A/N: probably going to have a bit of this story already written. I understand the timeline is a little messed up, but I promise I know what I'm doing. I think. :x I would appreciate some reviews. And to start off this story…on the second chapter, here is a question! I will ask one in every chapter.
What was the one class you often used in both Origins and DA2? Rogue, Warrior, or Mage.
Chapter 1
The Raven
"All caught up in the eye of the storm,
and trying to figure out what it's like moving on."
"Not that I am curious or anything, but was this friend attractive?"
"Andraste's flaming arse, Anders, can you please just be quiet?"
There was a small huff and the shifting of robes as the man crossed his arms childishly, "Well I'm just saying…"
"Oi, don't get yer knickers in a twist, Sparklefingers. I'll tell ya' all about Morrigan when yer old enough, hehe."
"Ew. No thank you." Anders shot a helpless glance at his Commander as Oghren scooted over closer to him. "Knowing you, dwarf, you'd probably go into full detail of your sick fantasies. I doubt I'd ever get clean again after that."
A tiny nose scrunched up in both frustration and annoyance as petite elven hands searched through the belongings of a woman she had once thought to call a friend. Everything was old and worn, dirtied by mud and other substances that had a faint glow to it. It had been only a few hours ago since she had spoken to Morrigan for the last time, the witch's words having an eerie and unsettling affect on her. She had requested that Morrigan keep some things to herself, that she didn't want to hear anything more about Flemeth or dark magic.
Oh, she knew that she was supposed to go back and tell the Wardens everything about the other woman, but there were things that were better left unsaid. Telling the others that she had let another partake in a ritual to save their own skins, potentially producing something dark and evil?
Perhaps the child that Morrigan protected was evil, but there was a certain look in the witch's feline eyes that had caught her interest. Morrigan had looked worried, but there was an air of determination and resolve about her that had rung with more truth than the Warden had ever seen in her. She loved the child, or at least that was what the elven Commander wanted to believe. She only hoped that Morrigan would not turn out as Flemeth had.
"Oriella?"
At the sound of her name, she dropped the small goblet in her hand into the puddle beneath her and turned her head toward Anders. His hand was reaching for the mirror without permission, and before she could tell him to step away from it, his fingers touched the glass. He let out a small yelp that startled her into standing, moving over toward her companion's side. She almost wished she hadn't sent Ariane and Finn back to where they came, because at least they knew more about this bloody mirror than she did, but she also knew that they had no business here.
But Oriella really regretted that she had not asked if the mirror was dangerous enough to warrant striking it down.
"What happened?"
"It burnt my sodding finger." Anders, with a grin tugging at his lips, raised his hand to the Commander's face. "Did you know that a kiss is the best healing magic of all?"
"Sissy-girl."
With a roll of her eyes, Oriella shoved Oghren aside with her hand until he was sputtering insults, only to quiet down as she handed him his confiscated flask back. There was a moment where the two simply stared at Oghren as he began to muttered nonsensical things to an inanimate object. It was Anders who broke the silence.
"As I was saying—"
"I am not touching your finger, Anders. It was your own damn fault." She let out a quiet sigh as the other mage whined beside her, enough until Oghren's attention was diverted back to him and they began their daily argument again. It usually consisted of 'you dirty dwarf' and the famous 'you sissy nug-humper.' It was easy to ignore once one got use to it, but as Oriella's brow furrowed in confusion and she spotted something shifting in the depths of the mirror, she found her patience thinning quickly.
"Enough you two!" She pushed back a curled strand of her blonde hair once it tickled her face, a hand on her hip and that stern little glare on her face that usually had people laughing because, honestly, it wasn't all that intimidating.
"He started it."
Oghren lashed out with a short kick to the mage's leg.
"Bloody buggering fuck!"
Anders then mentioned something along the lines of Oghren's height and how he even managed to reach as high as his knee in spite of the dwarf, but as she turned to look at the mirror she found herself freezing as she spotted that thing again. The sharp sensation of magic and something dark pulled at her stomach, fingers twitching at her side as instinct told her to guard herself.
"Do you two sense anything?
"Besides smelling Oghren on my clothes every time I stand next to him?"
"Hah. Yer just upset you don't smell like a real man."
"Something moved in the mirror." Oriella felt Anders' hand on her shoulder that moment, pulling her away as a small burst of energy pulsed against the glass. Something loud, like a clap of thunder, stung her ears until she winced and resorted to covering her eyes as a blinding flash of light seared her vision. It lasted longer than a burst of light should have, leaving a groaning Anders and a cursing dwarf in its wake.
"What the bloody hell was that?"
She would have answered with just the shrug of her shoulders, because she was none the wiser, but a sharp sound of gasping breath had her eyes falling upon the lean form of an elf on his knees, retching clear bile onto the dusty floor. It was her experience with the unknown that had her reaching for her staff behind her back, gritting down hard on teeth as her eyes took in his form.
He looked older than her by maybe four or three years? It was hard to pinpoint such a thing, but if the hard lines on his face as he finally looked up were any indication, he was older than her. And he had white hair. White hair and markings that vaguely reminded her of the Dalish, although there was a slight glow to them and they seemed to hum whenever the light pulsed within it.
Lyrium. He had lyrium etched in his skin.
How was that even possible?
She sucked in a breath as the sound of reality came rushing to her ears, reaching out to Anders to stop him as he went to check and see if the white-haired elf wasn't injured in anyway. But as soon as the other mage was close enough, close enough that the elf tensed at the approaching figure, the markings lit brighter and she immediately took that as a warning.
"Anders, don't—"
It must have been the name that set the elf off, because as soon as it left her mouth green eyes were narrowed harshly upon Anders and a snarl fell from foreign lips. It happened all so fast that she nearly tripped on her robes trying to make it over to them, or perhaps it was because she didn't understand what exactly happened.
One moment the elf's arm was solid, the next it was imbedded in Anders' chest as soon as the mage knelt down.
There was pain on Anders' face she had never seen before, contorting those playful dimples into something almost ugly as he dropped his staff and simply went limp.
"You are hurting him!"
Oghren moved, a small little blur of red that charged in the direction of the glowing elf. She debated whether this was a good idea, that it was better to just end the life of this stranger if he threatened those in her company, but he also had his hand in Anders' chest.
"Oghren!"
He stilled at his name being called, muttering something that Oriella didn't bother to catch as her eyes turned to the growling elf.
"Not that I'm flattered," Anders managed to get out, "But I think your hand is stuck in my chest."
His words didn't elicit any amusement from the elf. If anything, it made him even angrier as the muscles of his arm seemed to tighten and Anders let out a breathless sound of pain.
"What have you done to me, abomination?"
She wasn't good with daggers, swords, or even wooden ones. If Oriella was as uncoordinated as she walked, then giving her sharp weapons wasn't the best idea one could have. But on special occasions like this one, she did have a chance to pull that dagger she hid in the sleeves of her robes out and to hold it precariously close to the elf's neck. If she had been any other woman, she would have been memorized by the quiet hum of lyirum beneath skin that drew up in fancy lines along the neck she now threatened.
"Release him."
As green eyes met her, she faced a challenge. She could see he wasn't about to back done any second, but she took note of the exhaustion and confusion that lingered around the darker flecks of gold around his iris. She pressed the blade of the knife closer to his throat, her frown deepening as he only bared his teeth like an animal. There was a moment where they simply stared at each other, one too stubborn to give in and the other apprehensive and scared that Anders would be hurt beyond understanding.
His hand was in his chest.
But all it took was a roll her shoulders for stranger's eyes to fall down and land upon the pauldrons of her robes. It was the only actual armor she wore, protective plates that covered her shoulders. The others insisted that she wear something stronger to protect her, but she had walked around for a whole year in cheap metals and itchy fabrics enough for her to appreciate the simplicity of a robe. It wasn't what the elf was looking at however, but staring with wide and curious eyes at the insignia of the Grey Wardens burned proudly into the silverite metal.
To her great relief, Anders was released where he fell on his back and started clutching at his chest as if he couldn't believe it was still there.
"Thank Oghren's hairy ass!"
"Oi!"
The elf was avoiding her eyes now, but she took the hint and backed off a little. There was a pinch in her brow as looked him over, wearing all black. His armor was sharp, the claws of his gauntlet reminding her of a raven.
She liked ravens.
Her lips pursed, "Thank you."
"Don't thank me, witch."
Her brow furrowed even more, casting a glance to a shrugging Anders as the elf put his head in his hands and his elbows on his knees. It was an oddly vulnerably position to put one's self in at a time like this, but it didn't seem he was letting his guard down at all. Or maybe he was. She didn't know him at all, how could she possibly know his facets?
"Why did you call Anders an abomination?"
"Why do you ask such obvious questions?" His voice was raspy and low, a quality she would have appreciated if it weren't laced with such sarcasm. She scowled.
"I could interrogate you with my witchly powers, if you'd prefer."
He only scowled again and didn't respond right away, something she found both disrespectful and frustrating. Anders murmured something to Oghren that had the elf scowling, and Oriella couldn't help but feel this burning hatred coming off him that was directed entirely at Anders.
"Do you know him, Anders?"
"If you haven't noticed, Commander, he seems to have a thing against mages. And I'm all pro-mage, so I don't see us prancing through a field of flowers any time soon."
Oghren snorted.
"Well he seems to know you." Anders shrugged at her statement of observation, looking on in confusion as she moved back toward the elf with a nervous little twitch about her.
Her hand was held out to him with a stern look in her eyes, daring him to say or do anything rash. But he only glared and swatted her hand away like a child, and Oriella could only watch with some small sense of satisfaction as the other elf attempted to stand only to stumble. "Are you sure you're alright?" She reached out to him, but he practically growled at her. "You did just come through a mirror, of all things."
"I'm fine."
He didn't look fine. He looked considerably paler in his face than the rest of his body did, and he had reached around him in what Oriella could only guess was an instinctual movement to get a weapon from his back, but there was nothing there.
And then he stumbled again.
"Relax." She moved to help him and to put her arm around his shoulder, but the withering look he sent her made her hesitate. "I'm only trying to help you. And being that I am a Grey Warden, I will have to take you with me for questioning, so you might want to make it easy on yourself."
"Does being a Grey Warden give you a right to kidnap a person?"
"It does when said person came through an old artifact we've been studying, yes."
He waved her away again, and this time she did back up.
"Very well." The smile she offered him was bland, perhaps a little exhausted. "We will wait for you outside then. I am sure you know where that is then, yes?"
He sent her that look again. The look that said she was beneath him and that he didn't care who or what she is, other than the fact that she had offended him by trying to help him.
She gave him the ever familiar Warden salute, where she pressed her right fist into her chest and bowed her head ever so slightly. It had him staring at her in slight confusion, but it seemed to vanish into panic when she turned around and waved for the others to follow. It was only a few steps, almost right off the island that the mirror resided on, when she heard him speak.
"Wait." She smiled sincerely this time when she turned to look at him. "What is your name?"
"Oriella Surana. And you?"
If it were possible, he looked even more lost and frustrated than he already did. "That's not possible. You are supposed to be dead."
"Pardon?"
Anders sighed. "Please don't let this be another assassination attempt."
"Let me kill the little tree-hugger!"
Oriella smiled a little at the dwarf's words as she raised a hand to subdue him. "I am very much alive. Now do we get a name?"
He pursed his lips, studying her with those cold green eyes of his before he finally gave a little sigh and a nod of defeat. "Fenris."
"Fenris." It tasted strange on tongue, foreign and heavy. There was too much behind it she realized, this history she could see lying behind the glass of his eyes. If it had anything to do with the markings on his skin, the Warden wanted to know. "Come then. If we leave now, we could make it back to the Keep before sunset."
The way he moved reminded her so much of someone ready to spring if anything surprised him. It was good to be alert, especially in places like this, but it was the fact that the elf didn't loosen up. If anything, he only seemed to tense even more as he got closer to them.
"I promise Anders will be on his very best behavior." She laughed a little at the other elf's scoff of disbelief.
"I doubt it."
"Andraste's tits, I'm not an abomination!"
