I wrote something similar a while ago, but took it down and reworked it since it didn't feel complete the first time around. The character of Anders has been polarizing since Dragon Age 2, even more so than Loghain I think, and I can truly see why. He is complex, though I miss his more fun loving self that we originally saw him as in Awakening, and sometimes I'm not sure on how exactly to look at him.
Quote of the day:
Mal: I don't murder children.
The Operative: I do. If I have to.
Mal: Why? Do you even know why they sent you?
The Operative: It's not my place to ask. I believe in something greater than myself. A better world. A world without sin.
Mal: So me and mine gotta lay down and die... so you can live in your better world?
The Operative: I'm not going to live there. There's no place for me there... any more than there is for you. Malcolm... I'm a monster. What I do is evil. I have no illusions about it, but it must be done.
— Serenity
As the cold Orlesian wind brushed across his face while he stood at the peak of the Grand Cathedral where the Divine herself made her home, Anders remained silent and grim, his blond hair waving in the nighttime breeze of Val Royeaux. He had a choice to make, a choice that he knew would echo across the world like the evil he had committed for the greater good, and like the lives that had to be sacrificed for the sake of not only justice, but liberty as well.
It was an odd thing to think as his eyes watched the city, that no matter all the horrors that happened in Thedas, that no matter all the war and death, that in most places in the world that absolutely nothing was happening. When the Warden had risen up to end the Blight by killing Urthemiel, somewhere in the world a mother was cooing to her newborn child. When Loghain had been selling Elves into slavery and hiring assassins to kill the last two Grey Wardens in the country, there was a farmer on the other side of the continent wiping the sweat off his brow and wondering on just how successful the harvest would be that year.
In a way it was comforting that such peace could exist amidst all the turmoil that could be found in the world, and it was in times that he thought of that, or times that he watched a beautiful and proud city shine like a twinkling gem in the night, that brought Anders hope that maybe everything that he fought for wouldn't be in vain. In quieter moments he wondered if the choices he had made that had effectively changed the world were really his right to make them, but he always ended up shaking away those thoughts, Anders knowing that everything he had done wasn't because he wanted to do them, but because they were things that no matter how horrific they were, needed to be done. He took in a deep breath and began to stroll on the stone ledge that he was on, his eyes still remaining trained on the city all the while.
He was a monster and a murderer, Anders mused as he carefully walked the ledge near the precipice of the Grand Cathedral of Val Royeaux, the White Divine herself completely unaware of his presence. It had been easier than he thought to sneak his way into the Orlesian capital, and even simpler to actually be able to find himself looking out towards what could only be the grandest city in the entire world, from the grandest view that anyone could ever have. He hadn't been sure at first why he sought out the Grand Cathedral in the first place, why he had risked his life avoiding its guards and climbing nearly to the top of it, but now as he stared out at one of the most magnificent sights he had ever seen, the stars themselves glittering slowly as if they too were humbled by the beautiful Val Royeaux, he knew that there was only really one thing that he could actually do.
He wouldn't change what had happened in Kirkwall, though Anders had always made it a point to remind himself of all the innocents that had died because of him, innocents that had yet to see justice. What he had done was evil, he made no point to ever excuse himself for it, but to Anders it was a necessary evil just for the slightest chance to bring true freedom to his fellow mages. He didn't know how things would turn out at the end of the war between mages and Templars, whether he would go down in history as the revolutionary hero or terrorist villain that people had painted him as over the years, both of which were actually true. He knew nothing of the future except for the fact that he had been the catalyst of it all, but as he stopped walking and paused on that stone ledge of the Grand Cathedral, Anders did admit to himself that there was one thing that he wished had gone differently.
He still remembered the look of disgust, that look of utter contempt that Hawke had towards him when the apostate champion found out what had happened that caused the Chantry in Kirkwall to burst into the horrorshow of red light that it did. Anders had thought that Hawke would have slain him then and there, and in fact had actually hoped for that outcome so as to avoid becoming yet another mage to die at a Templar's sword, and in the end he had been surprised when Hawke simply said to go and to never ever return. They were terms he accepted, but Anders would never forget that look on Hawke's face when he turned to leave.
It would have been a lie if Anders said that there hadn't been moments when he was still in the Free Marches that he wanted to go back to Kirkwall to right whatever wrongs he had done, and to at least apologize to the families of the innocents he murdered in his one world changing act, but even then the rebel Warden knew that there was no going back to Kirkwall, and that looking back to his past would only remind him of his demons. Even if he had been able to convince himself against his better judgment to head back to his old city, he knew that doing so would only be a death sentence. If Hawke didn't kill him outright, Aveline would arrest him for his actions, her honor never allowing less than for the guard captain to hang an executioner's noose around his neck. Even if Hawke wavered once more and couldn't find it in their heart to stand against him, he knew that Fenris would never allow him to ever look upon Hawke's face ever gain, with the only exception that Anders could think of being if the Elf made it a point to make a trophy of his head.
Closing his eyes and taking in a deep breath, Anders oddly felt freer at that moment than he ever had in his entire life, despite the fact that Val Royeaux was probably the most Andrastian city in all of Thedas. When he had been just a boy growing up in the Circle of Lake Calenhad, Anders had always told himself and other apprentices that would listen without disregarding his dreams of freedom that he would one day travel the world, and there was a small part of him that was happy that he had been able to keep that promise to his young self, even if the way that he had traveled had been with a life of infamy. He had been a hero once with fighting as a Grey Warden at the side of the Hero of Ferelden to defend Amaranthine, but just like Teyrn Loghain who had died at the hands of the Hero back in Denerim, his history would forever be defined by the darkest moment of his life.
He began walking once more along the ledge when he opened his eyes, one foot after the other as his breath created little clouds of vapor when it came into contact with the cold Val Royeaux air, and it was that memory of the Hero that made him wonder just what the Warden would think about what had been necessary for him to do back in Kirkwall. He had been a bit older than the Hero back in those days when they were pupils together in Calenhad, but even then the young Daylen Amell shined like a diamond in the rough amongst peers like Jowan that could never hope to match his magical potential. They had been civil with one another, but it would have been a lie if Anders had said that part of him didn't hate the boy back in those old days that all these years later seemed more like a distant dream he once had than anything else.
Amell had so much power hidden just behind those eyes, power that Irving had seen that made the old magi practically take the boy in as his own personal pupil, power that Anders could tell that even Greagoir was wary of, and despite all of that, despite all the potential that Amell had to help his fellow mages, in those days the boy that would eventually become the Hero of Ferelden was content living as a slave. He had only brought it up once with him in passing since the two of them had never actually been friends or anything, but Anders still remembered how sincere Amell was when he said that the Circle was a wondrous place that provided a home for mages to study and practice in safety, and how they were all like a family. He remembered how his hands had balled into fists at all that wasted power, and how it had been then that Anders had only left the room in disgust. He pondered what he would have thought had he known that the young Amell would one day become his Commander, before running off and disappearing from every trace of Thedas itself to chase after a Witch of the Wilds that he had fallen in love with during the Blight.
He paused again, the Val Royeaux wind blowing past him as he stood still on that ledge high up in the air, his golden hair flowing just as freely as Anders had always wished that he could be when he was just a boy. His entire life had been a series of living by tenets defined by other people, whether it was the Templars who watched him for signs of corruption, or the Grey Wardens who demanded that he remain vigilant, that he be Grey like the stone, a guardian against the Darkness. True freedom like that of the wind was something he had never tasted. He had come close in Kirkwall with Hawke and all his friends, but Justice and the plight of his people made Anders know even then that the actions that he took, as well-intentioned as they began and as evil as they ended, had never truly been what he would have chosen.
He had a choice now though, he finally conceded as he tapped a lone pebble with his foot and watched as it fell into the darkness that surrounded the Grand Cathedral that night. The wind continued to blow, and a tear fell across his face as he stared into Val Royeaux, and as Anders realized for the first time ever how beautiful the world, how beautiful freedom, could truly be.
And then he let himself fall.
I am one of those people who tends to kill Anders on most of my play throughs, but it isn't for the reason that most people would probably think. I don't hate the guy, I miss the way he was in awakening, and there are actually moments where I feel sympathy for his cause, even if I don't agree with him on the issue. He does what he truly thinks is best, but sadly that involves taking the lives of innocents.