Nemesis
Chapter 14- Lost and Found
"This is only the beginning. You shall see that soon enough."
Badoc
Fenris woke, staring up into the dark empty rafters as he wearily wiped the sleep from his eyes and quickly assessed his surroundings. Rather than his usual waking- a haphazard sketch drawn out in panic and uncertainty as to where he was… which left him nearly always having to replay the last decade or so of his life in a matter of seconds- Fenris had rather unexpectedly startled into complete awareness of not only where he was but also of the precise moment he'd been startled into.
That was unusual.
It was also dangerously disconcerting.
A quick glance around verified he was indeed in Fort Fitz, although he was fairly certain that hadn't been the stronghold's original name. Judging from the architecture, this was just another of countless old Tevinter strongholds that had been abandoned for centuries before being repurposed for use in the Free Marches. Everything, from the pillars to the corning stones to the furniture to the old dusty carpets, simply screamed of the Imperium's ancient decadence. Only a Tevinter structure could still stand so strong and imposing so long after it had been lost. But that was the nature of the Imperium, it always left a piece of itself behind any place it touched- a dark stain of a reminder that tides always shifted and that the building itself was just waiting in quiet slumber for its true masters to return to the roost for good.
The small group of Templars hailing from Wycome had hosted them in this hated hovel for the past few days, kept them in this intimate dormitory by themselves, cloistered away from the others. Fenris had counted roughly twenty-five men in this battalion and they occupied only a small segment of the fortress. The rest of it had been cordoned off and sealed to protect from potential invaders. While that seemed perfectly reasonable, it was also an ideal excuse to keep the rebel party from exploring the area in full. That didn't sit well with the elf. In fact, little of this situation did.
For all the carefully guarded discussions they'd had with their leader, a Commander by the name of Badoc, they'd come no closer to convincing the group to abscond into the heart of the rebellion with them. In actuality, Fenris got the distinct impression this Badoc was on a fact-finding mission all his own. So many words had been exchanged between the groups but while they spoke with cordial politeness there was an underlying mistrust. For each and every word spoken, there were volumes that remained behind in silent unsaid mystery. For once, he was grateful to Merrill- the elf had likely been the sole cause for Carver entering the lion's den with an entourage instead of alone- he had to marvel a bit at Carver for that… the idea of his sister in potentially unfriendly hands made the young man far more reckless than usual.
All in all, he had the distinct impression that these men were not to be trusted. Too often conversations had been cut abruptly short whenever they approached, too many odd looks had been leveled at both himself and Merrill, and the patrols parading past their door had lingered too far long on far too many occasions. But that had not been the cause of his abrupt awakening. So what had?
It was still nighttime and by Fenris' estimation, he'd only been asleep for a few hours. He was just beginning to wonder what exactly had roused him when Merrill released a deep moan that had Fenris slamming his eyes shut once more.
Really Carver?
The boy had never struck Fenris as being anything approaching an exhibitionist but Fenris had noticed Merrill and Carver going missing for brief periods in the night while they camped beneath the stars on their way to the meet with the Templars. Fenris wasn't nearly ignorant enough to imagine Merrill simply fancied a moonlit frolic or rather that wasn't how she'd convinced Carver to accompany her. Perhaps the boy's libido had simply gotten the better of him. Carver suffered his affection for her in silence for years, which Fenris understood all to well having done the same. Had Fenris not been struck by such an adamant desire to court Marian Hawke properly, he very much doubted he would have let the mage out of bed for anything less than a month.
He waited in silence, willing his senses to block out his surroundings, but noticed his ears detected none of the other sounds he associated with sex- no accompanying groans or heavy breathing, no creaking of a bed beneath the added pressure of another body pushing into it. There was only a shifting of sheets accompanied by Merrill's soft moaning. Daring to behold a sight he suspected might blind him, he cracked his eyes and turned his head toward the sound.
Merrill was alone upon her cot, twisting violently against the sheets. The soft, frantic sounds she was making he recognized now as not being sexual in nature. She was having a nightmare. That unsettled him far more than the possibility of her engaging in coitus less than ten feet away from him. Mages who had nightmares were generally being plagued by something in the Fade and those things could use a witch's distress to reach out into the waking world.
Rolling from his own bed, Fenris considered for a brief moment attempting to wake her himself but then thought better of it. It would be better for her to disengage from the Fade to the sight of someone she associated with comfort. So he crept to Carver instead, jostling the other Templar from his sleep with a hushed whisper of his name.
"Carver," he rasped, "Merrill needs you."
The younger Hawke opened his eyes blearily, absently assessing his surroundings in sleepy confusion for too many moments before his ears too detected Merrill's nighttime suffering. Without another word, he darted from beneath his blanket, the plates in his armor catching and dragging the sheets from the bed as he scrambled to Merrill.
They all slept with their armor on, a silent agreement that this place was dangerous and the people who hosted them were never to be entirely trusted.
"Merrill, love," Carver cooed affectionately as he passed a hand through the mage's sweat soaked hair, "Wake up, love. You need to wake up."
Fenris took his distance to observe the mage's awakening. He knew he was an unwanted intruder between the two but if something were to happen, he needed to witness it. Carver continued his gentle prodding until Merrill awoke, gasping and wide-eyed as though she'd been shot through. She shot up through her sheets like an arrow had pierced her heart- open and terrified as any child waking from a nightmare.
"We have to leave," she gasped breathlessly. She drew her arms around her stomach in further effort to ward off her dreams. "We must leave this place."
"We are here," Carver whispered. "We are safe."
"We are not," she whispered fiercely. "This place is evil." It wasn't the first time she'd expressed her discomfort. It was, however, the first time she'd used that term to describe the fort.
Carver shook his head, apparently sharing the thought, and replied, "How?"
"I heard screaming in the Fade…" she moaned. "It's in pain."
Carver gave Fenris a desperate look but the elf could offer no answers. Danarius had professed reverence for that hated place, stating that its recognition was what placed mages above the so-called 'ungifted.' He'd even gone so far as saying that the Fade remembered things people had long forgotten. Anders often described his clinic as a place of healing, which Fenris figured was just an excuse to drag the party into the slum whenever anything beyond rudimentary healing was necessary. Even Hawke had described the Fade in such terms before- like it was a living, breathing thing and not merely location- but only once… when Varric pitched a job of clearing out a band of slavers that had roosted in the Foundry. As far as he knew, Marian had never returned to the place of her mother's slaughter.
Poisoned… she'd said Quentin had poisoned the Fade and then simply refused to reenter it despite her relish for dispatching slavers. At the time Fenris had dismissed the remark- after all her mother had been brutally murdered there and Fenris wasn't bastard enough to force the issue- but now he was wondering if she'd been talking about something more tangible than her own tainted memories. Varric in the end wisely took on the task without her. Fenris, Sebastian, and Aveline accompanied the dwarf and made quick work of the gang… the entire time the hairs on the back of his neck stood up on end. Even Aveline had commented that Hawke may have touched on some truth with her simple refusal.
But pain… Could a place even feel pain? And what did that mean for them?
"I recall rumors from Tevinter," Fenris tried at last, "of the Fade reflecting memories of the past. Perhaps that is what plagues her."
"It is not the past," Merrill shuddered bodily. "The Fade feels… dark somehow," the elf stuttered as she struggled to articulate. "It's almost like…" Then she trailed off, lost in her thoughts as she considered them.
"Like what, Merrill?" Carver gently prodded her.
She sighed and rubbed absently at her temples before answering. "It feels like Sundermount- like there's something very big and very evil waiting just on the other side of the Veil. Everything seemed normal enough but… now, I heard it screaming."
"Could this be just a nightmare?" Carver questioned gently, taking care not to dismiss her. "We're under a lot of pressure."
"There is blood in the Veil. This is no nightmare," she whispered seriously. "This is real. This is here. And if it is not now… then it is very recent."
"Merrill," Carver murmured and placed an arm around her delicate shoulders, scooting onto her cot to hold her properly, "do you know what could have caused this?"
"No," she admitted, tucking her head into the crook of Carver's neck. "But it worries me, Carver. Something is not right here."
Fenris averted his eyes from the couple, understanding the intimacy was something he was intruding upon. In spite of his opinions regarding Merrill, he found himself believing her. Perhaps it was the situation itself that explained it but he noticed gooseflesh had taken to his arms. Perhaps Marian had been right. Perhaps the world shaped the Fade around it and vice versa. If that was true, then Merrill's nightmare was the darkest omen he could fathom.
The younger Hawke entwined himself with his lover, looking up only to say, "I'll keep her solid for the night. You should get some rest."
The boy was right and Fenris couldn't deny it- they were all of them lambs slumbering in the lions' den with a single, wary wolf-in-sheepskin-gone-native. If Merrill was monitored then she'd surely make it to the morning where they could hopefully sort this whole mess out. Some sleep and sunshine could solve a world of problems. Without another word, Fenris crept back to his own cot and rested upon it, praying for a rough sleep he knew for certain would not come. Then he, Merrill, and Carver sat in silence waiting for the sunshine to protect them from the night.
When morning came and the others awoke, they had a quiet, hushed discussion as to what course of action should be taken next. Carver and Fenris had inevitably come to the same conclusion while lying awake. If something were as desperately wrong here as Merrill believed, they could not simply gather their belongings and leave without first investigating it. They'd never been given the freedom to wander the halls, which was a perfectly reasonable restriction for potentially hostile guests.
Their best course of action, it seemed, would be a bit of quiet snooping. While Fenris had a little experience with espionage, he didn't have the true talent for it that Varric and Sebastian did. So it was decided that Sebastian, perhaps the best-known rogue in their party would feign illness that would keep him confined into their quarters and Varric would remain behind to play the role of doting nursemaid until they had the opportunity to lurk away and explore.
Merrill, while still deeply opposed to remaining here a moment longer than necessary, agreed in the end that whatever had disrupted her sleep should be investigated before they left. This meant their morning was once more spent locked in a study with Knight-Commander Badoc as they once more discussed the possibility of a mass-defection from the Templar order.
"Is your sister planning on coming to the table, Knight Carver," Badoc asked for the first time since their arrival. Thus far, Marian had remained unmentioned by either group. Carver was concerned that revealing her missing status could compromise the rebellion and he was undeniably right. If it became known that Marian was missing or even…
He shook that thought aside. Marian was not dead. She was not staring blankly skyward, she had not been plunged six feet into dirt, she was not being digested by graveworms- those things were impossible. That woman had proven time and again that she simply didn't know how to die. It was doubly doubtful that anyone was fully prepared to educate her on the subject.
Regardless, any queries regarding her had been dodged. The rebellion needed her to act as a beacon. And while he still wasn't entirely comfortable sitting on this side of the table for this discussion, he was certain it would have been more awkward to sit beside Badoc- next to a man who may very well want to kill her. So he'd remained silent regarding Marian Hawke. There was no telling why Badoc had been similarly mute on the subject until now.
"My sister has been in Ferelden," Carver answered with practiced evasion. "She'll be happy to meet with you once she returns."
"Ferelden?" Badoc murmured wryly. "We were under the impression she'd gone north into Tevinter." There was a dark smugness underlying his words and it set Fenris' teeth on edge. From what he'd gathered from Carver, Marian's trip to Tevinter was a closely guarded secret. Fenris felt his eyes narrow slightly as he reappraised the man before him- Badoc clearly knew more than he was letting on.
Carver's ears perked slightly despite his ears being far less expressive than an elf's. "And what gave you that impression?"
"The rumor mills have been buzzing," Badoc admitted with a sheepish smile. All traces of the haughtiness from before were completely gone now, leaving behind only the ghost of the memory of it having been there. "I've personally heard of her being sighted in more than a dozen cities across Thedas- Markham, Ostwick, even as far west as Hunter Fell. We've even had reports of her possibly going into Orlais around the Harvest. A mage fitting your sister's description torched five innocent men there."
His sources were accurate at least on that count. Blast it, Fenris had done everything he could to conceal her presence there but Marian for all her abilities to sink into a crowd still cut a striking figure, especially when she left five charred bodies in her wake. He wondered briefly how many blue-eyed, raven-haired, pale-skinned, apostate pyromaniacs with a knack for the healing arts one should expect to find traipsing around Thedas. "Your sources are mistaken," Fenris replied instead, knowing the number to be devastatingly low. Even if Badoc had scored a lucky shot in learning that Hawke had been in Orlais, it would serve them better for him to think his sources were flawed.
"Are they?" Badoc sneered in cold calculation as he eyed Fenris. "Next I suppose you'll be telling me it was some other white-haired elven Knight from Starkhaven who covered her tracks."
Alright… Badoc's sources were extremely accurate. So what else did he know?
"I would not deny I was there." Not now at any rate, he added silently. "I was following up on the same rumors you've doubtlessly heard. The mage you speak of was apprehended outside Cosazure."
"And did she answer for her crimes?"
"She claimed it was self-defense and the evidence supported that. The men were gang members attempting rape. I am rather surprised your informants failed to pass that bit of trivia along." Fenris saw Carver's head jerk slightly in his peripheral vision. Apparently this was new information to him and judging by the cold steel that clouded his eyes, the news of some of the very real dangers Marian faced while leading the rebellion from the shadows was not welcome.
Fortunately Badoc was turned away and didn't catch the lapse in Carver's mask. "They did indeed. But you mean to tell me you do not think burning five men alive to be a bit of overkill?"
"My thoughts would not change the matter as it were. She thought her life to be in danger." Fenris himself believed that statement to be a lie. Knowing Marian's capabilities as well as he did meant that she'd in fact been in little peril and seeing the scorched carnage she'd reduced her attackers to proved it more so. But, again, revealing otherwise would have been a misstep in the careful dance he was toeing. "I would not begrudge myself a sword were I to find myself in similar circumstances," he finished with a succinct nod. "I am certain you too would be loath to begrudge a frightened woman the only weapon to her person."
"Fair enough," Badoc admitted before turning his focus back to Carver. "So you mean to say the rumors that she's gone north are baseless?"
"My last word from her was that she was still in Ferelden. If she went to Tevinter, I've yet to hear about it from her." Fenris almost grinned at Carver's rather impressive ability to tell the truth in a way that revealed very little of it. The boy wasn't an accomplished liar but had managed regardless to hone a different skill to work around it.
"And when was the last time you heard from her?"
"We like to keep in touch," Carver answered bluntly, stating without words that further discussion on this subject was closed. "So have you given further thought to joining the rebellion?"
A heavy knock sounded on the door and Badoc excused himself briefly to see to it. Fenris, Merrill, and Carver were left to their own devices for the moment but in this proximity to the Commander, there was no hope to discuss the odd turn the conversation had taken in anything other than wary, furtive glances. Carver and Merrill shared a slow look with one another before Carver turned his eyes to Fenris, holding his gaze for a long moment before shaking his head to indicate his mistrust.
Fenris nodded, catching the message Carver had silently delivered. Badoc's informers were far more reliable than they had any right to be. They needed to discover the heart of his information before they could even hope to leave.
Badoc sighed and rubbed his temples. "I am unsure I could convince the entirety of my charges to join you with what you've given me thus far."
Carver shrugged indifferently, nodding his understanding that this sort of decision wasn't one that could be made hastily. "So what more would you need?"
"Joining a movement under a mage who permitted the decimation of an entire Chantry and led the slaughter of an entire platoon of Circle Templars does not sit well with my people," Badoc replied with a blessed bluntness.
"My sister had no knowledge of Anders' plan and the Nullification was entirely borne of Meredith's madness," Carver answered in an automated drawl, indicating this was a speech he'd been compelled to deliver several times before. "Those mages deserved to be defended from being murdered for a crime they had no part in."
Badoc gave a wary chortle. "So you say. I think it would help my men to hear her say it in person and let them judge her crimes for themselves."
"That is not an option at this moment." Carver ran a tired hand through his hair, pushing it away from his face to eye the Commander better. "You have my assurances as a Knight that she had no participation in the event."
"And I should take the word of lapsed Knight leading a band of apostates and other lapsed Knights."
Carver scowled. It was a mean, hateful look Fenris hadn't before seen grace the boy's face. "Our vows were to protect the people from mages and to protect mages from themselves," he ground out. "I have kept my vows. Have you?"
"I've had no part in shielding apostates accused of blowing up any religious centers, if that's what you're asking," Badoc retorted snidely, letting a dark annoyed look overtake his eyes for a moment before shuttering it away again.
"My sister was not responsible for that."
"I'm afraid the facts say otherwise, Ser Carver." With that Badoc rose from his seat and placed his hands upon the table between them, letting his imposing size accent his words. "Your dwarven friend informed a Seeker that Hawke all but announced publicly that she helped him gather the materials for the bomb then distracted the Grand Cleric while Anders planted it."
While Fenris had little doubt that Varric had told a truthful, if unnecessarily dramatic, rendition of what had happened that wretched morning, he still found himself wishing the dwarf had toned down the truth a bit for the Seeker. "She was duped into thinking the supplies were for something else," Carver answered finally.
"And distracting the Grand Cleric?"
Carver massaged his temples for a moment before directing his eyes back at Badoc. "She placed her trust in a man who didn't deserve it. We've all…"
Badoc cut him short again with a sneered, "But she was aware he was an abomination?"
Carver swallowed visibly, likely coming to the same conclusion Fenris had in the same moment. There was little point in denying that Marian had known quite well that Anders was possessed. It was similarly pointless to claim that Marian had no idea just how dangerous Anders' spirit of Justice had proved himself even before he'd destroyed the Chantry. Varric had doubtless already informed the Seeker otherwise- it was a story as compelling as it was damning and the dwarf couldn't have kept it safely censored even for Hawke's benefit.
Fenris would have to remember later to speak with the dwarf regarding the merits of half-truths and outright lies when it came to discussing the illustrious career of Kirkwall's fallen Champion. Leave it for the final edition. Leave the truth alone until it couldn't hurt her anymore.
"Yes," Carver answered after a brief moment. "She believed the distinction between harboring a spirit and a demon was a factor worth considering."
"Yes, a factor that has led to a pandemic of war."
Carver huffed out a sigh and straightened his shoulders before beginning in a firm lecture, "I'll remind you the Hero of Ferelden also traveled with a mage hosting a Fade spirit and I'm certain I don't need to remind you that went rather smashingly for everyone involved."
"Yes," Badoc admitted before tacking on, "the Hero of Ferelden certainly had no part in blowing up any Chantries."
"My sister has made mistakes," Carver tried before Badoc cut him off with an angry snarl.
"Mistakes? You call the deaths of hundreds of people mere mistake?" The Commander banged his hands angrily against the table and stalked to Hawke's brother to point an ugly, accusatory finger at him. "Her mistakes, as you so casually name them, would have any decent leader turning the reins over to another. The Chantry knows about all the countless, unforgivable errors- how she released apostates and placed her trust in thieves and pirates and murderers! And now she has to audacity to beg assistance without even having the stones to face her own crimes? I'd laugh if you weren't daft enough to be serious."
"Watch your tone," Carver warned, as he too rose to his feet, "or you risk this becoming an unfriendly discussion."
"It would be in your best interest to sit down, Carver Hawke, or the dwarf and Vael will regret it," Badoc snarled back. "Now I'll ask you again- where is your sister?"
Fenris watched as the boy's knees began to buckle, watched as his face took on a greenish tint as he sunk back into his chair. "What have you done?" he growled with a distinctly furious chatter in his teeth.
"Your two friends were caught sneaking about and before you think to try anything, we've already managed to secure them. So I'd caution against doing anything rash." Badoc returned to his seat with a smug grin and poured himself a glass of water. "I've tried to be civil but if you insist on feeding me lies then rest assured, I have less conventional methods for making an honest man of you."
Badoc smirked, leaving Fenris with an unbearable urge to beat the snide smile from his face. The elf lurched forward from his seat, tossing his chair aside to land a single blow to the man's face before a heavy strike against his skull had him collapsing at the immaculate Templar's feet. The room began to fade away, darkness crashing in at the edges of his vision in an impromptu nighttime, before he forced it back and let the painful anger steer his body's vessel. His arm shot out to strike two more jabs into the Commander's exposed midsection.
Vaguely, he felt the other man wrap his hand into his hair and direct the elf's face up to his sneer. "Where is she?"
The hatred overpowered the wound for a moment, permitting the elf to reach up to the man's groin and deliver a solid punch to his bollocks. His efforts were rewarded with a yelp of pain, the Commander's face going purple as he brought his sharp knee up to slam into Fenris' jaw. The pain barely found him for a moment before he heard the door crash open. He took Badoc's brief distraction as an opportunity to pull the dagger from the Commander's waist holster and press the long blade against the man's throat.
The man, looking absolutely unperturbed to the shift in circumstances, simply sneered, "Do it and your friends die, elf," Badoc sneered.
"Kill them and you have sentenced your men to the same fate," Fenris spit back, feeling a thick trickle of blood leak from the edge of his mouth. Absently he ran his tongue over his teeth and was rather delighted to find none of them had broken.
Badoc threw his head back and released a hearty belly-laugh. "You know what, Fenris? I rather like you. Sitting here in my base and giving me lip- that takes balls, son. It's a shame you picked the losing side. You would have done well here."
Fenris gently pressed the blade closer, delighting when the skin on Badoc's neck yielded beneath the sharp metal and bloomed a thick, scarlet line. Badoc's eyes, however, ceded nothing- no fear, no uncertainty, no acknowledgment that his life was in a rather immediate mortal peril. It was because the man, when it came down to it, was entirely safe if only for the moment… and he knew it. Even if the rage was so cloying on the elf's tongue, Badoc knew Fenris would not endanger the lives of his captured companions for a small, if sweet, revenge.
"This is not over," Fenris promised and lowered Badoc's knife from the man's treacherous throat as he felt rather than saw the incoming Templars fasten his arms behind his back. His peripheral vision caught Carver and Merrill being similarly manhandled.
"You're correct," Badoc called as the elf was pulled bodily away. "This is only the beginning. You shall see that soon enough."
There was something beautiful to be found in destruction. There was some kind of poetry in loss, in defeat, in failure. And for the life of him, Fenris couldn't find it. They'd been dragged into some previously cordoned-off subbasement, stripped of their weapons and armors, and left utterly defenseless from the attacks that were certainly coming. Two guards stood nearby, eliminating the possibility for actively plotting an escape- the men were certainly prepared to overhear their each and every word.
"We must stop meeting like this," Sebastian joked when he finally awoke, wincing as the movement from his words shifted the black and blue face tapestry adorning his typically pale skin. "Tell me, did they make you carry me here?" Then he broke off in a series of wet, rattling coughs. Just from the sound of them, Fenris figured the prince was nursing a few broken ribs.
Fenris shook his head rather than give a spoken response. Varric and Sebastian had been unconscious for the last several hours, though if it was from the trauma of having several angry Templars bashing their bodies for sport or some sort of poison Fenris couldn't rightly tell. All he could discern from his position was that the bruises must have been absolute agony. The two spies-turned-prisoners been placed in a cell across from theirs and the thick bars had prevented him from inspecting the damage too closely. Upon his waking Sebastian moved sluggishly, in an almost drugged fashion. His head lolled atop his long neck, the thick muscles seeming too uncoordinated to support it properly. Even his attempts to strain against the shackles holding him in place looked weak and tired.
Varric made no attempt to move, seeming to understand by observing Sebastian that the efforts would be in vain and opting to reserve what strength he had. "How long was I out?" he asked instead, giving a cursory glance to his bare chest as he realized his state of undress.
"A few hours," Merrill answered as she rolled her head uncomfortably against the collar clamped tightly around her neck. He'd heard of them being used in Tevinter on mage prisoners but had only ever seen them once he joined the Templars under Petra. Fenris could detect a slight waver in her tone. She hadn't needed to voice her concerns that they would not wake- it had been a silent pact between them to not acknowledge that very real possibility. "What happened?"
Varric groaned as he situated himself into a proper seated position rather than remaining sprawled out on the floor. "For starters, there are more of them than you've seen."
"Easily twice as many," Sebastian groaned. "Possibly more."
Varric nodded, grimacing as he brought his hand up to rub his neck. "We made it past that door on the ground level. You remember the one at the end of the great hall?" When Fenris nodded, Varric continued, "It's not unoccupied. These people came here for a fight. They're armed to the teeth. Carver, they're going to take the camp. It's the only thing that makes sense."
"I already sent word to Margot to move it," Carver answered, which surprised Fenris since he hadn't seen the boy mailing off any letters. How were the Mage camps communicating with one another anyways? If Carver and Marian were spearheading this rebellion from such a great distance it stood to reason that there must have been some relatively secure method of communication between them. The siblings certainly weren't foolish enough to keep mailboxes in the nearby settlements. "I don't know where it is anymore. Won't know until they resettle."
"They won't believe you," Merrill replied quietly.
"It doesn't matter," Carver said after a hard swallow. "They won't be found."
"What about you?" Merrill asked, staring at the ground by her feet.
"I'll be fine. They're not going to hurt any of us if my sister is still out there."
Fenris considered Carver's words, turning them over in his mind until the obvious answer revealed itself. "You think they mean to use us as bait."
Carver nodded. "They don't know where she is and they want her. They're aiming to knock us out with one blow. Take her out. Take me out. The rest just falls apart."
"Would it be that easy?" Fenris balked, finding it hard to believe that the whole of the rebellion could crumble with the loss of two single, albeit very important, people.
Carver and Merrill both broke from the conversation to shoot him deeply annoyed, skeptical looks. "Of course not. Don't be stupid." He gave a brief wave to the room and continued, "These people are stupid. You're not. Besides, we already have fail-safes in place in the event that anything happens to us."
Fenris nodded at the backhanded compliment. Of course it couldn't be felled that easily. Carver and Marian had been campaigning and networking for over a year, joining groups together and keeping them safely apart. He'd only seen one camp and there were at least five more from what he'd managed to gather on his covert eavesdropping missions. They'd amassed a number of trusted lieutenants that were doubtless prepared to take the reins. After all, this rebellion had begun with Anders… and it certainly hadn't died with him.
"What if she doesn't come?" Sebastian spoke softly. "What if something really did happen to her?"
"She'll come," Varric answered. "They're counting on it. That's why we are here, choirboy. That's why we're still alive."
But they couldn't wait. There was no telling when the dashing heroine could arrive or even if she'd arrive at all. Carver had admitted to sending word to her of their intentions to meet with these Templars but was uncertain she'd received them- she'd failed to respond to his past missives, although he was clueless as to whether she'd received them. Even if she did manage to stage some daring rescue, she would still be waltzing into the trap these men had so neatly laid out of her. The imminent threat hovering over them was all too real and if they were to escape, they'd need to do it quickly and use the advantage surprise would give them.
Fenris considered the options. Their two trusty lockpicks were disposed of at the moment- Fenris seriously doubted either were in good enough form to slip from their bonds and their current situation robbed them of the privacy needed to orchestrate any sort of elaborate escape. Carver would be similarly useless and unless Merrill was willing to break her self-imposed pledge of abstinence from cavorting with demons she, too, would be of no help toward staging an escape.
That left Fenris- a strange elf with a myriad of unusual talents that had seen him through situations such as this more than once.
His phasing ability could possibly get him past the shackles on his wrists but he'd never successfully managed to pass his entire body through anything remotely solid. The lyrium, which was the source of his unconventional abilities, was more tightly wound about his arms and legs but that meant he usually got stuck somewhere around his shoulders where his body mass was too dense to become fully unsolid. That meant while he could free himself from the chains, he couldn't hope to get through the bars of the cell.
So he figured he'd have to find a way to convince the guards to open the cell for him.
It was doubtful a simple request was going to see that goal accomplished. After all, while these men may be stupid enough to pick a fight with Marian Hawke he couldn't hope they'd be foolish enough to open the cell for a prisoner. Fenris also didn't believe he had sufficient acting chops to feign a believable ailment. Even if he did, that was still no guarantee they'd consider him valuable enough to take on the risk of approaching.
Then rather abruptly he remembered a conversation he'd had with Hawke some eight years past, shortly after they'd met and before her name had become synonymous with success in Kirkwall. He'd commented, quite reasonably he felt, that Hawke could likely avoid many of her battles if she endeavored to keep her cheeky tongue to herself. Her response had been something that had stuck with him, inane and foolish as he believed it was.
"People look at me and they think I'm nothing. If I start mouthing off, if I prove to them I'm not afraid- if a lowly little woman treats them as though they are unworthy of fear… well, then they get angry. And an angry opponent, Fenris, is one you've already disarmed of his wits." Then she'd shot him a playful smile and tucked her hair behind her ear. "You should try it. You'd be surprised how sloppy people become when they've hyper focused on just making you shut up."
Perhaps this would be an ideal time to test that theory. He considered the two jailors keeping watch over them. Two men, both tall and well-built, having a hushed conversation about some woman with one another and more or less ignoring their captives. The catch was he was unsure which tactics, if any, would stick. He'd seen Hawke handle scenarios like this before, when she appeared to have an utter disadvantage… and the mouthy mageling would proceed to fire off at the mouth, unleashing a rapid succession of jokes, terrible puns, and veiled insults until her enemies were inspired to attack. Fenris, while admittedly being a fairly cunning linguist in his own right, doubted he'd be able to wield mere words in the same fashion as Marian's devastating tongue did. He'd have to adapt this strategy and make it his own.
The guards were talking about a woman so that was just as appropriate place to start as any. Taking a deep breath, Fenris opened his mouth to shout, "Which of you two is the woman?"
Fenris' efforts rewarded him with a room full of gaping mouths. His fellow cellmates stared at him as though he'd grown a second head, completely gob smacked that the elf had chosen this manner to address the guards. But the elf felt a twinge of victory as the first guard turned and demanded, "What did you say?"
Perhaps Hawke was right to utilize this tactic, he mused silently before answering, "I was merely wondering which of you was the man and which was the woman. It is a simple question."
"Neither of us is the woman," the second guard snarled.
"So you take turns then?" Fenris asked casually before gifting them with an unconcerned shrug. It felt odd to use the insinuation of homosexuality as a weapon, especially since it was an issue he himself had struggled with extensively once he'd freed himself from Danarius' perversions. Personally, he found men to be attractive from time to time and, thanks mostly to Isabela, no longer begrudged himself for being sexually flexible. "Do not imagine that I would judge you for it," he tacked on with a sly smile. "Cold nights. Warm bodies."
"Shut up, elf." The first guard growled before turning away and muttering, "Fucking elves think everyone's half-queer."
"What's wrong?" Fenris persisted, pushing the conversation further. Seems the men weren't rattled by that but he was still the center of their attention so he must have riled them a little at least. He'd have to aim for something else. "Forgotten how to use it?"
Sebastian interrupted with a hissed, "Maker, Fenris! Shut up!"
The second guard shot the elf a dirty look and sneered, "You should listen to your friend."
Ignoring every ounce of common sense that told him he'd be better off for not inspiring these men to rage, he continued undaunted to the first guard. "I have heard they have salves in Antiva for it. A decent healer should be able to clear up anything physical."
The guard approached the cell and snarled, "Trust me, elf. Everything works just fine."
"It could be in your mind. Have you consulted a prostitute?" he continued undaunted before a wild, insane thought took roost and refused to shake free. "I would be happy to suggest a few. Although I suspect your mother would not appreciate my recommending you to her competition."
The silence that fell over the room was so thick Fenris could practically taste it and he knew instinctively that he'd finally managed to land a proper blow. Seems the man had a soft spot for his mother. Typical.
"What?" the man ground out the syllable in one of the lowest, most hateful tones Fenris had ever been privileged to hear. "What do you think you're implying?"
"I imply nothing," Fenris answered with another indifferent shrug. "Your mother is a glorious whore, ser. Any fool with two coppers will agree."
The guard grasped a heavy baton and ordered, "Open the door."
"Mitchell," the other tried before he was cut off.
"My mother is a saint!" Mitchell snarled to the elf as he gestured wildly for the other guard to get the keys.
Fenris gave the man an evil grin and sneered, "I was unaware they had a saint who utilizes your mother's particular skills."
The second guard shot the elf an evil look and reached first for his sword, then for the keyring, which he tossed to this Mitchell with a growled warning. Fenris fixed the furious guard with the most hateful glare he could muster as the door squealed open. The guard's steps brought him just into the elf's reach when Fenris put his plan into motion in a flurry of blue light.
Quickly phasing through the shackles on his wrists, Fenris heard the guard register a soft, shocked sound before the elf was fist-deep into his chest, wrenching his heart loose from the cavity. The look on the other guard's face was nothing short of priceless as Fenris first chucked the still-beating organ directly into the man's face before following in violent pursuit and tearing into him as well.
Fenris dispatched the second guard with little effort. The man didn't even have time to scream. When it was all said and done, Fenris retrieved the keys from the door and set to releasing Varric and Sebastian.
"I must say, Broody, that's the most Hawke-ish thing I've ever seen you do," Varric commented as he rubbed his freed wrists. "Excepting the whole 'magic fisting' thing obviously."
"Obviously," Fenris agreed with a droll eye roll as he set to unbinding Sebastian while Varric stumbled to Carver and Merrill. "We should depart."
"Get it off," he heard Merrill growl as Carver bent before her and fiddled with the keys, trying to undo the collar. "Get this thing off me."
Carver groaned and pulled the key ring away. "None of these fit. It's got to be on Badoc's keyring."
"We need our weapons if we're to have any hope of escaping," Sebastian reminded him, pointing to a heavy chest sitting on the opposite side of the room. "Naked and unarmed is no way to enter a fight, friend."
"Can you open it?" Carver inquired as he rose to his feet and inspected the keyring in Fenris' hand. "None of these will do it. Badoc must have that too."
Sebastian shook his head with a muttered, "They took my picks. They're likely in that very chest."
Varric made a short, disgruntled sound and grumbled, "Amateur," before plopping onto his rear. Turning his hairy foot over, he began kneading the heel until a small sliver of metal manifested from the callous. "Keys are for chumps and lesser suckers," he grinned and strode stiffly by the prince to settle before the chest.
"I'll have to remember that trick," Sebastian mused with a quirk of a smile.
"They may take your clothes but they never take your skin," the dwarf answered as he began manipulating the lock with a low curse. "Shit, I hate people who have the good sense to invest in security. This will take a minute."
Naturally it took well beyond a minute. Fenris spent every second of it staring at the staircase that would take them from this blasted place, dreading the moment more of their captors could manifest before they were sufficiently armed. He'd seen no patrols thus far and there had been no changing of the guards. They'd been shackled here for nearly the entire day…
Fenris felt dread pool in his stomach.
Certainly someone should have come by now… to check on them… to make sure Varric and Sebastian had not succumbed to their injuries.
While he knew very little about the routines these men held, that had to be uncommon. He'd been held prisoner before- once when he'd made the mistake of trusting a mercenary who proceeded to sell him out to the nearest group of slavers and once again in Kirkwall when an ill-advised bender coupled with Isabela's larcenous nature landed them both in lockup until Marian and Aveline came to spring them. Guard rotations staved off boredom and hunger- kept them from making the very sort of mistakes that had taken the lives of the two men he'd just dispatched. Those men should have been relieved from prisoner detail hours ago. So why hadn't they been?
The most logical answer was that the Templars were occupied elsewhere. They couldn't possibly be launching an attack on the rebel camp- the fools hadn't even bothered asking Carver where it was. So what had occupied the fifty-plus Templars so thoroughly they ignored the five extremely hostile captives sitting just below their feet?
This did not bode well with him.
He breathed a sigh of relief when he heard the heavy clunk of the lock falling away from the chest, ignoring his paranoia as he dressed himself in record time. As much as he disliked the armor Danarius had fashioned for him, he still welcomed its embrace… for everything terrible and wretched Danarius had been, he'd at least had the sense to invest his money and research in Fenris' primary source of protection.
He shot another wary glance at Merrill. While she was once more clothed she would still be helpless in the oncoming fight so long as that collar remained around her neck. There was a small comfort to be taken in that she was skilled enough with her staff to bang around a few Templars. Now that he thought of it, with her history of blood magic this might be an unexpected blessing for her- there was no opportunity to crash back into her old habits. She'd have to adapt. Fenris was unexpectedly certain that she would rise to the challenge rather than buckle beneath it.
With Carver taking lead- he still found following behind the boy to be a little disconcerting- they ascended the stairs to determine exactly what was going on here.
The first thing he noticed when they charged into the great hall was the plethora of Templars, all lying still and prone in a variety of uncomfortable positions. Fenris approached one face-down upon his supper plate and discovered him to be snoring into his mashed potatoes. Touching his fingers to the man's exposed throat, he felt the man's pulse beating strongly, albeit slowly.
"Poison. It does not appear to be lethal," he announced the obvious as he surveyed the bodies once more and noticed the soft risings of their chests. "It seems they've had rather an epidemic of it."
"Explains why the guards never switched out," Carver added with a thoughtful nudge against one of the sleeping men's boot. A small grin stole over Fenris' face, apparently he and the younger Hawke had thought on that and come to the same conclusion. The last year out of his sister's shadow had seen the former soldier blossoming into a formidable ally with a mind every bit as sharp as Marian's.
Varric made an annoyed sound as he shoved one of the Templars out of his chair and gave the unconscious man a rather unceremonious kick to his groin. "That's for touching Bianca, you prick," he grumbled before turning to Carver and asking, "Could they have triggered one of Hawke's smoke bombs?"
"I doubt it," Merrill answered quickly. "They stink something terrible. Marian washed her robes five times before she gave up and threw them away- said she couldn't always count on being downwind."
"The blue ones?" Carver inquired. At Merrill's nod he added, "I'd wondered what happened to those."
"The ones with the gold embroidery on the shoulder?" Varric asked. When Merrill nodded once more, the dwarf sighed, "I liked those. They looked good on her."
Fenris smirked to himself as he remembered that particular set of robes as well. He'd silently questioned whether they'd been designed for protection or if they were just meant to draw the eye directly to Hawke's backside. Being a dwarf, Varric likely spent more time staring at Hawke's bottom than any of them. It seemed he and Varric agreed that those particular robes would be sorely missed.
Merrill huffed in a rare display of annoyance. "Is this truly something we should be discussing right now? Shouldn't we…"
Merrill didn't get a chance to finish her statement. The door leading to the rest of the hold simply exploded inwards. Fenris didn't even have time to shield his face from the incoming debris, bringing his hands up too late to stop the sharp splinters from blasting against his face. When he brought them down, Fenris gaped as five abominations barreled in, homing in on the group in hateful fury.
Sebastian and Varric began firing wildly into the oncoming attack. The arrows sticking into misshapen heads and chests did little to slow them, appearing to be more an annoyance than an actual deterrent. Fenris heard Carver draw his sword and charge forward. He and Merrill followed suit although the mage was forced to fight defensively, her primary mode of attack still inaccessible to her.
Fenris pulled his muscles tight, feeling the world once more slow around him as the lyrium bit its sting into his skin. He ghosted across the room, slicing his sword into one of the monsters, neatly severing both arms from its torso is a spatter of dark blood before hacking into its neck once… twice… three times before the sword managed to cut through its spine and an additional three times before the skull lolled from its shoulders.
Demons.
This place was overrun with demons.
What the blight was happening here? Was this the source of Merrill's strange premonition?
The Knight-Commander had insisted there were no mages here but it was increasingly evident that the man had lied about that as well. Another Abomination barreled down upon him but Fenris only managed to land a single blow before the creature swept passed him and set its gnarled claws into one of the unconscious men, tearing him open and apart before Fenris could even think to defend him.
He looked over the situation once more, realizing the abominations were not targeting Merrill… nor were they focusing their limited attentions on Sebastian and Varric or even himself and Carver. They were putting all their effort into attacking the unconscious Templars, ripping the helpless men apart with a furious gusto.
The lyrium flickered and went out as he tried to reconcile the scene. Abominations attacked everything but it still stood to reason they should attack their most imminent threat first. Apparently, they viewed the poisoned Templars as greater threats than the five people actively fighting them.
The others appeared to notice this as well, holding their weapons fearfully.
"What is going on here?" Carver marveled and gazed with open disbelief at the scenario playing out before them. "Why aren't they attacking us?"
"Let them play," a dangerous deep voice echoed through the carnage. "My darlings deserve a little fun."
They skittered to a stop and looked back, confronted with a Desire Demon resplendent in her full form… heaving breasts, the stiff back, that playful come-hither gaze. He assessed his surroundings, logically as he knew to do. Fenris gazed upon the hated beast with all the contempt he'd grant a street urchin.
"The Veil is ripped," Merrill hissed to them. "It's bleeding out into reality. Stay strong."
"Meaning?" Varric requested as he brought Bianca up to his shoulder.
Fenris knew exactly what she was saying; he'd seen it in Minrathous a dozen times before. "She means we're half in the Fade," he growled and eyed the demon, "And so is that thing."
The demon considered Merrill for a moment and murmured, "So pretty but so collared- I could break it for you."
Merrill eyed the demon for a long moment, seeming to contemplate the offer before Carver called her name, dropping a heavy hand onto her shoulder. The elf dropped her head, raising her hand up to twine their fingers, and whispered, "I'm fine. I know enough of these things to know a bad deal when I am offered one."
It snarled before turning her sultry gaze on Fenris and purred, "And you… You don't belong here."
Sebastian let loose a low, menacing growl and answered, "He belongs here."
It ignored the prince and persisted, "You're looking for something. What if I could offer you what you seek? What if I told you your search could finally be over?"
Fenris felt the demon's allure wash over him, the thick syrup coating his mind in sticky sweetness. The damning thought that it could be that simple, that unbelievably easy, was all it took for the poison to take hold. Before Fenris could form any sort of reply, he saw the world and his companions swirled away in thick Fade mist… and standing in the middle of the clearing was a lone, dark-haired figure...
... Marian. Against all reason and possibility, she was standing before him. Close enough that he could take a few short steps and touch her. The tableau of the masquerade in Lydes faded in and out around her, pulsing softly with the same music that had been so jarring and loud when he'd found himself in the thick of it. She was garbed in the same deep red robes she'd been wearing when circumstances collided them together once more so many months ago.
"Fenris!" she called with no little concern, wide blue eyes sweeping across the landscape of smoke and mirrors. The festival had clearly disoriented her, half formed bodies slamming into her and causing her to stumble clumsily as she failed to steady herself against phantoms she couldn't properly fight. "Fenris, where are you?"
"That's not Marian," he growled at the demon doubtlessly watching them, desperately seeking a way to exit the illusion he'd fallen into.
"But it is," the voice rasped directly into his ear, causing it to twitch uncomfortably from the staggering heat of the demon's breath. "It is her as you've always wanted her- lacking the one thing that's always kept her from you in truth."
He didn't have to ask what that thing was. The mirage of Marian chose that moment to demonstrate as she attempted to summon a wisp of light in her hands to illuminate the area. Nothing happened, not a spark, not even a fizzle of energy was conjured into her waiting hands. She stared at them, first in abject confusion before something very unsettling took over her gaze. Fear. Her chest heaved faster as panic began to set in, puffing out fog as her warm breath collided with the cold air.
"You lie," he retorted, ignoring the mirage of his former lover in distress. "You cannot remove a mage's magic."
"Do I?" it wheezed into his mind and directed his gaze back to Hawke, tripping blindly through the mists, calling his name with increasing franticness. "The Fade is stronger than her magic here. As long as she remains here, you'll never have to fear that part of her."
"You lie," Fenris repeated.
"What is fantasy but a lie we tell ourselves?" The demon chuckled her cold laughter against his brain and continued, "But that isn't what you want, is it? Or it simply isn't all you want. Maybe something a little different?"
And before his eyes, the scene dissipated, the Harvest masquerade disintegrating into the thick Fade before a new vision replaced it. And Fenris was no longer observing her through the mists of the party but in Marian's dark, fire lit bedroom at the Amell estate. The bed, more imposing than he remembered, now stood center-stage. Fenris braced himself as he waited for what was doubtless coming next.
There stood Marian, clad in something silk and fragile, breathing unsteadily as Sebastian stood behind her, letting her body conceal his naked frame. He smoothed his palms over her arms. The sight of the prince's lips on her neck brought a pang of sickness into his stomach. He'd admit to occasionally being struck by Sebastian's regal sort of beauty, the way the prince moved with such surety had more than once set uncomfortable arousal through the elf before he could squash it back down. But Sebastian was the closest friend that Fenris had ever known and the sight of his hands on Marian, rather than inspiring arousal only managed to inspire a fervent desire for the image before him to cease. The elf drove his nails into his palm, frantically reminding himself that this was an illusion and nothing more. Marian wasn't here- she was somewhere out there in the wilderness.
Sebastian brought his eyes up to meet Fenris' and murmured, "No, of course not, you'd never share her this way. Something a little different, friend?" And his strong body shifted, shimmering away until manifesting into something a little more petite, with calculating dark eyes and light hair.
Margot raised her eyes to him, glittering with mayhem, and smirked. "Don't pretend you haven't thought about it. I have." She stroked her fingers over the mage's face and murmured, "She has."
He didn't answer, just watched Marian's eyes slid closed as she leaned back against the taller woman. There was no sense in denying it- the demon had indeed stumbled on something he'd been desperately trying not to think about. He forced his eyes shut just as Margot's hand moved to cup one of Marian's breasts, doing something that made the mage gasp and then moan. Fenris didn't think it was possible to be so sickly aroused by something he knew to be wrong… but there it was, straining against his pants in a frantic effort to join in the scene his imagination had written after Margot's half-confession.
"Come on, Fenris," Margot cajoled in a husky murmur. "It's no different than those two girls you had at the brothel. You'll recall they seemed perfectly satisfied with the arrangement."
The visuals of that memory swam unbidden into his mind, shocking him back into the thick of the Fade. Although at the time he'd been perfectly content to allow himself the entertainment of the two rather flexible young women, they hadn't been friends- they'd been prostitutes. He did not know them as he knew Margot and Marian- he knew them in no context other than sex. In light of this situation, with the ghost of Marian standing before him, that night felt rather base and quite perverted. This was not something he could imagine from Margot, who apparently had her heart a little more wrapped up in Marian Hawke than she cared to admit. And Marian… this was not something he could picture himself wanting of her.
This was not what he wanted, he repeated to himself. Or rather, to take the demon's words as his own, it was not all he wanted. He forced his breathing back into an even tempo and shuttered the sick arousal that threatened to take him further into this scene. He kept his eyes shut as one of the pair of women released another soft gasp. He would not be duped. He would not play into this.
"Or perhaps something a bit…" The voice shifted from Margot's low rasp into something much lower, "…closer to home?"
That voice…
No.
His eyes flew open and there was Danarius, holding a delicate golden chain wrapped tightly around Marian's neck in his clenched, clawed hand. Danarius had always been a perverted bastard and the chains coiled over her naked breasts and hips, tying her up like a glorified body slave, testified to that. She teetered, tears streaming down her face, as his former master jerked his wrist back and drew the chain hard against her throat. When had she begun crying? How long had his eyes been shut?
Her frightened eyes peeled open wide as she struggled to breathe, her hands clawing mindlessly at her neck to ease the deathly pressure. This isn't real, he repeated silently himself as he watched her choke. This could not be Marian.
"A gift to you, Fenris," Danarius sneered, releasing the apostate only to shove her to the ground. She landed with a pained yelp, which Fenris felt echo in his own knees, scrambling away for a moment before his master dropped the chain and permitted her to claw once more at her throat. "A pet for my pet."
This isn't real, he kept telling himself. But that thought didn't stop his breath from coming faster, his heart from pounding in painful rage, and it didn't stop the terrible sound of her strangled sobbing. If this wasn't real then why was it still happening?
Unless it was real.
"Thank your master." With that, Danarius delivered a sharp kick to Marian's side, sending her flying across the floor with a strangled cry. She landed at the elf's feet, tangling his hands in a weak grip as she sobbed, "Please, you have to make this stop!"
"What's wrong, lad?" the magister sneered as he bent to stoop behind her. "Do you need a demonstration?"
He was all-too familiar with what would inevitably happen next when he saw Danarius lift his robes and clap a possessive hand over Marian's rump. She screamed his name, her high panicked wail shattering the still air. Logic flew the way of the wind as Fenris reached for his sword and shouted, "Let her go!"
He was on the magister with his next breath, hacking into his body with unbridled fury. Danarius went down without even a token fight but Fenris still relished in the opportunity to murder his master a second time, swinging harder, cutting deeper over and over again as he mutilated the man who'd hurt so many and hurt them so badly. He was barely cold and dead when he dissolved back into the Fade's miasma, leaving behind Marian- still choking on her tears as she looked up at him in watery wonder.
She was safe. He'd protected her. But as he looked down upon her, saw the tear-streaked pathos that was so vastly different from the woman he'd known for years, and knew for certain he'd been deceived.
Of course the demon hadn't been Danarius, he realized dully as his true enemy cowered before him. It was all another smoke and mirrors attempt to engage the elf, to lure him into a fantasy until the demon finally found the one that could tempt him away from the truth. It wasn't the cloying allure of power that he desperately craved, which had set him to succumbing to a demon's clutches once before. It wasn't even Marian, he realized as he stared at his former lover not as the woman who'd had countless foes trembling at her very footsteps but as some mythical, shackled animal cowering at his feet… telling him something he'd never had the ability to face before.
He wanted to be a hero.
Just once he wanted be the hero instead of the shrieking ingénue in distress. He wanted to break from his past and save the innocents, save the girl, save the day.
But he couldn't do that here- locked in a world of fiction.
This wasn't real, he repeated again to himself. Marian had never been in danger, had never been here at all. He'd saved no one, not even himself, from his twisted dead master. Armed with that, he could see the demon's countenance masking itself within the lines of Marian's body- could see a flash of horns through her dark hair, a twinge of grey scales breaking along the soft flesh of her side, eyes that blazed black at random intervals through blue sky.
Then it was gone and she was Marian again, looking up at him with confusion apparent in her wet eyes. "I called for you," she whispered, reaching a hand out to touch the scarf tangled around his wrist. He shut his eyes as she tugged against it, gently pulling his attention back to her. "Where were you?"
It would be easy, he thought as he looked upon the thing disguising itself as the object of countless dreams, so easy to fall into the illusion, to have a mirage of her that would shift to accommodate his every whim, that would be whatever he wanted whenever he wanted her to become it. But it wasn't what the demon had unwittingly revealed that he truly wanted. It was just another form of slavery. If he accepted, he'd once more be stepping into the cage, locking the door, and tossing the key himself. He'd already done that once and knew the horrors that would follow… and even if he'd lacked the ability to understand them as Leto, he certainly understood them now as Fenris.
And the real Marian Hawke was still out there, doubtless doing things that would inevitably infuriate him beyond words- making rash decisions, trusting the wrong people, helping people who didn't deserve it. She was being hunted.
And she believed in him once. In spite of everything he'd done to her, Marian Hawke had believed in him when no reasonable person should have… believed he could be the man he desperately wanted to be.
"I have been looking for you," he answered gently and stooped next to her. Her arms opened to him and against every bit of him that was screaming for him to withdraw, he entered her embrace, wrapping his arms around her tightly. She even smelled the way he remembered, he thought as he buried his nose into her hair. He allowed himself this weakness, one final opportunity to hold her in a way he likely never would again.
It would be easy, so easy to stay here.
After a lifetime of hardships and failures, it was hard to deny himself a simple comfort. He deserved a bit of happiness after the life he'd led, a bit of easiness after so much strife. It would be easy to look the gift horse in the mouth and ignore the poisoned apple clenched in its snarling, decayed maw.
It could be so easy…
But it wasn't what he wanted.
He unwound his arms from her and stood, the chains bound around her prevented her from rising with him. She gave a serene smile, all traces of her sorrow erased from her suddenly immaculate face. His hand found his sword, feeling its comforting weight in his hands. The steel was real. This was not. And there was only one way to end it.
"Forgive me," he whispered, more to himself than to her, as he dared to stroke his fingers across her face, watching her turn into the caress with a soft, comforted sound…
Then he drove it down into her chest and felt the world explode. He saw ivory particles of sand banging against the seawall and burst into nothing… saw clouds sucked from the sky… saw the universe shatter … accompanied by the sound of terrible, inhuman screaming that he'd never know for certain came only from her.
The illusion shattered around him like rock thrown into a hall of mirrors, bits and pieces cracking and falling away, and suddenly he was standing, panting with exhaustion with his sword deeply embedded in the demon's chest.
"I gave you everything," it snarled, blackened blood spilling from its sharp teeth.
His head bowed as he considered its words. "I would rather suffer reality than shackle myself to an illusion of happiness," he answered before calmly withdrawing his blade. "But as a demon, you could not possibly understand."
He whipped the sword around once more, this time at its neck- felt it connect and cut through the sinew and spine before passing through the other side in a spray of gore. As he watched the head roll across the ground and the corpse disintegrate into ashes, he remembered that he was not alone.
When he turned to find his companions, he found them gawking in blood-spattered shock. The abominations lay dead, corpses littered over the bodies of the men they'd slain. The sting of bruises informed him rather abruptly that he had indeed fallen into the stupor, fighting when he had no mind of his own to do so. Fortunately no one looked terribly worse for it. They'd pulled their punches. It was uncertain that he'd have done the same were their positions reversed.
"It appears I forgot myself," he offered lamely as he fastened his sword once more to its bolster. "You have my apologies."
It was Merrill who found her tongue first. "You found it again. That's all that matters."
"Right," Carver agreed warily. If the boy had a further thought on the matter, he chose to keep it to himself. "Let's focus on getting out of here."
"We have to close off the Fade," Merrill interrupted. "A rift this massive will have more demons clamoring to get in."
"How would we do that?" Carver asked.
"I don't know," she replied. "Perhaps someone back at the camp could tell us."
"But where did they come from?" Sebastian interjected. "They said no mages were being kept here- so how is this place crawling with demons and abominations?"
"I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that maybe, just maybe, they were lying," Carver answered with unbridled annoyance.
"Shouldn't we focus our efforts on finding them? There may be a few that are uncorrupted. Perhaps there are even a few survivors that could tell us what is going on."
"He's right," Carver grumbled with a furious shake of his head. "Dammit, he's bloody right. Stick together, we're going to have to search this place top to bottom. Fenris, you said this is an old Tevinter stronghold, right?"
Fenris nodded, "Indeed."
"Do you think there are any secret rooms?"
He considered for a moment. Tevinter architecture didn't utilize secret passages as much as, say, Orlais' did. Still they were no stranger to doors concealed behind bookshelves and the occasional secret passageway. "I would recognize any hidden passages if I were to see them."
"Good. Take point," Carver instructed before adding, "I want to know if these bastards are hiding anywhere."
Fenris nodded and took the lead without another word. The next three rooms were unremarkable, save for the dead Templars littering the floor and one hidden alcove holding a number of books. Regardless, the carnage that had taken place here was nothing short of astonishing. The abominations had positively ripped these men apart. It was, to steal Badoc's word, overkill. Though they may have been monsters, they'd come after these men with a focused rage Fenris had never an abomination display before.
It was off the kitchens in one of the larders that Fenris found anything of note, although it wasn't exactly hidden any more. They all noticed the back wall of the pantry had been blasted apart, its tattered remains on either side revealing the dark passage.
"Well that's ominous," Varric remarked and clutched Bianca a bit more tightly as Fenris grabbed an oil lantern and led the way within.
It was a small, stone room- well-insulated by the rock to ensure privacy. The stench of blood and bile was nauseating. Manacles covered the walls, Fenris recognized the method as being native to Tevinter. This in all likelihood had originally been intended as a slave hold. But when he saw the stains of blood, the ripped scraps of clothing, and the red, sharp knives fastened to the wall, he knew it wasn't one any more.
It was a torture chamber.
"Ma vhenan," Merrill murmured her horror, doubtless realizing this was likely where Badoc intended to interrogate Carver.
"Maker preserve us," Sebastian whispered as he surveyed the area with dull shock.
Fenris saw a bright swatch of fabric, mostly intact, and brought it nearer the light to study it. He could feel the magic woven into the fabric and deduced that this had originally been part of a set of extremely expensive robes. But that wasn't what caught his attention… it was the stitchwork. Fenris was no stranger to sewing, he modified his armor whenever the opportunity presented itself. Robes in the south used relatively simple stitching, usually done with simple cotton lines. Tevinter thread, he'd cursed that blasted gossamer more times than he could count- it's soft, spiderweb quality was practically invisible to the eye and nearly impossible to run through a needle.
Tevinter thread was also obscenely strong and Fenris knew when he saw the clean stitching shining intact between two rent pieces of fabric that this robe hadn't belonged to a southerner. "These prisoners were from Tevinter," he said quietly. A very uncomfortable feeling of pity came over him.
Danarius had a room like this.
Fenris did not care to think of the unspeakable horrors he'd seen in there. No information was this valuable. Nothing justified this. Even if they had been magisters and blood mages, Fenris would have preferred to see them quietly executed rather than held in a terrible limbo they'd been subject.
"Oh fuck," Sebastian groaned. The man had to be considering the implications of he dead abominations above them. One thing was certain- before they left, they needed to conceal any evidence of what happened here or risk the wrath of the Magistrate.
"They saw a chance to escape and they took it," Carver muttered. "I'm feeling a little less sorry for the men upstairs."
Fenris noticed Merrill was visibly shaking, eyes locked on a single collar lying broken on the floor. Furious tears welled up in her eyes, leaking over to trickle down her cheeks. "Excuse me," she whispered before tearing back into the kitchen with Carver and Varric close on her heels.
When they were alone once more, Sebastian muttered, "What do you think they knew?"
"I do not know," Fenris answered. "Perhaps they were going to the camp."
"Fenris," Sebastian began. "Starkhaven does not have an army that could take on Tevinter. If they find out about this…"
"I agree," the elf replied. "But I wouldn't approach Merrill or Carver with that now. We shall stay behind if necessary and…" Fenris swallowed, forcing the saliva around the rock that had settled in his throat, "… clean house."
He heard Carver shout from above. Without another word, the pair wielded their weapons and charged toward the sound. Another abomination flanked by two demons had found the interlopers.
The abomination bore down on Merrill, who looked every bit a deer caught in a hunter's sight for a moment before she brought her staff up and thwacked it heavily over its huge, snarling head, startling it into a brief recoil. Before Fenris could get to her, fireballs blocked the beast from its prey and someone in dark rogue's armor materialized in front of her and, taking the long, bladed staff from his back, began hacking into the charging beast. Fenris' sword was stayed as he watched the intruder's movements… he was using a staff but not in any way he'd seen before… the man was wielding it as though it were a sword rather than a magical instrument- there was no mana being dispatched with the blows.
Another dark figure appeared, this one making no compunction of her magic. She threw fire, caused the earth itself to quake, summoned ice from the scant water particles in the air to encapsulate and imprison her foes before hurling them backwards in a beautiful symphony of blood before tearing into the demon.
Marian used that technique often. She'd called it Shock-and-Awe. Varric simply titled it her Die-Shitheads spell. Before he could dwell much on the memory of her, he noticed the garb covering their two unexpected allies. There was too much distance to notice anything as minute as stitch work and the masks concealing their faces revealed no expression… the emblem blazoned on the robes told him everything he needed to know.
"They are from the Imperial Chantry!" Fenris shouted his warning. The Imperial Chantry… they'd come looking for the lost mages they were currently battling. Maker, there was no hope to hide the bodies now unless they were willing to bury a few more.
Sebastian shook his head as though attempting to shake the mirage from his eyes. "What are they doing here?" he cried, worry clearly etched into every syllable.
"They're helping us," Carver snarled back and clutched his sword tighter. "We can deal with the politics later!"
Carver threw himself into battle and the others followed in rapid succession. The three enemies were finished in short order with their temporary allies. The female focused on keeping the demons at bay whilst the man twirled his staff with a precision that was as deadly as it was non-magical. When it was all said and done, the five of them were left warily eying the Tevinters and the Tevinters regarding them with a similar guarded curiosity.
The man of the pair stared blankly forward, evaluating them with a cold calculation. The woman eyed them thoughtfully, cagily even, as she shifted uncomfortably on her toes- he could sense the latent magic emanating outward to assess the threat and instinctively he opened his senses to reach back… but he recognized the smell and taste of it… this was no blood mage, this was a healer… moonflowers and ember, fire and thunder…
And it froze him in his tracks, mentally asking three lonely syllables. Carver, too, was similarly still, though Fenris couldn't know for certain if he was asking himself the same question.
The illusion was over, wasn't it? He'd defeated the demon… struck her down through the artifice that vile thing and stretched over his mind. This couldn't be another layer of the fantasy that had pulled him in so thoroughly. His mind felt perfectly clear, cleansed of its evil influence… so that could only mean one thing.
Marian…
"What are you doing here?" Sebastian demanded as he raised his bow and aimed a single arrow at the man. Before he had a chance to fire, the woman threw a wave of energy at the prince, knocking him from his feet and clear across the small room. The arrow pinged into the rafters, dislodging only a small wave of harmless dust.
"Well Sebastian, nice to see you too." the woman muttered to the prince before forcibly removing her staff from one of the demons' backs with a dull thunk. Pulling the cowl loose from her face and pushing the hood from her dark hair, their unexpected savior revealed herself to be none other than Marian Hawke, returned to her flock at last.
Author's Notes- Back from hiatus! Surgery went fine (with a few minor snafus) and I've managed to beat real life into submission and get this sucker out. Thanks to everyone for your patience and words of encouragement as I worked through my recovery and my horrible work backlog.
As always, thanks to my gorgeous betas, AmericanCorvis and BuriedBeneath, for catching my various spelling errors and for all their support.