts.
"You were there when Remille tried to take control of Kinloch Hold. So was Loghain. So was Wynne. I know - from you three, and from The Architect's memories - that he had created magical brooches that could accelerate a Warden's Calling. When the infection is accelerated, and then stopped, you get someone immune, like me. But Remille didn't intend to create brooches for every person in Thedas. He intended to make the taint airborne. I have wondered, since, how he intended to do this. If magic could do such a thing, then why haven't other maleficarum tried it?"
Rylock's face is hawk-sharp. She leans forward. This is her Calling, her arena. "Perhaps there will be others. This is something we Templars must watch for."
"There was one other time. Only one - and twenty years later. The Tevinter Elf-only plague unleashed in the Alienage. Except I know that plague wasn't created by magic. I know it because every member of my extended family who'd once had marshfever didn't catch it."
"I don't understand."
"It wasn't created my magic. It was created by science. The same science I'm attempting here. I think the Magister responsible altered what was originally marshfever and set it loose. I think Remille had planned to do something similar with taint: cross it with a perfectly ordinary sickness that spreads through miasma. Now - we know that every one of Remille's associates died when Loghain took back the Tower. Except one. The one who tortured you and got away."
Rylock's face is ashen, but her voice is very calm. "His name was Aran Danarian. I wondered at the time why he was headed north-east when we caught up to him."
"If I'm to spread a cure, I must learn his technique. But more important than curing taint is to make sure he doesn't survive to repeat his experiments. You told me the Tevinter slave trade reaches all the way from Denerim to Kirkwall to Minrathous. Tell me everything you know. Help me to get him."
Rylock shoots to her feet, real fear in her eyes. "Not you - you'll have no defense against that filth! Give me time to find a replacement Knight Commander, and I'll go."
I strut. Preen. "You're forgetting that I am a master of the Litany. I'm bard-trained - and now that I have Urthemiel's Song to add to my repertoire, I can paralyze whole hordes of demons…stop possession in its tracks. No Magister's going to make a Blood Puppet out of me. An ability a Templar would give their right arm for."
Rylock's face goes carefully still. Involuntarily, she glances down at the right arm that tortured and killed her best friend. I blanch, feeling the blood drain from my face, and hang my head to hide the sudden rush of burning tears. "You were wrong about me," I wail, "I'm not myself. I must be Urthemiel, or The Architect. Rilian was never that grossly insensitive."
"I hate to interrupt your self-flagellation," Rylock says briskly, "But I'm afraid you always were. After five years, I am well used to it, so there is no new cause for concern."
I dare to look up. The dark eyes are warmed by a faint gleam of amusement. Impulsively, I squeeze her hand. "You're a wonderful Templar, Rylock. And a good friend."
Only someone who knows her as well as I do could discern in that seemingly unmoved face the slightest tinge of shy appreciation.
Together we tidy the remains of my experiment, and I destroy the samples of her blood just as Jowan and Ser Otto get back. They've brought tea, and pork scratchings, and my mind is thrown back to the very first day I met Rylock. I was visiting Ser Otto in the tiny Docks flat where he was recovering from his burns. Rylock had come to visit him too: the only Templar who read him reports and shared news as though he were still on active duty. I remember complimenting her on being so flat-chested she didn't need to alter the fit of her man's armour. I remember telling Ser Otto about my first day as a Docker and describing it as a "trial by fire". Sadly, Rylock is right about me. I can't blame my lack of tact on Urthemiel, or The Architect. I come by it honestly.
It feels almost exactly the same as we sit and eat together - except that Jowan is here, too. The mage-hunter and the Blood Mage are sipping Elven tea together. It's either the silliest beginning of a medical breakthrough in history - or the best.
Midwinter snow had turned Castle Redcliffe to an ice sculpture. Loghain rode through the front gates, and a gangly squire rushed to see to his horse. The General sighed, the gust of breath swirling in the cold like mist. After eight weeks chasing the remnants of the horde through the Wilds, his body felt like molten metal poured into an iron exoskeleton. Loghain and his men, Teyrn Fergus and his Chasind, and Alistair and the Orlesian Wardens had pushed the darkspawn back to the original Blightwound, and used Dworkin's Gaatlok to seal the breach. The Dwarven army had successfully defended Orzammar. Loghain grunted, thinking to himself that he'd enjoyed the Orlesians' company about as much as he'd expected. He'd made a point of wearing General Thiebaut Caron's armour in front of his nephew, Guillaume - the skin of a leopard. Riordan's second-in-command had been irritatingly unconcerned. He'd remarked only that he'd no more want the armour back than Loghain would have wanted King Cailan's armour back after the Hurlock General had worn it. Guillaume's own griffon armour was - of course - grandiose. But for all that the Orlesian was a supremely competent fighter.
The chevaliers had not attempted to join the Orlesian Wardens. The Wardens had come through the Deep Roads, all the way from the Dales to Orzammar. For the chevaliers to attempt to cross Gherlen's Pass at this time of year would have been suicide.
Unfortunately, the same could not be said for the Orlesian fleet sitting off Denerim coast. Twenty ships - carrying around eight hundred men. They had been passive since their arrival. But that could mean almost anything; he needed to know what it did mean. Anora had sent a message he'd only gotten last week, explaining she was "entertaining" the Empress' representative, Lady Marjolaine Reveur, along with the Orlesian Grand Cleric Jocasta and Knight Divine Gerard Caron.
Loghain had recalled all Ferelden's forces and would lead them to the capital immediately. He had stopped at Redcliffe for one reason only - and that was to see Rilian. He had a number of reasons.
One was that the presence of Bann Sighard, the Cousland brothers, the Carons and the Chantry at the Landsmeet meant his life was forfeit. The murder of the chevaliers at the Pass last spring - his involvement with Uldred and Tevinter slavers - the rape and torture of Sighard's son by Arl Howe - the destruction of Castle Cousland…all debts being called in by the universal treasury of death. And if his death meant the Bannorn could unite against the invaders he would pay it gladly.
The desire to say goodbye might have been enough to make him visit Rilian: they were friends, after all - to the extent that Loghain could be said to have friends. As it happened, however, he had two additional reasons for wanting to see her. First, he had thought long and searchingly - not his favourite form of exertion - about the implications his death posed for Ferelden…and he didn't like any of his conclusions. Second, he had heard from no less than eight reliable witnesses that early one evening last week, Rilian had been persuaded to leave the Arlessa's dungeon to visit her father. She had returned to the cell to find someone rifling through her research.
The Senior Mage Warden of Weisshaupt.
Rilian had nearly killed her.
Since then, Rilian hadn't left the dungeon. She was protected from the Orlesian Wardens by a succession of Templar guards. By a twist of fate so odd it made Loghain's guts knot, the person Rilian had trusted to protect her was Rylock.
Why Rylock, of all people? Rilian and Loghain had both argued with her before the Battle of Drakon River. Both had wanted to allow Jowan to use Blood Magic against the darkspawn and Rylock had forbidden it.
Why would Rilian trust Rylock to protect her and her research? Or were the Templars jailors? He had heard from young Carver Hawke - once his best scout, now a Warden - that barely an hour after the attack on the Weisshaupt Warden, Rilian had called Rylock to see her and they had been heard shouting at each other. Perhaps Rylock was keeping her quarantined as much as she was protecting her.
He was determined to find out.
Loghain's first two attempts met with failure. He was turned away by Templar Sergeant Rocald in a manner more suggestive of the Dock Ward Drunk Toss than a polite refusal. Rocald's dark, ravaged face suggested a hound straining on a leash, just begging for the excuse to tear his throat out. Rocald's wife and children had been murdered by the abomination at Redcliffe, their animated corpses sent out to attack the village at nightfall. Rocald had been a member of the militia then. The next day, he had joined Rylock's Templars.
Cullen and Irminric gave him no warmer reception. He wondered if Rylock were deliberately picking guards who wanted to hang his guts out to dry. Then again, after all his crimes he would be hard pressed to find someone who didn't want his head on a pike.
On the third day, Loghain got lucky. He didn't know what duty was so important as to call the heavy mob away and leave Carroll in their place like a lame puppy trailing after a victory procession. He didn't question his good fortune. Carroll greeted him with a friendly smile.
"You're not looking to talk to Rilian, are you? Because I've strict orders not to let anyone pass."
Loghain's jaws chewed iron. "I am not anyone. I am Ferelden's General. I need Rilian's assistance in a matter of national security."
"No-one gets to bother Rilian! She's off-limits to all - even Generals. I have my orders."
"I'm going to shove your orders down your throat and open your stomach to pull them back out!"
"Um - is that bad? I'm just trying to do my job! Look…I'll take you right now…just like you wanted…"
"Good lad."
Carroll put up his hands. "Come along, I suppose. Well - since you force me. Someone's got to look after Rilian. See she gets enough to eat. Might as well be you. Stay away from her research through. And don't let her near you with a needle or a syringe."
Loghain gave an exhausted bow. "Thank you. It's good to have a man like you behind me."
"I know, I know. As far behind you as possible."
Chuckling, Loghain opened the door.
The cell was ill-lit, unswept, and cold. Vials of blood were stacked along some makeshift shelves. The cell had a desk, which held an odd-looking object - magical, Loghain supposed. The sheer number of old plates and discarded, half-full cups of tea showed Rilian had given up all pretence of housekeeping. The single torch in its bracket gave just enough light to show the cell was filthy.
Rilian was hunched over her desk, scribbling furiously, tapping one foot. Her eyes were red with exhaustion or malice - or grief - and her left hand curled as though imagining the Weisshaupt Warden's neck between its fingers. The chair she sat on was a strange-looking contraption as well - a normal wooden stool, except that its four feet had small wheels. She spun around on it without bothering to get up. Perched on its edge, she faced Loghain and rasped distinctly: "I'm going to disembowel Carroll for letting you in here."
Several answers fell into place. So: Rylock really was a protector, not a jailor.
The stale air was foul with dirt, rancid sweat, food gone to maggots. Loghain stifled an impulse to gag. Pretending his nauseated expression was a smile, he replied: "No, you won't. Carroll was just trying to help. If you want to get him, you'll have to go through me. And you won't do that. You wouldn't dare. I'm the most popular man in Ferelden."
Rilian kicked off from one wall and whizzed to the other side of the cell. "Horseshit! You're about as popular as a skunk at a wedding. Ferelden's citizens owe you their lives - but now the Blight is over the vultures are gathering to have you hung, drawn and quartered. You'll be lucky to live beyond the Landsmeet: which is, no doubt, why you've come." Rilian blinked malevolently. "You want me to make good on my promise to Anora: make you a Warden. She'll inherit Gwaren - giving her a legitimate claim to the throne - and you'll be able to continue as General of Ferelden as soon as Weisshaupt's not looking. Am I right?"
"You took the words right out of my mouth."
Rilian was rocketing around the cell on the stool. She'd zoom up to a wall, kick it, and then zoom to the other side. It seemed to help her think. Looking at the way she was dressed made it more clear than anything else that Rilian was not herself. With an odd pang, Loghain recalled the young woman who had boasted: "A Warden doesn't fight darkspawn in less than her best." Rilian's preferred outfit had been tight leggings, emblazoned tunic, gaudy buckles, heavy jewelry, and a black leather cloak with a red appliquéd fox's visage. Or the close-fitting Shadow of the Empire purple leather that had made her look like a walking grape. Or the ridiculously ornate Dragonscale armour. Now she was a moving pile of rags, wearing - of all things! - white. White trousers that hung loosely off bony legs - a badly fitting white tunic that showed every stain of blood and sweat and old food. Stranger still was the odd contraption on her head: a kind of golden mesh. It held in place two lenses that magnified her fractured amber eyes. Their combination of abstracted disfocus and searing intensity made her look like a demented insect. She had tucked her quill behind one pointed ear, oblivious to the ink that dripped onto her neck like black blood. She peered up at him.
"Unfortunately, I can't help you. I don't give a dragon's crap for politics. The vulgar rabble of the Landsmeet is as nothing to me now. I have soared on dragon's wings - been worshipped as a god - I have no use for thrones or other trappings."
On second thoughts, Loghain thought dourly, Rilian is very much herself. A vainglorious little bantam. Adding the memories of the Old God was like pouring Dworkin's Gaatlok onto a naked flame.
"Forgive me," he said silkily, "I didn't realize you were too holy to keep promises. Anora has kept hers: she has made Valendrian Bann of the Alienage."
"I can't do it. Come away with you to the Landsmeet. That's what they're waiting for. That's why they didn't try to stop you seeing me. They want me to come out. They want you to make me come out."
Feigning nonchalance, Loghain inquired: "They?"
"They! The rutting dogs who call themselves Wardens! The ones who sat on a possible cure for taint for twenty years - who experimented with The Architect's brooches and made Weisshaupt an hourglass about to run out! The ones who wanted to make an example of Ferelden - of you - for outlawing the Order. See what happens to nations who don't run to us for protection. The ones who think I ought to be strung up for revealing Warden secrets - and because I slapped that Orlesian whore a couple of times. They. They want me to come out so they can jump me. They want you to make me come out."
"Sorry." Loghain loathed dealing with Rilian like this - he'd rather have faced Celene's court without a sword. As a result, he sounded incongruously happy, as though he were having a wonderful time. "I hate to contradict you when you're in such a good mood, but I have no intention of letting the Wardens get their hands on you. In fact, I'm quite certain I want to work against them in every manner possible. Now: you say you know that Weisshaupt has been sitting on a cure for twenty years? How do you know that?"
"I know because the First Warden's slut was in here! Bold as brass, rifling through my papers! I know because she's like me: we were both given brooches - we both had our Calling accelerated and then cured - we're both immune to taint!" She pointed fiercely at the door, then pounded her fist on her thigh. "I came in to find her studying my blood - my blood!"
Then her ferocity dimmed.
"The woman's name is Fiona. She said Alistair had told her where to find me. She has some kind of hold on him. She told me I'd misunderstood her. That she hadn't tried to deny Thedas a cure. That that was why she'd joined the Wardens of Montsimmard and hoped to fight at Ostagar. That it was your fault for turning them away. That a cure for tainted soldiers - even if it could also destroy darkspawn - didn't mean we could have fought the Blight without loss of life. Injecting a darkspawn - or an Archdemon - with a lethal mixture is harder than just killing them, after all. She told me the cure didn't mean much until we could find a way to replicate Remille's research and make it airborne. She wanted to work with me."
Rilian glared fiercely. "I wanted to believe her - I did believe her. But then I asked what had happened to the remaining brooches." A wild grin stretched her mouth. "And she answered."
Loghain held his breath and said nothing.
"That's when I hit her. She's lucky I didn't stab her in the eye with a tainted needle. I'm a monster. Nobody understands why Rylock defends me. Why she hasn't had me gutted for my forbidden research. The Wardens want to break me. They want me to hide down here until I rot."
Loghain felt frantically that he was getting nowhere. He was tempted to back out of the dungeon, put some distance between himself and Rilian's lunacy. But his regret was stronger than his alarm. He'd already let both Cauthrien and Anora down.
Instead of retreating, he tried a different approach.
"Speaking of Rylock: I've wondered about her involvement in this mess. I heard rumours of an argument."
Rilian interrupted him balefully. "Were we?"
"Were we what?"
"Speaking of Rylock? Or were you just prying?"
Loghain grinned. "I was prying. And I'm going to keep on prying until you say three sentences in a row that make sense. If you don't pull yourself together, you will rot."
"Do you remember when you and Rylock and I disagreed over Jowan at the Drakon River?" As if by accident, some of the tension in Rilian's face loosened. On some level, Loghain had distracted her. "We wanted Jowan to use Blood Magic against the darkspawn and Rylock wouldn't let us."
Loghain grunted.
"She said: We Templars will fight - but it must be the right fight." Suddenly, she glared at Loghain as if something he'd done had left a bad taste in her mouth. "You said: The right fight ends when the dust has cleared and you're still standing - the wrong fight ends when you do."
She paused a moment as though the meaning should be obvious. "That's why I asked Rylock to protect me from the Wardens - and not you."
Loghain began to hope he was on the right track. He didn't quite understand what Rilian was getting at, but she seemed to be recovering her self-command. Maybe it was time to risk…
Because he was the sort of man who took risks, Loghain said:
"That's better. You're doing much better. Any minute now you're going to be your old self again. There's just a couple of things I still want to know."
He took a deep breath. "Rilian," he began - wondering whether she would object to his use of her given name. She had always insisted he call her Warden (my father calls me by my name - the father you tried to sell to Tevinter!) but he didn't want to use the title and push her back into turmoil. When she didn't react, he said, "What in the name of sanity is the connection between Fiona's answer and Weisshaupt being an hourglass about to run out? Or between that and your need for protection?"
For a long moment, Rilian glowered as if she meant to explode. A muscle in her left cheek twitched…she absently rubbed the old, thin scar - legacy of Arl Howe's assault - smearing ink over the side of her face with her fingertips. Her eyes burned red, drawing the darkness of the cell around her.
"Do you know that the Children bred by the Mother were larval Broodmothers? The Architect's attempt to make his kind self-perpetuating? Do you know how they were created?"
Loghain dared say nothing. He had learned long ago that he had no talent for asking the right questions. Better let Rilian come to the truth in her own way.
"The Architect used the brooch to accelerate Duncan's Calling - accelerate it until he was almost one of them. But human enough to sire Children that bred true. The Architect giving Boann Warden blood to regain her self-awareness was merely a poisoned gift - it had nothing to do with the creation of the Children. They were created because it was Duncan who turned her. What Fiona told me was that they had abandoned testing the brooches because one of their male volunteers - a man nearly as far along as Duncan was when we found him - escaped to the Deep Roads."
Loghain growled, low in his throat. Red rage scored his vision. He understood Rilian now - understood that if he had been there to hear the story he would have snapped Fiona's neck.
Dreamily, Rilian murmured in a sing-song voice: "And the Maker said to them: be fruitful and multiply…" Suddenly her eyes snapped awake, her focus sharpened. "How many Broodmothers could he have created before the taint rode him to a screaming gibbering death? And if every one of them bred Children who became Broodmothers in turn - how many darkspawn could they have created?" She laughed dryly. "Ferelden knows the answer to that. And because Warden Commander Bregan's treachery told The Architect where to find Urthemiel…and Urthemiel drew them here, instead of to Weisshaupt, who deserved them…we have suffered. And after all that - Fiona expected me to trust the First Warden with Remille's research!"
Loghain was right on the point of asking: so why don't you help me go and get them at the Landsmeet? Instead of holing up here like a beaten mabari? He stopped himself just in time. As soon as the question occurred to him, he realized why Rilian had trusted Rylock instead of him. Because he had let Tevinter slavers unleash an Elf-only plague on the Alienage. Because she knew there was nothing he would not do for his homeland - nothing he would not unleash on Orlais, if he had to.
As if she read his mind, Rilian said: "I thought about who to turn to. I could have asked you to send guards - or Shianni to send Dalish archers. But I know what you've done - and Shianni has told me often enough she wishes she had a way to wipe every shem off the face of Thedas. I wondered if Rylock might want the same: an airborne plague that targets Blood Mages. So I tested her. I offered to work on that. That's why we argued. She tried to kill me for attempting to corrupt her - for falling so far myself. You see: Rylock hates Blood Mages like plague - but she wants to be good. Not use evil to fight evil."
"A pity it hasn't occurred to her that the phylacteries are a form of Blood Magic."
Rilian scoffed. "Oh not that tired old argument! The Templars use phylacteries to track - rather like we use the Joining to track darkspawn. They're not using the blood in rituals to kill the mages - even the ones who become maleficarum. They're not hiring "tame" Blood Mages to manipulate it - make the donors controllable."
Loghain's face creased in a worn smile. It was touching, really, that someone so terribly abused as Rilian could retain that kind of innocence. The refusal to use phylacteries for more than tracking might be morality in Rylock's case - for the Chantry as a whole he suspected it was simply to do with the impossibility of controlling "tame" Blood Mages. Or lack of imagination.
He chuckled softly, "So, you trust a Templar who tried to kill you more than you trust the cousin who'd lay down her life for you?"
Rilian looked at him, slowly, like someone waking from nightmare. "Do you think I'm frightened of dying? After what happened in the Trenches? I'm frightened of looking into a mirror and seeing Avernus staring back. I need a friend good enough to kill me before that happens. Maybe if you'd asked for the same instead of for blind loyalty you wouldn't have…"
Something warned Rilian. She stopped the words in her throat. Loghain struggled against a rage that threatened to ruin their friendship forever. "Never insult a woman who gave her life for Ferelden. I won't warn you again."
"I'm sorry," Rilian muttered. She had the sense not to mention Cauthrien by name.
The sorrow in her face wrung Loghain's heart. Without premeditation or forethought he said quietly: "You know, Rilian, if your father saw this pigsty he'd tan your backside."
By luck or intuition, he'd found the right approach. Rilian's face crumpled sheepishly. "I know," she muttered, "I'm going to clean it up. I'll get round to it soon. Then I'll join you at the Landsmeet."
"Thank you. But don't bother clearing up. Just pack up your vials and notes and whatever that contraption is and stay with me in my quarters. I've got a spare room. You can bring your pet Templars and Wardens too - they'll make sure no-one bothers you."
Rilian stared dumbly. She looked around the filthy cell as if Loghain had just asked her to give up the only thing that held her in one piece. She looked like a person lost in memories - her own, and others' - someone who might never find her way back. Then she slowly reached for the enormous case of Dwarven make that had brought the items here. On its side, she had scrawled: The Luggage. He knew better than to offer to help - merely watched as she huffed and cursed. She had fitted wheels to the bottom as she had fitted them to her chair, but she still had difficulty. "If only this thing had legs that walked," she grumbled.
Without tension to keep her upright, however, Rilian's legs wobbled and she swayed. Loghain did help her, then, supporting her as she supported The Luggage.
"Have you eaten anything besides Elven tea lately?"
"Oh," Rilian said absently, "It's not that. I'm only a little less hungry than I was when I was a Warden. It's the samples. I must have more tea than blood in my veins by now."
"Idiot," Loghain growled. "I've seen mabari with better sense than you've got."
A whisper of sadness brushed him. I think Ravenous has better sense than either of us…
Rilian turned strained, sunken eyes to his and managed a shadow of her old smile. "Hey. You're talking about the Dragonslayer, Hero of Ferelden, Master of the Litany, Scope Jockey and all-round genius here."
Loghain laughed quietly. Then subsided into a silence filled with his own dilemma.
Rilian was right to trust Rylock. What she didn't know was that Anora's letter had told him the Grand Cleric would court martial Rylock and Harith as soon as they returned to Denerim. For disobeying their orders to remain in the capital - for leading the Templars of Denerim and Redcliffe in a war the Chantry still considered to be none of its concern. And when they put an Orlesian Knight Commander in Rylock's place, Rilian would find the Chantry no safe haven.
He intended to warn Rylock - but knew already it would do no good. Rylock's stubborn honesty would tie the noose around her own neck. But Rilian still had a choice. Loghain knew if he was a true friend he'd tell her to get as far away from the Wardens, the Chantry, and old Fereldan war criminals as possible. It was madness to expect that sanity newly built from crystal could endure the lion's den that was the Landsmeet.
Should I put Rilian in danger merely to protect a nation whose future is so ambivalent?
Could I throw away thirty years spent defending something just when Ferelden needs me most?
The question left a dusty, rotten taste in his mouth.
AN: I subscribe to Shakespira's brilliant "Dark Stewards" theory from "The Lion's Den" (for those unfamiliar with her fic, it's the idea that the Wardens tried to use taint to resist Tevinter Blood Magic, and unwittingly unleashed the First Blight). Hence Rilian describing The Architect as "a descendant of Wardens".
The Litany Rilian refers to is the Litany of Adralla. My theory is that the Litany is a way of resisting possession through music. It's related to the lost lore of Arlathan Rilian learned from the Arcane Warrior spirit, and to the bard's Captivating Song ability. Because my fic posits a link between demons and taint, Rilian was able to use it to hold Urthemiel. I'm not trying to make her superTabris (honest!) just trying to find a way to explain the quasi-magical powers a level 20 bard with high willpower seems to have.
The first study of living tissue via microscope was "The Fly's Eye" published in 1644. I think centuries of study by Tevinter magisters could manage the same - particularly with magic providing sample illumination. The only thing I can't see them being able to create is an electron microscope - but the way to get around that is indeed to watch the effects of the sample rather than the sample itself.
Next up: Chapter 2 - I See A Dark Sail