He's always hung on to the hope that Arl Eamon would make it all better. Fix everything. Just like that. Snap of the fingers. But then they get to Redcliffe, and oh, wouldn't you know, doom. Arl Eamon is sick, and all his knightly friends are gone but Arlessa Isolde isn't – you think with so much doom in the world she'd at least have the decency to fall in a well somewhere – and Recliffe itself...
Well...
The undead horde isn't here for tea and crumpets, that's for sure.
At least, he consoles himself (while wiping slime off his sword for the fiftieth time that night) 'undead' doesn't start with a D.
But of course there is a dungeon. Isn't that just typical. And you think Teagan would have the intelligence to not walk into a trap that might as well have a big, flashing red sign on it saying TRAP, but so much for that. He chalks it up to the Arlessa. Everything always comes back to the Arlessa.
There is a dungeon, and that's an entire week's worth of doom because they find the bloodmage down there. Though he looks like too much of a wimp to be a bloodmage. He's still in apprentice robes, for Andraste's sake. Alistair begins playing soccer with an undead head against the wall, waiting for Verissa to finish her questioning and get it over with, you'd think after what just happened at the Circle she'd know that maleficarum need to be killed quickly –
"...Jowan..."
He turns. "What?" He points his sword-tip at the man, who flinches away even through the bars (and why is he still in Templar armor?). "Your best friend Jowan? That Jowan? You mean to tell me that this is him?"
Nod.
He is surely gaping at her, at both of them. He can tell because Morrigan is giving him that look. He doesn't care. "Can you tell me why your best friend is a bloodmage?"
She gives a long, long sigh. "Alistair..."
"She didn't know I was a bloodmage!" says the man – boy? – earnestly in rising, whining tones. "Honest! And I only dabbled – only a little! I swear! I've given it up!"
But there are years and years of Chantry discipline screaming in his head. "We should kill this man now," he says, as if 'this man' isn't here. Because they should. Obviously.
"Jowan," says Verissa, gone all cold. "His name is Jowan."
"And we should –"
"Set him free."
It takes a minute for the words to penetrate his Templar armor, and when they do the only thing that springs to mind is "what?"
"I'm setting him free," Verissa repeats, and even though she has to crane her neck to look at him she doesn't flinch at all. "You can fight me, if you like."
And yes, he is certainly gaping at her, because that's what it always takes to get Morrigan to step in. "She's talking sense, Templar," she says lightly, head cocked to the side as if considering him for her next spidery meal. "He's of little use to us here and he swears that he will help. What's the sense in letting a possible ally rot in some dank, disgusting cell?"
"Oh, and of course you would say that," he snaps, "with your – your strong moral center and all –"
Verissa's eyes are trained on him and they are dangerous. "Alistair, he is my friend."
"No. No, he should be dead, or at least he should be left here to let the rats nibble on him. End. Of. Story."
"And no one asks what I think," sighs an accented and disgustingly long-suffering voice from the shadows. "It's all just orders. Zevran, do this. Zevran, kill this man. Zevran, stand there and look ridiculously handsome." A sigh. "How fortunate that I am so good at it."
Verissa smiles, gaze not wavering an inch. "Zevran, open this cage?"
"Ah, yes. That too." The elf slips past and Alistair could grab him, could throw him to the ground and wipe that little Antivan smirk off his face and break all those shiny little lockpicks. But he and his mageling are glaring at each other, and he's not even sure who has who rooted to the spot. "If anyone's asking, I agree with the lovely women here," the Antivan tells him (or does he? He can never tell; half the times it seems Zevran talks to the air, the walls, or anything that will listen). "He's promised not to kill you, and we all know such promises hold weight, yes?"
"Shut up," Alistair mutters.
He doesn't want to look away, doesn't want to give up the slightest inch of ground, doesn't want to stop pouring this is wrong and how stupid can you be and bloodmage, HELLO! into her cool grey eyes. So she's the one who does. Finally. She turns to Jowan in his tattered blood-spattered robes and she hugs him, by Andraste, she hugs the bloodmage, and he is left there making small stupid inarticulate noises of rage and wondering, when did the world get so wrong?
