If you like it, drop me a little note in the reviews; it's a real morale booster!
Dragon Age and affiliated characters belong to Bioware and Electronic Arts.
Rhyann had been awake for some time, though the prospect of opening her eyes scared her. She feared that being freed from her cell was nothing more than a sweet dream of a better life than hers. And, she would wake to find a smug expression plastered on Vaughan's face as he hung on to the bars of his cell just across from hers. Instead, she sniffed the air curiously, finding it smelled sweetly of wildflowers with a faint undertone of some sort of roasting meat. The savory aroma caused the elf's mouth to water. This only made her believe that every sensation was little more than a dream as well; though the food she ate back in the Alienage was tasty and filled her, it never smelled quite as decadent as whatever it was that was currently wafting into her nostrils. Her hands became tangled in some soft fabric below her body; she flexed her fingers, getting a good grip of the cloth and running it between her thumbs and forefingers.
The curiosity was just too much for her by that point, so she cautiously opened her eyes. Just beyond her lids was the most lustrous room she had ever seen. Rhyann was lying in a four-poster bed, which was made of a beautiful dark wood that gleamed in the candlelight. She looked down at her waist, to see it covered with a bedspread made of rich red and gold fabric. Beautiful paintings of landscapes decorated the walls. Even Arl Urien's estate wasn't as nice as this. A fine exotic rug lined the flooring, most likely from foreign lands. Ferelden craftspeople weren't known for their talent in weaving rugs.
But, how did she get there? Rhyann wondered this as her fingers continued to muss with the sheets below her. The last thing she remembered was her world going black and falling to the stone floor of the dungeon. Perhaps she died, mused the girl thoughtfully. It certainly made sense, seeing as she was deprived of food and water. This wasn't what she imaged the Fade would be like, and if she was dead, she had hoped that her mother would enter the room. Even though she passed when the elf was still a small child, and her memories of her were possibly fabrications of her imagination, she still missed her with every day and held her in the highest regards.
Looking back up from her lap, Rhyann noticed that she wasn't alone in this lavish room. She recognized him instantly as the blonde man from the dungeon. He was without his heavy armor, though, instead, wearing a simple tunic with trousers. When he noticed that she was awake, his stony gaze turned to instant relief. "You're awake! Thank the Maker." He chimed, taking a large stride towards her in the bed.
At him approaching, Rhyann lurched back in the bed. His sudden movement panicked the girl. Something about a human man drawing near sent her on edge, though she really couldn't recall why something so typical would cause her heart to race and sweat to form on her brow. She drew her legs up towards her torso as a means to put further distance between her and the strange man she didn't know. He didn't seem all that menacing; in fact, that grin on his face and the kindness in his eyes begged for him to be trusted. Still, after what she had been through at the hands of human men, she couldn't be too careful.
Throwing his arms up in front on him in surrender, the man ceased his tread. He waved his hands animatedly through the gesture. "I won't hurt you." He said apologetically, taking a careful step backwards. "I was just checking on you, honest."
Not one to argue, especially with strangers, Rhyann accepted his promise and eased up a bit. A watchful eye remained on him just in case. She relaxed back into the pillow. Since spotting the man, the elf had decided that she was, in fact, alive. This fact alone brought her much solace; at least she didn't leave her family behind. But, it didn't answer the question about her location, or how she got there. "Where am I?" She questioned, the confusion in her voice was heavy in every word.
"You fainted after we released you from the cell in Arl Howe's estate. I'm not sure if you remembered that. We took you here—to Arl Eamon's estate in Denerim. You've been out for two days." The man adjusted positions as he spoke. "I'm Alistair, by the way, and you are…"
"Rhyann." The answer the girl provided was feeble, barely audible due to the hushed voice she used. This was all so much for her to absorb, and a large part of her felt immensely guilty for burdening that group of people who had not expected to find a pair of malnourished elves slowly dying in Urien's dungeon. She was avoiding eye-contact with him for that very reason, and yet as her stomach started to gurgle in an unsettling fashion; she couldn't help but look at him in the most embarrassed of manners.
The sound was apparently humorous to the man—Alistair. A brief chuckle met his lips at the sight of the flustered elf now gripping her stomach uneasily. He realized, she assumed, that his laughter was more than likely uncouth, judging by the girl's expression of humiliation. "I figured you'd be hungry." Said the man with a note of gaiety in his tone. "I'll go get you something from the kitchens…permitting the cook doesn't yell at me again."
Rhyann watched as the man strode out of the room in search of food. "What a strange man." Said the elf to herself with complete conviction. It was as though he had completely missed the fact that she was an elf; any self-respecting human wouldn't allow themselves to run errands for her kind.
Her alone time was cut tragically short when the door opened. In walked the elven woman with the facial markings, looking more haggard than Rhyann recalled, but otherwise the same as the day in the dungeon. Though she didn't know this woman, except for a few minutes when she released her, Rhyann felt comfortable around her. Maybe it was because she was an elf, or because she was a woman, but there was something calming about her.
"You seem to be doing better." Hummed the Dalish woman calmly. She took a seat at the foot of the bed, her eyes danced over the smaller elf girl as if to examine her for further injury that was possibly missed on their first encounter. "My friends took good care of you when I was in Fort Drakon, it seems—where are my manners? My name is Lyna, and you're Rhyann, right? Your cousin, Soris I think… he's here too and was talking about you."
Soris's name filled Rhyann's ears, causing her large eyes to grow wide with excitement. During the months in her cell, she had known that he was locked up as well, but he was always in a different chamber, so she never saw him. "My cousin is here?" Her voice cracked as she spoke, a little shocked by the revelation. "Can I see him?" Family was always an important, not only as one of Rhyann's personal convictions, but also as Alienage culture. They didn't have much, but they had each other, which was always more than enough.
"You should probably eat first. Wynne said that they force-fed you when you were unconscious, but it isn't quite the same as eating for yourself."
"That blonde human man went to get me something just a moment ago." Explained Rhyann quickly. There was no way that she was in any condition to go and get the food herself, and she knew that.
"You must mean Alistair." Confirmed Lyna, but mainly for herself. "After you've eaten, I'll take you to meet everyone and see your cousin. They're still not letting anyone into the Alienage, but the Queen's trying to pull some strings to get the Wardens in, so you may be staying here a while."
Tears welled up in Rhyann's eyes as Lyna finished speaking. For the whole time she was locked in that cell, she never cried because it would give Vaughan satisfaction to know he broke her. He did; the elf knew that he crushed the naïve, innocent girl she once was. And yet, here in front of a woman she hardly knew, she begun to do just that. Fat little tears rolled down her face at the memory of seeing Shianni brutalized, feeling the putrid breath of her tormenters crawling across her ivory skin, or the debilitating hunger the clawed at her belly for months. It all came rushing at her at once in one torrent of pain, causing her to hiccup uncontrollably as she attempted to mop up her face with the back of her hand. She glanced up at Lyna once, noticing her concerned gaze. "I'm sorry." Bellowed the elf in an attempt to stop the crying. "I just…I never thought that I'd get out of that cell. But, then you came in like a gift from the Maker and freed me."
Mentally, Rhyann slapped herself when she realized what she had said. The Dalish, they didn't believe in the Maker. And now this woman probably thought that she was uneducated and preachy for even mentioning the human God. "I'm sorry, that was probably rude of me." Muttered the girl in an attempt to back-peddle from her faux-pas. "You don't believe in the Maker…do you?"
"You apologize too much." Observed Lyna, though she remained composed through her speech. She turned slightly, to face the other elf more effectively. "Saying that I don't believe in the Maker would kind of be a lie." She explained. "My partner was a sister in the Chantry, and she believes in the Maker with such conviction that there must be some truth to it. Personally, I believe that the human deity 'The Maker' is one and the same with Elgarn'nan; the Chantry teaches that the Maker created everything, and the Dalish believe that Elgarn'nan created everything. It's not a widely accepted belief, but it's what I think is true." A brief smile cut her face after she explained her religious standing. "It wasn't rude, either. I have come to accept that not everyone believes the way I do."
"I'm not interrupting something, am I?"
Both elves looked up towards the door at the comment. Alistair had returned, carrying a wooden bowl of something obviously hot, judging by the steam emanating from it. He also held a bit of bread in his other hand, fresh-baked, if the smell was any indicator. "The cook practically pummeled me with her stew spoon." He joked light-heartedly, taking a few paces towards the bed. "She thought I was getting into the cheese again."
Lyna took the food from the man as he went to hand it to her. They both clearly knew that it would be easier for the woman to hand the food to their hungry new friend, so speaking of it seemed redundant. "Do you blame her, Al? Eamon had some fancy Orlesian cheese imported for Isolde's birthday, and you ate it all during one of your infamous midnight raids of the larder."
"You know, I hate it when you call me 'Al'." Chided the man, though the smirk on his face only made him seem otherwise unfazed by the remark. "And, we agreed never to speak of that again."
"Okay, Prince Alistair." Teased the Dalish mischievously. Her words rolled off of her tongue just as she handed the bowl and bread over to the girl.
Abandoning any sense of manners that Rhyann may have had, the girl snatched up the food being presented to her. The spoon submerged in the bland-colored stew was neglected entirely, instead, she viciously ripped apart hunks of the bread, deciding that an edible utensil made much more sense at that particular moment. In her haste, the young elf scarcely tasted the food she was consuming at record speed. After about four mouthfuls, she looked up, a bit of the grayish-brown gravy ambling down her chin leisurely. Both Lyna and Alistair were staring at her; their eyes had grown wide with the spectacle at hand. Her shoulders slumped as the shame of embarrassing herself in front of strangers settled in. The near-emptied bowl was set in her lap in an over-exaggeratedly slow movement, lending to her theory that time had stopped.
"She looks exactly like you did at dinner the other night!" Roared Lyna, breaking the uneasy silence that had befell them. A raucous laughter complimented her statement. The Dalish then punched the man in the arm playfully, though whatever force she had put into the movement was lost due to being weakened by her mirth and the sheer unrelenting qualities of the compact muscles of his arm.
Alistair looked as though he wanted to laugh at the spectacle, for about the three seconds between the image of Rhyann with food on her face and Lyna scrutinizing his own eating habits. "I…that's not very nice, Lyna." The slightly hurt expression on his face matched the tone of his voice as he stammered through his words. Almost instantly, however, his composure changed, and his hand reached out for the knob on the door. "I actually have to go. Eamon has been hounding me to meet with him and Anora to discuss this whole 'Landsmeet' thing, and I've been avoiding both of them. I should probably get it out of the way."
While the other elf seemed concerned with the man's exit, Rhyann used her arm to wipe the food off of her face. Having a full stomach definitely helped to make her feel better, both physically and emotionally. Regardless of how she felt, she still didn't understand why a human man was concerning himself with her well-being. Since she was alone yet again with Lyna, it was probably a good time to ask about that. "Why was he helping me? Alistair, that is. He must have some ulterior motive for helping elves."
"Al? Ulterior motive? Are you sure we're talking about the same man?" Questioned Lyna curiously. She took the now-empty bowl from the smaller female and placed it on the table just beyond the bed as a means to help her. "Alistair's one of the nicest people I've ever met, and this is coming from someone who had a vendetta against every human who crossed their path just a few months ago. He's always treated the other elves traveling with us and I as his equals, so I think him getting things for you was just concern for someone who is otherwise incapable of doing it for themselves."
Lyna's words confused Rhyann. Maybe it was due to her sheltered upbringing behind the Alienage walls, but she was of the opinion that all humans saw elves as second-class citizens to be ordered around at their whim. She was still having a hard time believing that there was nothing to the kind gesture, other than just that; all the humans she met were always nice until they could get her to do what they wanted, then, they became mean. "I still don't understand." She admitted shyly.
"Humans can surprise you, sweetie; don't strain yourself mulling over the fine details." The Dalish rose to her feet with the slightest of bounces. "How about I take you to meet everyone now? I'm sure they'll be happy to see you're feeling better and you probably want to see your cousin."
At the mention of Soris, Rhyann practically bounced out of the bed excitedly. Her bony legs had never moved so quickly in her whole life, the girl figured. Already, she was overwhelmed with everything she was being faced with and was apprehensive about meeting even more new people, but if this woman had faith and trust in them, the young elf figured that they had to be nice enough.