DISCLIAMER: I own none of the intellectual property from the Dragon Age franchise.

Anders heard the knock on the door and looked up from his book. Ser Pounce-A-Lot purred and snuggled in further as he scratched the cat behind his ears. "Come in!"

The door opened and Elissa walked in. She appeared puzzled over something. "Are you busy?"

Anders shook his head. "No, I'm not doing anything important." He stretched a bit, recrossed his legs at the ankles, and fixed the pillows behind him so he could sit up straighter on his bed. He indicated the chair in the room. "What can I do for you?"

"Well," she said, "a thought just occurred to me. I was wondering something." She paused a minute while she sat down. "I don't want to get your hopes up, though."

Anders chuckled and patted the bed next to him. "Well, my lady! I won't tell Nathaniel if you won't!" He grinned his best you know you love me smile at her while she laughed.

"Not what I meant, Anders." She playfully swatted at his faked you wound me, my lady expression. "Although you might want to consult Nathaniel, actually."

Anders raised his eyebrow. "Well, this sounds interesting. I don't know if I can play nice that way. And even if I could, I think Zevran would want to be involved."

"You've been spending entirely too much time with him, I see." Elissa grinned at him, obviously amused at the lengths Anders was willing to take to continue the joke. "This is actually somewhat serious, but not in a bad way. I think."

Anders' curiousity was piqued. "So what is it?"

Elissa started, "Well, your phylactery was drawn when you were an apprentice mage, right?"

"Yes."

"And you only get your blood drawn the one time, right? You don't get it taken again later?"

"No," Anders replied. "Our blood only needs to be drawn once. The phylacteries are specially treated so our blood stays fresh in them forever."

Elissa nodded. "That's what I thought. So you didn't have your blood drawn again anytime after taking the Joining?"

Anders shook his head. "No, there wasn't a need." He looked at her intently. "So, why all this interest in my phylactery all of a sudden?"

"Well, Nathaniel has been teaching me some of the basics of poison-making, and the thought occurred to me that a poison that works in the blood, like, say, the darkspawn blood used in the Joining, might change the properties of the blood ..."

Anders' eyes grew wide and he jumped up, spilling the cat off his lap. "You mean … you think that maybe …" He started pacing excitedly.

Elissa nodded. "I don't know, to be certain. I don't know everything that's involved or how to even test the theory. But what if the Joining changes your blood enough that your phylactery is no longer valid?"

Anders turned to face Elissa. "You are ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT!" He grabbed her and kissed her soundly, then ran out of the room. "I have to find Nathaniel right away!"

Elissa smiled, bemused, as she touched a hand to her lips. "I hope he doesn't kiss Nathaniel like that. Awkwaaard..." She stooped to pet the now-offended cat before taking her leave.

Anders and Nathaniel decided that they would test the theory by drawing some blood from the next batch of recruits, then preparing phylacteries as best they could. They would draw the blood of any survivors and compare the blood to the prior samples taken. It wouldn't be foolproof, because they didn't have an exact idea of how the phylacteries were used to track the mages who escaped the Circle Tower, but it would give them a starting point. Elissa did her part, and kept an eye out for books about phylacteries and blood tracking. Anything she found related to the subject was purchased and brought to the keep.

It turned out that the next group of Warden recruits included two mages from the Circle. Nathaniel got permission to draw a little of their blood and he and Anders prepared the phylacteries. This was a lucky Joining; both of the mages survived. Nathaniel drew their blood again and prepared another set of phylacteries, and he and Anders went to work.

Neither man was adept at alchemy, but Elissa and Oghren proved resourceful yet again and found more texts on that sort of experimentation. They set up a basic laboratory and let the two men get to work.

"All right, now for the moment of truth." Nathaniel added three drops of some foul-smelling substance to the first mage's blood samples. "I think we have to wait a few minutes to see if … look!"

Anders looked. Then he looked again. The mixture containing the blood drawn before the Joining was glowing faintly. The mixture containing the blood drawn after … was not.

Anders blinked. Then his hands started shaking. "Nathaniel, please. Let's test this on the other mage recruit." Nathaniel nodded and repeated the process on the second mage's samples. The same result happened.

"I think we have an answer, Anders," Nathaniel said. He turned to look at his friend just as Elissa and Oghren poked their heads in the door to see how the two men were doing.

Anders sat there quietly for a minute. Then, he started chuckling quietly. It grew louder until it reached a full-blown belly laugh before he jumped up from his chair and started hollering and whooping, tears of joy springing unbidden to his eyes. He grabbed Nathaniel and kissed him soundly, then ran down the hallway shouting, "I AM FREE! FREE!" He got to the throne room and they saw him perform a somersault before running out of sight, the seneschal shouting, "HEY!" a moment later.

Elissa blinked, and then said, "Well, I'm certainly glad he wears smallclothes under his robes." Nathaniel was still sputtering and wiping his mouth, and Oghren just laughed as he wandered off, muttering something about having a liquid lunch.