*Trigger Warning for Chapter Content*
"Rise and shine!"
The covers lifted off her legs as another servant threw open the velvet curtains, spilling daylight into her chambers. With a smile, the girl stretched her arms above her head, sighing as each vertebra popped and released its tension. Helen, her handmaiden, hummed as she poured a fresh cup of tea for her mistress from the porcelain set seated to the girl's left. She propped herself up on an arm still coated in sleep, as a massive yawn erupted from her thin frame, both servants giggled at their mistress' playful nature that morning.
"Someone appears in bright spirits." Helen mused as she collected the blankets from the bottom of the four-poster bed, her heavy Starkhaven accent melodic. "Though I suppose it isn't every day a Lady turns seventeen."
The girl squealed and jumped out of bed, grabbing Helen by her wrists. "Please tell me, dear Helen, do you know what my father got me for my birthday?" Helen laughed, removing the girl's porcelain hands from hers.
"Ay lass, I'm but a servant and am not informed of important dealins in your family." There was a twinkle in her eye as she finished, and the girl groaned, her chin falling forward to her chest.
Helen gestured the girl towards her enormous vanity where her fresh cup of tea rested, and a beautiful white chiffon gown for her presentation ball that night.
The girl sat on the cushioned stool as a team of servants poured into the room, half cleaning her bed from rest, the other half to prepare her for guests. A waif-like girl approached her from behind with a brush in her hand and worked the bristles through the multiple tangles in her waist-length, fiery auburn hair.
As she sipped her tea, a hardy morning blend, she reached to pick up the notated list her father left her on the families attending the ball and the details she was to memorize about each one. He also supplied a list of conversation topics for her to limit her conversation to, and what family business dealings she was to omit.
Most of the topics covered a recent warm stretch of weather occupying the Free Marches or the newest breeds of horses her family gained from their renowned stables. The Blight and political unrest in Ferelden topped her barred subjects.
A Ladies mind were not meant for politics, her father always told her. A woman was unattractive to young men if she held too many opinions different from her future husband. The girl listened and keep her mind away from subjects her father deemed unfavorable to the other sex, and so far, she was successful. At her ball tonight there would be a handful of families bringing their heirs to see her unveiling. The girl hoped she showed she could be a considerate wife who knew how to follow the rules of the Game.
The waif servant, pleased with removing the knots from her hair, called to Helen, who came over and separated the girl's hair into strands and braided the pieces around her head, pulling tight against her scalp. Only preoccupied with herself, the girl squinted at her reflection to see if she looked any older. After inspecting every feature- her porcelain skin, her angled cheekbones, her plump rose lips, and rounded chin, she found everything the same.
She noted the shape and color of her eyes with pride: almond-shaped eyes, of the palest green, thick dark lashes surrounding them. They were her father's eyes, identical in color and structure. She watched them move in the mirror. The outsides lined in the deepest brown fading into the pools of olive green as Helen continued to braid intricate designs into the back of her head.
Her hair finished, a team of servants swooped in with brushes and tubs of makeup, proceeding to paint her face until the greens of her eyes popped across a room, a natural blush painted across the apples of her cheeks, and her lips coated in the deepest red lipstick she had ever seen.
As she rose to her feet, the servants motioned for the girl to place her hands above her head, and four women surrounded her in a circle. Two tightened her corset while the others lifted the white dress over her head. She remained still as the servants pulled the smooth fabric over her body until it rested into place around her trim waist, fanning out in all directions like a princess from a storybook.
The thin servant appeared behind her, draping a shoulder cape of matching soft material over her shoulders. The servants nodded in unison at the vision she made, proud of their work. She spun, her dress orbiting around her, as she headed towards the door to the hallway, floating on air. She remembered exiting the door before she stood at the entrance to the ball.
Each family announced in line before entering, and she would be last since this was her presentation. Time swirled around her in a mass of sound before she saw her father waiting at the doors with a toothy grin and his hand outstretched. She placed her trusting hand in his and moved into the spotlight. The room focused on her as they hushed to a murmur.
"Now presenting Lord Trevelyan and the Lady Evelyn Trevelyan." A polite clap worked its way out of the crowd through hushed whispers as they walked to the middle of the landing.
"Thank you, everyone, for attending." Her father's Free Marcher accent boomed along the walls as he projected his voice. "This is an important day for our family, as my only daughter has reached womanhood. If her mother were still alive, I know she would be proud of our Evelyn." The room's applause grew louder, and her father stepped away to engage families on one side of the long room while the girl went to other side and her brothers mingled amongst families throughout the ballroom.
The night moved like a dream as she passed from one set of warm dancing arms to another until she staggered lightheaded from the spinning.
By the end of the night, most families left to return to their Free March estates, leaving just business partners of her father's and close family friends. As the girl leaned on a wall at the side of the dance floor to catch her breath, a flute of champagne in hand, a throat cleared behind her. A servant awaited her attention.
"Lady Trevelyan, your father expects you in his study for business." The girl acknowledged the servant before he left on his next errand.
She turned, her skirts gliding around her, and made her apologies to the next in line for a chance at her graces. Her heels traveled with haste towards her father's drawing room, where he retired to smoke pipes and drink scotch with old friends after these sorts of festivities. She'd never entered these meetings before, but it could be part of her new adult responsibilities.
Arriving at the door, she rapped against the thick wood which echoed in the empty hallway, until the servant who informed her earlier opened it, showing her in. Her father seated behind his large desk, a full glass of thick amber liquid in his hand, three older men seated in the plush chairs her father furnished his office with. She was hyper-aware of the sets of eyes observing her in a way they hadn't when presented to the crowd.
"Come forward, Ev." Her father motioned, and she walked into the room with hesitation, to hide her sudden nervousness with each solid step. When she was ten feet from his desk, her father motioned for her to stop with his hand, his chunky fingers twitching, and she stilled, unmoving as the men in the room continued to stare.
"So, gentlemen, these are the terms: ten thousand gold per night, unless you have a trade to offer. No bruises, no marks, nothing to harm her maidenhead, but other than that, I leave it between you and your Maker, you sick fucks," Her father said with a laugh, as the other men chuckled.
She couldn't swallow. Her throat so dry the act of breathing made her lungs squeal. Beads of sweat broke across the top of her forehead and the back of her neck as she became lightheaded. This had to be a misunderstanding. This was her father. Her only parent. They were never close, but no father would consider doing this to their only daughter…
His words as he dropped off the lists to her last night echoed back into her empty mind, 'It's time you can help the Trevelyan family.' She was proud when she heard those words, thinking they meant her securing her a marriage to boost the family's status at the ball.
She was confused about what was happening. She had to be. If she wasn't, then she was nothing more than one of her father's prize horses being put up on the auction block.
What would they do next? Check her teeth, examine the long lines of her form, look under her skirts? She had the giddy thought perhaps she should prance about the room, showing them what fine trotting skills, she had, to toss her silky mane so they could see her careful breeding. The giddiness turned into a fissure of terror working its way through her chest, and the girl bit down a cry trying to escape her throat.
She thought to call out for help but knew no one would come to save her in her father's house. She couldn't breathe. Her stays kept her lungs from expanding, and as her heart beat faster, less oxygen made it into her limbs. Her legs shook beneath the many layers of now sweltering material.
The man sitting closest to her father, with a mop of thick white greasy hair and matching handlebar mustache, stroked his chin with one hand before licking his lips. He turned to her father without breaking his sight from her. His hollow cheeks seemed to flutter as the muscles along his jaw rippled, tensing as he clenched against a smile she could feel in his predatory gaze but find no trace of across his mouth. She was among wolves, and this man, with his starving eyes and sunken skin, had the look of a scoundrel on the hunt long before she heard its howling in the woods. He was hunting, and he was hungry.
"Twenty thousand for tonight." Her father burst into laughter before reaching over and shaking the man's hand as he looked the girl up and down. Pleased with his purchase.
"Well gentlemen, it appears we must take our negotiations elsewhere for the night."
Her father and the three men rose to their feet, and the two strangers exited the room before her father came to her. Leaning forward, he whispered, his mustache grazing her skin. "Do what the man says Ev, or I'll beat you until you wish you died with your mother." With a smile, he patted her on the shoulder and exited the room, leaving her behind with the greasy-haired monster whose dubious grin matched her father's. Though her father shut the door quietly behind him, it was an explosion of thunder bursting across her eardrums, causing her to jump.
As she watched, the man approached her, the hunter closing on his prey. She closed her eyes, trying to calm herself before she passed out.
This was a story. This was all a bad dream. She was the girl lost in the woods, wearing a hood of red against the cold and the shadows, against the things wearing the faces of the people she once loved.
She would not be afraid of the big, bad wolf.
Don't be afraid, just survive. Just survive. She repeated the words in her head as a mantra, even as she sensed the greasy man's foul breath on her skin.
Hours later, hours she hadn't counted and didn't want to, Evelyn sat on the edge of her fresh bed, still adorned in the white dress she'd been so excited to wear that morning. Every inch of her body numb.
Looking down at her hands, she noticed the smallest speck of blood dried onto the top of her skin. One bead of crimson proof, staring into the face of all the denial echoing in the cavernous hole in her heart. She jumped to her feet and ran to the wash basin where she thrust her hands into the freezing water and grabbed the bristled scrub brush.
She focused her attention to where she'd seen the spot. She couldn't see it anymore, but she felt it, nestled against her skin like a tattoo, a sign to the world her worth was compromised. She scrubbed and scrubbed, trying to remove the spot until she had taken off the top layer of skin, her hand bleeding freely into the basin, turning it into a spiraling crimson pool.
With a sharp cry, she grabbed the basin and threw it against the wall where it shattered. Pieces of heavy porcelain exploded against the force, flying by her face in slow motion as she continued to scream, a blood-curdling sound that channeled her fear and pain.
Helen burst into her room, her nightdress and hair out of sorts as she ran to her screaming mistress.
"Lass, what is wrong?" Helen grabbed her profusely bleeding hand seeking to keep her from harming herself, but Evelyn pushed her away as she continued screaming—nonsensical words pouring between her lipstick-smeared lips.
Helen's was terrified. She didn't know what to do. From the shadows of the open doorway she saw a large figure walk through, she sighed in relief at seeing Lord Trevelyan enter to investigate the commotion occurring within his home.
Evelyn's heart froze as she saw the man heading towards her. He gripped her by the wrist, dragging her across the expanse of floor, to examine her bleeding hand dripping streams of maroon liquid across the plush Orlesian carpets and her ruined dress.
"Ugh, that beast Tomlinson. I told him not to ruin the goods... Though for twenty grand?" He shrugged with a sneering grin, and she melted away to absorb into the carpet like the pools of her blood. "Go to sleep Evelyn and appreciate that due to your help you'll have a roof to sleep under for that much longer, instead of living on the streets of Kirkwall as a disgraced noble trying to earn food in her mouth the way you did last night."
With a chuckle, the man left, leaving his bleeding daughter with her servant, whose eyes were filled with fear. He hadn't bothered to send the handmaiden out of the room before speaking his vile words out loud.
Her lips quivering, she avoided Helen's eyes and collapsed as the servant wrapped her worn limbs around the trembling child. She dropped to the floor sobbing and laid there until the early rays of the sun peaked through the edges of the window.
Helen pulled herself from Evelyn and rose clasping her hand as she helped the shaking girl to her feet and over to her closet. She opened the swinging doors and chose a simple dressing gown. Evelyn was stripped from her soiled clothes and into the soft fabric. As she slid into bed beneath the heavy covers, and her eyes shut, she heard Helen whisper.
"Get rest, My Lady. I believe you have many long days ahead of you…"
"Rise and shine!"
Evelyn lurched forward in bed, gasping, her hand wrapped protectively around her throat. Her desperate eyes took seconds to recognize her bearings, but the Free Marcher style furniture melted away, leaving behind grand pieces of Orlesian fashion. When she was sure she was no longer within the bedroom of her former estate, she swung her legs off the side of the tall cushioned bed. She placed her head between her knees as her gasping breaths shook her abdomen. When a calmness slid across her body like a gown, she sat up, wiping her sweat-soaked hair out of her eyes.
It had been weeks since she'd dreamed of her father and months since a nightmare so vivid about the hell that was the last decade of her life. She knew she was in the guest suite of Grand Duke Gaspard's winter villa, but she still had a fear swirling within her gut she'd open her eyes and find herself locked back within her gilded cage. Cracking her pale eyes open, she found the villa as she remembered. The decorating was exquisite, speaking of the cultured people of Orlais. An elegance worthy to aspire to, one she would claim for her own because she willed it.
Her sweaty dressing gown clung to her fear-frozen skin, and she trembled from the light breeze drifting from the cracked window. For a moment her body craved a pair of strong arms wrapping around her shoulders from behind, the pair of soft lips pressed against the skin just behind her ear to tell her the dreams were over, the way they had the past few months.
Evelyn shook the thought away as it entered her mind. Cullen did not differ from the men who used that frightened girl. In ways he was worse than those men—he pretended to be something more to her while using her title, power, and body.
The clients her father secured understood what the arrangement was and there were no lies, only the brutal honesty that comes along with stripping the humanity from another human being. Men stuck around for one reason, and it was that they hadn't taken everything they wanted from her.
She was the girl no longer and understood the rules of the Game. Taken enough lessons on the matter to fill a textbook. Someday she'd repay her father for teaching her the lesson of trusting no one and finding any way to survive that you can. For years while her father sent her from estate to estate to comfort lonely and rich nobles, Evelyn always kept her eyes and ears open.
In the beginning, it meant telling her father the pieces of information she deciphered from her conversations with her father's clients. Over time it led to her being braver, making her own requests of the men who paid exorbitant amounts of their family fortunes to spend a night with her.
From one client, she blackmailed, threatening she would inform his family of their dealings. In exchange for her silence, she received training as a rogue. From another, she beguiled away jewels and Orlesian trinkets unaffordable on her own, and from yet another, she extracted information on her father's dealings to find a loophole to buy her freedom from her father's clutches. His grip over her grew tighter after her two middle brothers died in service as Templar, another favor granted by a dedicated and fearful client of Evelyn's.
The less Trevelyan's existed, the more value Evelyn gained, and the prospects of a potential marriage she could secure. As her list of clients grew, the potential marriage opportunities slimmed. Well-respected men had no qualms sexually assaulting a girl for a cash exchange but grew a conscience when it was time for their heirs to marry. Evelyn descended from the most desired catch in the Free Marches to alone and followed by whispers as she traveled to the weddings of far less desirable and younger women.
The morning of her twenty-fifth birthday, her father threw open the door of her room and announced she was too old and matronly for the prospect of marriage, and his heir, her oldest brother Michael, would escort her to the Divine's conclave, where she and Michael would speak on behalf of her family. She'd be given to the Chantry, in a sign of solidarity with the Divine, to live out the rest of her years as a Sister in service to the Maker.
She sighed a breath of relief and anger in unison. Her father deemed her of having no more value to him, so he was disposing of her. She failed to secure a marriage since he forced her to service the men of the Free Marches for business partnerships and opportunities for himself. Her worth as a commodity used up, and so she was being donated to charity to make space for something more precious.
She secured one last favor from her clients before boarding the ship to take her across the rolling ocean to the Conclave; a vial containing the essence of hemlock. When she gained the vial, its purpose had been to feed it to her father.
She fantasized the ways she would deliver it to him- in his brandy, in his food, pouring it into his mouth as he slept. Whatever the way, she wanted to watch the fat fucker die, to watch the life pour out of him onto the floor the way her blood had from her hand that first night.
As the nights drew closer to her to leave, she realized murdering her father would not improve her situation and would condemn her life to the Chantry since she couldn't survive as a poor spinster. Never lose a chance to gain, Evelyn. Never give up power until you get what you want. Revenge, like all things, had a sweet purpose she would bend to her will. She would gain, and everyone else would lose, and that suited her better than a simple murder.
Into the pocket of her dress, she stashed the vial, with the comfort when the time came she would drink it, freeing herself of the cage her father placed her in, the fear that cursed her womanhood.
But first Evelyn would destroy his world.
She would follow his plan and speak at the Conclave, but no one could keep her from telling the truth to implicate not only her father but every noble house in attendance to the Divine. The minute she opened her mouth for those black words to tumble out she knew she would live on borrowed time. No one in the Game could destroy so many houses in one fell swoop and survive to tell the tale.
She would tell them the truth, drink the vial, and forever free herself from having to do anything that corrupted and vile man wished of her again. Her poison tinged lips would be the wings she would use to fly, and the devastation she left in her wake would be the vengeance she deserved.
But Corypheus' plan and an exploding Conclave changed her fate.
As Inquisitor, Evelyn was provided with opportunities she'd never received in her father's house. Instead of being valued for her beauty, they valued her honed skills in battle, her ability to think quickly in the Game. She was elated after Haven as the first marriage proposals poured into Josephine for the great 'Herald of Andraste'. She told her Ambassador to string the families along as she found as much information as possible about the those who now clamored to have Evelyn boost their family's status.
The world watched her every move as she collected pieces of power to throw around the board. Surrounded by her own staff and advisers, ultimately, she was always alone, as mornings like this one proved.
Leaving the sweat soaked bed behind, she took steps appearing more confident than the shaken noble inside. She peeled her drenched sleeping gown over her head, letting the moist satin fall to the floor before pulling a heavy dressing robe off a hanging hook. Wrapped tight around her curves, she sat down at the massive vanity stretching across one side of the room and towering to the ceiling.
With a slight knock, the door opened and a line of servants wearing the golden masks of the royal family entered, each carrying a small silver tray containing everything from beauty supplies to snacks and tea. A tray of tiny cakes caught her attention, but Evelyn feigned ignorance of the small tower of confections making its way to an adjacent table. As the food and tea were set down along the tabletop stretching to infinity, the line of servants turned and exited, leaving behind the two handmaidens Gaspard appointed for her while the Inquisition stayed with him.
Evelyn ignored the servants as they brushed out the long red hair curling over her shoulders and cascading down her back. She thought about the plans for the day while sipping her tea. Her arrival two days early from the expected for the Inquisition, gave Evelyn enough time to speak with their host and see what kind of man the future Emperor was.
She received enough letters from the Grand Duke to understand what his purpose was and how she could help with those goals, but she liked to speak with people in person to see what their tells told her. Watching, gathering information. Men could hide behind the brush of the pen, but in person, their rushing blood and filthy thoughts always gave them away. They could never hide the truth in their eyes.
Glancing up from her tea, Evelyn froze. The eyes in the mirror were not her own, but her father's, always shining out of her skull, judging her every decision. She thought of the eyes once belonging to that bright-eyed girl who sat in front of a similar vanity, in the excitement of walking out and joining the Game, unknowing the evil resting within men's hearts. No matter how far she ran, no matter how much power she gained, his eyes would always remind her of how easy it was to become powerless.
Her fist flew out and smashed into the mirror. The glass cracked up to the ceiling before shattering in pieces to the ground as the two servants screamed, fleeing to the other side of the room letting the shards rain down on their mistress, who didn't flinch as the pieces of glass cut her ivory skin.
As the eyes disappeared from the mirror, she breathed a sigh of relief and slid back on her own mask of protection. She raised an eyebrow as she took in the two shaking handmaidens.
"What kind of service is this? You destroy my mirror then stand there instead of cleaning it up? I'd hate to report this to the Grand Duke and get you whipped."
The women nodded, their faces pointed towards the ground as they darted across the room to pick up the broken pieces of glass from the floor. She reveled in their obedience, in the power that came from commanding their fear. The nasty petty things were no doubt there to watch her, to send details along to Gaspard and inform him of all the cracks in her armor. He would never get the information. He'd find her armor flawless, as smooth as the mirror she destroyed.
Let the servants see the fear in their own eyes as they plucked the reflective shards from the ground and let the jagged edges scrape against the palms of their hands. Let them remember that when Gaspard asked them for a report. Let them remember what her wrath could look like.
Evelyn walked over to her hanging closet to look over her dresses, every step a declaration of her superiority over the dithering handmaids. There was a loud and sloppy knock before the door opened, and Dorian stepped through, dressed in a suede leather outfit that contained more buckles than actual fabric. In his hand sloshed a large goblet of wine, and she licked her lips watching the alcohol move closer to her.
"My, my… what has happened here?" Dorian sauntered forward and rested against a post of her bed.
"Sloppy servants, that's all." She replied as she pulled a deep crimson dress from within the wardrobe. Dorian shook his head in disapproval before walking up beside her. He pulled a slim black dress with gold trim from its hanger and tossed it towards the bed. As he reached to remove the red dress from her hands, he stilled observing the crimson cracks oozing across the tops of her knuckles, still shaped into a fist.
"Those servants are truly careless." He muttered as he pushed his healing energy over her fingers, sealing shut the wounds. His magic spread across her arms, healing the many tiny cuts from the raining shards of glass. "Bad dream?" his whisper barely reached Evelyn's ears. Her silence enough of a giveaway that the mage sighed and reached behind her, pushing the goblet of wine into her hands. "You need this more."
Evelyn tilted the goblet back, consuming more than half the large glass in just a few swallows. She sighed as the familiar burn enter her chest, and Dorian made his way to the bed to unlace the bodice of the black dress he chose for her.
He motioned her forward and Evelyn stepped into his domain. Stepping out of her robe, her cousin pulled the smooth black dress over her curves until the fabric gathered on the floor. They were silent as he pulled the laces on the back of her corset to tighten it until she looked the part of an ancient goddess. She swigged down the rest of the wine and turned to Dorian, who clucked in appreciation.
"My darling Evelyn," he mused. "You look to die for."
Evelyn smiled, her wine-stained lips tilting sideways. "That's the plan, Dorian… that's the plan."