Californian Dreamin'

I was a horse! Running as fast as the wind, my hooves thundered against the hard packed ground. The cool wind lifted my mane and my tail. I heard another horse running fast behind me, catching up. I bucked playfully, not trying to hurt the horse behind me. It caught up to me and nipped me on the flank and I whinnied with mock pain and fury. It didn't really hurt.

The other horse got in front of me and forced me to stop. I stood there a moment, my sides heaving with my breath, and my coat was damp with sweat. The other horse changed into a human and then so did I.

"Bendrick!" I cried when I saw him. "You're alive!" I threw myself into his arms. "I thought you...", I couldn't continue, my voice was choked with tears.

"Shush, Lucy. I'm here," he said softly. He stroked my hair and I just clung to him, suddenly and painfully reminded how much I had missed him, how much comfort he had been to me in a very confusing world.

"How did you escape the battle?" I asked. "And you're a shape-changer? I never knew that."

He smiled at me. "We didn't really have an opportunity to get to know each other that well, did we? We can now, Lucy."

"But the Blight, we have to take care of that. It will be good to have you with us. Did anyone else survive?" I asked.

"The Blight is over, Lucy. The Wardens won the battle and slew the archdemon. The King got his legendary battle and is enjoying himself in Denerim now."

I shook my head. "No, we lost the battle. Everyone died. Duncan, the King... Loghain withdrew when we lit the beacon. Alistair and I nearly died."

Bendrick took my hands in his and pulled me close. "Do I look dead, sweet Lucy?" He pulled me into a kiss and folded me up in his arms.

"No," I mumbled against his lips. It didn't make sense but it was easy to overlook that. I wanted him to be here. That nagging pull of sadness that had overlaid everything, left me. I was happy to think that what was cut short so brutally could be resumed. Happy and very uncritical. It was like my inner-skeptic had been car-jacked, left tied up and gagged, while inner-child went on a joy-ride with inner-skeptics sports car.

His fingers started hunting out the latches on my armor and I unfastened his robe. It all seemed to dissolve with little effort and we were lying in the meadow we had just been running through. The grass was soft and the sunshine was enough to keep us warm.

Before when we'd made love it always seemed like there was never quite enough time to really take our time, this time it felt like we could spend an eternity exploring each others' bodies. This time he used his magic to hold us back from the peak, not rush us to it.

His mouth was buried between my legs and I was close to climax once again when the air shimmered and I saw Morrigan standing next to me staring at us.

"Um," I said, really disappointed because I was really, really close and Bendrick had been teasing me for what seemed like ages, "really bad timing, Morri."

"You really should back away from him, Lucy, he's not who you think he is."

Bendrick sat up and looked at me. "Don't listen to her, Lucy. Stay here with me."

I sat up on my elbows, my inner-skeptic stirred a bit. I knew Morri was right. I'd known from the start it wasn't real, but I pushed that knowledge away as the unwelcome thing it was. I stood up and started to dress, tears running down my face.

"Lucy, every day could be like this," he told me. "No need to pretend to be someone you're not any longer. The Grey Wardens accept who you are, we all do."

Well yeah, they did, but Duncan also expected me to become Elissa Cousland. Bendrick on the other hand, accepted me for who I was.

"Demon?" I asked Morri. She nodded.

"Lucy," Bendrick said, "I love you."

"Stop! This is just cruel," I said, covering my ears.

Morri nodded. "Indeed," she said. She zapped Bendrick with a lightning bolt. That caused the demon to drop his disguise and I saw that it was a desire demon. I felt really stupid that I had thought myself immune to them compared to the poor templars. I saw then we all had vulnerabilities that could be exploited if we suspended our disbelief, if we gave into the temptation of wanting too badly what we could not have.

I pulled my daggers and between us we killed the desire demon without too much fuss, although I could barely see for the tears in my eyes. I never thought of her as the comforting type but Morrigan actually hugged me.

"Welcome to the Fade, Lucy," she said. "You did okay, just don't forget what you learned here today." She waited for me to collect myself. "We'd better find the others."

She took me to a Fade portal that reminded me of a Star Trek prop and we ended up in Alistair's dream.

"Oh no," I turned to Morri, flushing brightly. I saw that Alistair was putting into practice what I had told him about "tasting" a few nights back. Even worse, it was me, or a demon that looked like me, he was practicing on. "Do we really have to intrude?" I asked Morri.

"Yes. We'll get stuck here if we stay too long."

"Crap!" I really didn't want to know that Alistair was fantasizing about me. This brought up all sorts of things that made me uncomfortable. Al was like a son or nephew to me. Even though I looked like a girl his age, or younger, the brain was not. I'd have felt like I was robbing the cradle if I did anything with Alistair. "Let's get this over with," I told Morri.

We walked up to where we would be noticed. Alistair looked up at me, his face gleaming with... best not to think about it. "Lissy? What are you doing? How come there are two of you?"

I frowned. "There aren't, Alistair. That...", I pointed at the naked copy of me, "isn't me. It's best you stop and come with us."

"She's lying, my love," Not-me said, "she's the demon. Get back to work, you've improved a lot but you have a ways to go." Not-me tried to jam his head back between her thighs.

Alistair looked between us, looking torn and confused.

Morrigan looked at Alistair with disgust. "Alistair, think about it carefully now, with the brain on top of your shoulders, small as it is. Remember the Mage tower and the hideous demon with the melted face?"

Alistair glared at Morrigan. "If this were a dream you'd be nice to me."

"She's right, Al. Morrigan and I are real but that... copy of me isn't. It's probably a desire demon."

Alistair jumped up suddenly and wiped his face off looking disgusted.

"Sorry, Al... I know the feeling," I said. I couldn't help but notice that Alistair's rapidly shrinking manhood was impressive. I filed that information away in the Do Not Go There section of my brain.

"Alistair..." Not-me whined, "I want you, pumpkin. I have so much to teach you."

"Pumpkin?" I said, "Really? I'd never say that."

Morrigan laughed. "That's not a copy of you, it's a copy of you from Alistair's mind. Stand back, lover-boy, your girlfriend is going to fry."

Alistair jumped back and tripped over his clothes and armor while Morrigan lit up Not-me with a lot of voltage. As it happened for me, the demon took it's real form. Alistair grabbed his shield and sword and swung at her, naked as he was. She was dead, or whatever state demons go into after you make them stop moving, in short order.

I turned my back and let Alistair dress in privacy.

"Lissy, I'm really...", Alistair started to say, fumbling for words.

"No need to say anything, Al. It's just a dream. You should see some of the whacky dreams I have."

Morrigan looked at me sideways like there was something she really wanted to tell me.

When Alistair was dressed I clapped him on the back. "Let's get out of this place. It's very depressing."

That was an understatement when we came to Wynne's dream. She was being tormented with images of the apprentices she hadn't been able to save. I wasn't sure what their goal was - to try to get her to commit suicide? It was horribly depressing and Wynne was ready to give up and die.

The three of us talked to her and got her to remember where we had been and realize that she was in the Fade and it was just a dream. We killed the inevitable demons that spawned from the illusionary apprentices and took the final portal and met the disgusting beast who had sent us here.

Morrigan had acquired some amazing skills in the Fade. She was able to turn into a flaming man, a golem, or a spirit. She was instrumental in us killing the the demon that was blocking our exit from the Fade. It was a horrible fight and it nearly killed us each more than once.

When the beast fell, we awoke in the Circle Tower. Morrigan ran to the corpse of someone lying nearby and held up a book and said it would prevent a blood mage from making a thrall. Something I didn't understand at all. I made a mental note to question her about that.

Not one of us, except perhaps Morri, was not shaken and pensive with what happened in the Fade. It was difficult to face that next flight of stairs and confront whatever was up there. But we had to go on and so we did.

We found the templar, Cullen, who looked three-quarters insane, and we promised we'd release him from his glowing prison. One last flight of steps to the Harrowing chamber and I suspected what we would encounter would be harrowing indeed. Fortunately it was just that officious little mage, Uldred. I remembered him from that meeting just after I woke up in this world. He was tormenting a rather elderly mage with some sort of magical energy.

"Hey! Stop that." I shouted at him. Elder abuse was a terrible thing to witness. "What kind of monster are you?"

Uldred turned, and dropped the spell off the old man, and looked at me. He giggled. "Indeed, good question." His gaze swept over me carefully. "I seem to remember you, vaguely. But how could I forget someone as intriguing as you? An outsider but not from the Fade. What are you?"

I narrowed my eyes, drew my weapons, stood up very straight, tried to look as threatening as possible.

"Your doom," I said, thinking I had delivered the line quite well.

Uldred found it funny. Although I suppose, as a villain, he was required to laugh. "You will join us too, eventually. Your power is... interesting, unusual and untamed."

I knew this script cold. "Never!" I hissed, "I'd rather die than join the likes of you." Now you say, "that can be arranged", I thought.

Uldred smirked. "Very well, as you wish." He changed into the biggest demon we'd seen yet.

Bastard! Deviating from the script. The Writer's Union would have their revenge.

Another fight with another demon. Morrigan kept doing something with the book she had picked off the corpse. I was busy poking Uldred full of holes, aerating him like a duck about to be roasted. Seriously, you puncture the skin with a lot of little holes and the fat drains out and the skin gets really nice and crispy. Glorious!

"Morri, roast this fat duck," I called to her.

She looked at me like I'd lost my mind but she did her best. Unfortunately he didn't smell nice like a roasting duck. He smelled like a pile of burning tires. I certainly wasn't tempted to try roast demon after we finally killed him.

Wynne performed admirably as a healer. I'd get a claw raked across my arm one minute and the next minute there would be absolutely no sign that I'd been wounded. I wondered how she was with menstrual cramps.

Wynne introduced us to First Enchanter Irving, the man Uldred had been abusing. He explained what had happened, how Uldred hadn't liked the way the meeting was going and he decided to hijack the agenda by summoning a demon that took him over. He was a sneaky, conniving little weasel. Apparently he had been really good at uncovering blood mages, while secretly being in league with them. I wondered how many of those so-called blood mages were actually just mages wrongfully accused. And I still didn't really know what a blood mage was, I was going to have to talk about that with Morri.

"Well, now that we got all the demons taken care of, we'd better get back to Greagoir," I said. "He said he was going to invoke the Right of Annulment. I'm not exactly sure what that is, but I doubt if it's got anything to do with an unconsummated marriage."

We helped Irving down all the flights of stairs and the Knight-Commander actually looked happy to see him.

"So," I gloated slightly, "I guess this means we're not insane, eh?" I reminded Greagoir of his words.

"Yes. Yes," he snapped at me, "You're very brave."

We made arrangements for some mages to come to Redcliffe Castle as soon as possible and while we were there we reminded Greagoir of the treaty with the Grey Wardens and that we would be needing assistance. He refused to send any templars but Irving did promise mages, although given their causalities here I wondered how many we would get.

Wynne said she'd come along with us and I was overjoyed to have her. I felt that once we'd gotten my origins squared away we'd have something in common... being old.

...

The title of this chapter is actually from the song: California Dreamin' but I stuck an 'n' on California to make it descriptive of Lucy's trip to the Fade.

Thanks for the reviews folks! It makes my day.