WARNINGS: AU, mpreg, child-abuse-torture-death, slash

A/N: Tell me what you think and any mistakes you find that need correcting.


Tevinter Imperium:

Buying good slaves was a gold consuming task. Sure, you could always get a cheap one, but they either died from sickness or for trying to escape. Breaking a slave was time consuming. Sure, it could be satisfying, but only if you truly had the time needed to dedicate to the task. It was an art that had to be perfectly done or you would lose your whole investment.

Breeding slaves was easier and mostly free. The mother would care for the child until it was old enough to survive on its own. She would teach the child how to act, what to fear, what to do and all the ways to keep their masters pleased.

The magisters had made a game of breeding slaves themselves. A magister wishing to breed a slave outside his household would flaunt the poor thing in front of his friends and allies. If someone was interested, a contract was written. Usually two children, one for each magister, were promised in this sort of deal and magic used to ensure the two children would be delivered.

Danarius had no plans of breeding his bodyguard. Fenris was a unique creature and he didn't like the idea of his prized possession losing his uniqueness. When Hadrianna came with the idea of getting a slave to continue his experimentations with lyrium he'd been intrigued, but had to admit the cost of buying slaves to lose them to the process was too high for his liking. When she whispered to him that he had a slave that had proven strong enough to withstand the process and whose resilience could be passed to his offspring, the idea took hold on him. Once she reminded him that he could get more than one child on a pregnancy, the magister jumped to the idea.

He didn't want any slave for his little wolf. A slave he might be, but he deserved the best specimen to rut with. After all, only the best would produce a strong, healthy child capable to survive the experiments he would subject it to.

It was another magister's bodyguard that took his attention. Nerio was an elf, like his little wolf, and the magister clearly wanted to breed her with the way he was boasting about her skills and the way he showed her off to the other magisters.

He didn't approach the magister with intentions to breed, but with intention to buy her. The magister didn't like it, but Danarius knew everyone had a price. Once he knew whose blood needed to be spilled the magister grudgingly sold his bodyguard.

Watching them breed was fascinating. A potion to ignite their passion along with the extra potent fertility potion was all it was needed. Part of him wished he could leave them to it or someone else to watch them, but Danarius couldn't afford to be careless. The potion drove any thought of their well being away and he had to make sure they didn't injure themselves.

He gave his Fenris one day to enjoy the female until the potion's effects ran its course. His slave was the better bodyguard, as the lyrium made him available to continue his duties after his body was clear of the potion. The female was bedridden for three days, but she had conceived.

Danarius kept a close watch on the elf, meaning Fenris watched the pregnancy as closely as his master. Perhaps she'd been pretty, but her previous life as a bodyguard left her with more scars in visible places, like her face and hands. She was strong, but the potent fertility potion Danarius had given her gave her more children than her body could hold. Fenris watched in muted horror as the skin stretched into an impossibly large belly for her build. He knew she would not survive the birth and she knew it too. Yet he didn't feel guilty and she didn't hate him. They had done as ordered and they had pleased their master. If they had to hate someone it would have to be him, but they couldn't hate a person they lived to please.

When the time came, her screams tore at what little feelings slaves usually kept for themselves. She died before any of her children saw the light of day, but Danarius simply cut her body open. Five babies. One dead before it was born. Fenris feared his master would be angry at the loss of two slaves in one day. Instead he watched as the dead one became the first experiment and witnessed the future this four wailing things would have.

Lyrium could not raise the dead for long and he remembered well the agony of his own ritual, but at least his master proved lyrium could be recovered from a dead body.

Four children. Given a place in a room that was already too small for him. Blankets that were too thin to keep the cold and not enough milk for the quantities they desired. But he had orders to not lose even one of them and Fenris did his best to obey. Caring for things that slowly turned to children in his mind. Children that dangerously started to become his instead of Danarius'. Making the mistake of giving them names in his mind: Nenia, Carna, Larentina and Levana. Naming them meant he had to name the dead one, if only to honor the horrifying minutes of agony he knew she suffered when Danarius tried to revive her. Little Paverta had still probably been the luckiest of the girls by being dead.

Little Nenia followed her six months later. What Danarius wanted to accomplish was unknown to him. Perhaps the magister had spoken about it, but he could not listen. His ears were filled with the baby's cries of terror and pain. His eyes, that should be on the floor unless he suspected a threat, could only see the little arms trying to reach him and the green eyes pleading him to save her. His hands bled as he cut his palm with his gauntlets and his whole body trembled as he fought with the instinct to rush in and save her. She died burned alive by lyrium. Danarius was oddly satisfied. Fenris could only hold his three remaining daughters afterwards knowing that, should the magister come for them, he would have to give them up.

Six more months. A whole year of feeding and caring for three little girls when Danarius didn't need him. They were beautiful and it scared him. It tormented him to know he could not save them. He dreaded the moment Danarius came for one of them. A moment that came all too soon.

His little Carna. The only one with the red hair and blue eyes of their mother. He placed her on the table when Danarius ordered. He watched her being cut open while alive because his master wanted to see the effect of lyrium on the insides of the body. He witnessed as magic kept her suffering going on for days. And for the first time in years, he dared to plead his master to end her suffering.

Fenris had nothing save his body. He was nothing but a slave. He breathed because his master wished him to. He would die because his master willed it so. There was no hope, no dreams, no mercy and no escape. It didn't surprise him when Danarius laughed at his begging and continued his experiment. It didn't surprise him when he was punished for daring to speak to the magister. Or when he was ordered to return to the room to watch the rest of the experiment.

It took his little one six days to die. Danarius had him clean up the butchered remains. Of all his children, this one's death was the one that most haunted him. If only because he did not fight for her and the agony his little Carna went through surpassed by far his very own experience with lyrium. No child, no person, should suffer what his beautiful baby suffered at the hands of a mage.

Finally a respite. Danarius was busy trying to show his political rivals he could fight as well as any other man against the Qunari without actually doing any fighting himself. With the aid of the household slaves he managed to keep his two daughters hidden. The foolish thought that Danarius would forget about them, perhaps grow bored of it all, had entered his mind a few times. Part of him, the foolish side that had dared to claim the little girls as his and named them, wanted to embrace that thought. Part of him, the side that knew how the real world worked, knew it was only a matter of time until he was forced to witness their deaths too.

His little Larentina was only two years, but so full of life. She would run around their little room giggling and smiling like a free child. The slave in charge of them when he was out with Danarius had taught his girls to give hugs and kisses. She was always the first to run to him and cling to his legs when he arrived. She would give him sloppy kisses when he held her in his arms. Dark haired and green eyed, she was way too curious for his peace of mind. He dared pray to any deity that would listen to keep her from finding a way out of their room.

He left two little girls to hunt down a magister that had annoyed his master. He returned to find only one waiting for him. And once he knew the fate of Larentina, he vowed to never pray again. For she had found a way out of the room and ran straight into Hadrianna, who smacked her for daring to touch her. When his child cried in pain, the apprentice asked Danarius to have her tongue removed.

His attention again on the girls, the magister jumped at the idea and had her join to watch if lyrium could be used to give the body the ability to regenerate limbs and organs that were removed. She was dead when he arrived. He still doesn't know if he should be grateful for that or not. After all, he was spared from witnessing his brightest star of five being extinguished for no reason at all, but it broke his heart, a heart he thought long dead, to know she died alone surrounded by monsters.

After that, he made sure Levana became a ghost. He had to leave her in the care of a slave when he had orders, but it was clear the woman could not forget what happened to her other charge and did not dare to sleep whenever the remaining child was entrusted to her. Teaching her all the things being a slave entailed.

Levana. One of five. His. Like all the others, save Carna, she had his eyes and the dark hair he suspected he had before the ritual. The quietest of the five. The smallest of the five. The less active of the five. Barely three and she knew it was not wise to speak. Barely three and she knew it was better to remain hidden. Just a child that knew crying did no good and playing would only get her killed, like the sister she barely remembered.

When Danarius was forced to go to Seheron to prove he truly could fight as he said he could, Fenris feared she would be left behind when it was obvious he would have to go too. But Danarius had brought her along, a gleam in his eye that told him he would lose his little one despite all the precautions to keep her out of the magister's gaze.

Either luck or a repentant god were at work the day Danarius was injured. Levana had strict orders to stay close at hand to the magister. Fenris knew then she was to be his blood sacrifice if anything happened. But she had become frightened by the battle and had run away from their master's hold. Fenris watched in dismay as she ran to the forest while he had to stay and fight. The distraction cost them both, magister and slave alike.

Injured, Fenris was ordered to get Danarius to safety. Despite everything telling him to run into the forest and search for his child, he did what he was told to. His master's face when he was forced to leave him made him feel something he now recognized as satisfaction. Something that changed into a more familiar fear as his wounds finally overtook him. His vision unfocused as he tried to follow the trail left by his own blood. To find his way back to the place he lost sight of his daughter. To save her, because this time he could save her. Only for his body to betray him as it fell to the ground halfway, the roar of his blood like a dragon's enraged cry as everything went black.

When the world turns black there is a second before the Maker gathers you in his arms. They say it is the moment where He can give a person one last chance at life. His last thought a wish. A wish to have his daughters back. A wish to hold them one more time. A wish to turn back time and die protecting them as he should have. And a woman's voice, old and menacing as a magister's, hard and unforgiving as a whip on his back…

"Freedom is a curious thing. A beautiful idea that everyone wants and no one has. Chains come in different forms. Some we want. Some we don't. Some we carry alone and others are carried by the whole. See the chains for what they are, but do not fear them. The most important, the ones that truly matter to us are the chains that we have to hold with both hands and fight with all our strength to keep."

When Fenris opened his eyes, he was in a hut. His wounds were dressed and his little girl was curled beside him fast asleep. Someone was with him, a woman smelling of herbs and a man with a sword in his hands. They watched him in turn. Him as well as his little child.

"Greetings, stranger. We found the child wandering the forest. She has not said a word, but she seems to know you."

He licked his lips, cracked and bleeding, before speaking. Voice hoarse and throat dry. Muscles screaming in protest and fear as he dared use his voice. He tightened his hold around the sleeping child. His child. His.

"Who are you?"

"We are many clans. Each with its own name that only friends know. Everyone else calls us Fog Warriors."

The fog warriors spoke of freedom. Did things no slave would dare to do. They smiled openly. The loved for everyone to see. They hoped and wished and dreamed. They lived as they pleased.

It was hard to act like they did, but he wanted to. It was hard to keep his daughter from learning all this terrible things that would only get her killed. Master Danarius would come at any moment. He would take him from this place and punish him for not waiting where he ordered him. He would beat his child. Kill her for running when she should've stayed. But time passed, like it always does, and his master didn't come.

He allowed a little hope to creep in. He allowed himself to dream he and Levana were free. It was so painful when Danarius marched into the village. The dream, the only one where Levana could remain alive, was over.

Soon he'll be back to Minrathous. Soon he'll cease to be a father until Danarius wished to breed him again. And then, he'll watch another handful of children, HIS, die. Over and over.

He couldn't do it. He couldn't let her die too. So in the middle of the battle between the warriors and Danarius' men, Fenris grabbed his daughter and fled. Hope kept him going until sand turned to water. Hope kept him going until sea turned to land again. Always running. Always hiding. Always living with the barest taste of freedom.

He didn't care. He couldn't care. Whenever he despaired, whenever he faltered, his daughter's smile was all he needed to remember why he ran away in the first place. She was one of five. The only one he had left. The only one he had fought for. He doubted any ritual could erase them from his mind. Lucky Paverta who the Maker brought dead and Danarius killed twice. Little Nenia who went up in flames wondering why her father didn't rescue her. Beautiful Carna who he gave willingly and saw suffer more than anyone. Vivacious Larentina who died alone for the crime of being a child. And Levana, his shining star and reason for living. The only family he remembered. The only chain that he did not care to carry. Dead or alive they were the first thing he called his own. His. Only his.