MALEDICTUS
29.
8 Bloomingtide
"Alright, so you're unarmed and your mana is dry. You've got no lyrium potions on hand, and I've got you pinned. What do you do?"
The day was hot and humid, with rain clouds threatening from the east, but refusing to relinquish the reprieve from the sun. Samson was backlit from the sun, sweat gleaming on his skin, which had gone from a red burn to a deep, farmer's tan. His hair was stringy with sweat which dripped onto the sands below. He was poised to strike. Hadiza lay pinned beneath him, her staff too far out of reach, and her mana dry. He had drained her himself to create the effect. Without magic or a weapon, Hadiza had only her wits. Samson waited for her answer, and gave her ten seconds.
"Decide." He ordered curtly, "Because I guarantee you won't have this much time to in a real bout."
"Then why don't you make it a real one?" Hadiza shot back irritably. Samson hesitated, searching her face. Hadiza was serious, her eyes smoldering silver fire in the mid afternoon sunlight. Samson lowered his fist slowly, his face conflicted, mouth set in a grim line. For a moment, the pit was quiet, and Hadiza's chest heaved in heavy breaths. Samson had never thought to actually strike her before, but he knew it was the only way one could learn.
His fist came down, faster than his age belied, and Hadiza reacted, nearly too late, jerking aside as he left a deep imprint in the dirt by her head. Immediately, her head came up and crashed into his nose. He let out a curse, and Hadiza rolled them over. She brought two blows down, quick, like he showed her. He tapped the ground, signifying surrender.
Later, she helped him nurse his broken nose and bruised eye. Samson laughed, blood in his teeth, wincing as Hadiza's fingertips touched the break gingerly.
"I'm sorry." She murmured and then set the break, making him shout out an expletive she'd never heard before. She smiled grimly, her hands bloody, and then reached for the lyrium potion which she drank straight away. With her magic replenished, she mended the break, biting her lip.
"As if my nose wasn't crooked enough already." Samson muttered irritably, "When I said to use your head that's not exactly what I had in mind."
Hadiza's healing magic roved his face, dispelling the unfathomable ache, and reducing the swelling. Her smile was half-hearted.
"You're the one who put me in a situation where I had little choice. Do not ask for claws and then cry when I draw blood. Tilt your head forward…no, there. Alright, good." She checked his nose for any further injury, then helped wipe away the blood from his face. For a moment, Samson let himself believe that nothing had changed between them. She was caring for him as she always had, and he basked in her attentions, ignoring the cracks in the glass. Hadiza paused, fingertips lingering on his cheeks, and their eyes met. Samson wanted to turn his head, kiss her bloodied fingertips, to feel the weight of her in his heart again, and he nearly did. Hadiza watched, pupils dilated, before she summarily took her hands away, washing them in the small bowl to clean off the majority of the blood. Samson let out the breath he'd been holding in a heavy and quiet sigh.
"Try not to blow your nose too hard if you need to," Hadiza instructed, the quintessential healer, "at least for a few hours. And don't poke at the mending site. Healing magic is not an absolute thing as you well know." She stood, wiping her hands on the front of her thighs.
"Hadiza…" Samson started and she reached down to pick up the bowl and blood-stiffened cloth she'd been using. Samson wanted to take her arm, pull her back, kiss her fucking face and tell her that he was sorry, but he didn't. He wasn't sure if it was pride or shame that goaded him.
"Thank you," she said, shifting uneasily on her feet, "for your help. I feel myself getting faster, now. And even the shield was lighter today." She smiled quickly, almost nervously. "I should go. And Fasadé wants to see you, by the way." Without another word, she was gone, leaving Samson alone to watch the sun set behind the mountains in the west, the ghostly image of two moons beginning to show against the dusky tapestry of the sky. In the distance, he heard the caw of crows, and the high-pitched song of cicadas in the bush. Sighing, he passed his hands over his face, careful not to aggravate the break site, wincing as he did anyway, and then got up to leave.
Fasadé was not a woman who raised her voice against anyone, even her enemies. She had been keeping House Fayé's records for years, and while she was far older than her posture and gait belied, she was still old, and thus, had run the gamut of things that could try her patience. Thus, when Samson arrived in the library, she did not move from the tome she was reading, did not even look up as he approached, and even as he stood before her, she kept reading.
"You wanted to see me." Samson stated, and she finally looked up at him, silver eyes rheumy with age, her weathered face giving way to a warmth he'd not had bestowed upon him since first he set foot in Rivain. Samson would never admit it aloud, but it felt good to be looked upon with something other than disdain or disgust. He had been to think that even this far north, the taint of his crimes followed him, and ultimately, he forgot about his ultimate crime: being a templar.
"Sit down, Ser Templar," Fasadé said, gesturing to the chair across from her. Samson sat, feeling like a boy twice his junior the way the old bat looked at him. She smiled, showing gold teeth, and he wondered not for the first time what the gold teeth signified.
"You've caused quite a stir since your arrival," she remarked, "and I reckon young Hadiza is the only thing tethering you to this place." Samson frowned.
"I serve the Inquisition. Where the Inquisitor wishes for me to go, I've got no choice but to get going." He shrugged. Fasadé fixed him with a look that made him feel small and feeble.
"That's horseshit and you know it." She said, "At any time you could have been sent somewhere else. You decided to tag along." She shut the tome she was reading, turning the full weight of her attention to the man across from her. "I've been alive a long time, Ser Templar, and I know the look of maddening love when I see it. You'd bring her the moon if she asked you to."
Samson laughed. "I…" He thought about it. "You presume much."
"I don't think so. You know, mages and templars have been at each other's throats since that holier-than-thou Andraste of yours put it in people's heads that magic was somehow a bad thing." She glanced around the library, the tenebrous presence of a deepening night encroach around them, making the two candles on the table that much brighter. "And it's ever been a fun romance that Thedas has entertained, a mage and templar falling in love. Forbidden. Taboo. All of the things that make for an exciting story."
Samson sighed. "You got a point?" He demanded. Fasadé grinned, the golden light of the candles throwing her face into light and shadow, making her look eerie and almost preternatural in appearance.
"I do, I do." She leaned back. "But before I get to my point…I need to know: what do you expect will happen if she wins? What does it mean for you if she takes on the role expected of a scion of this House?"
"She's still the Inquisitor," Samson said, "and I'm still yoked to the Inquisition for the rest of my days. Her status in this place doesn't have any bearing on that. If she chooses to send me to the Western Approach then that's where I'll go. I'm not…I'm not as important to her as you think I am."
Silence pervaded for a moment as the weight of his words bowed his shoulders slightly. He wasn't. He didn't think he ever was, but the lyrium dulled the pain of it, the pain that while he was living on borrowed time, so too was whatever they had together.
"And when do you plan on telling her of your condition?" Fasadé asked him. Samson startled.
"My…what do you know of it?" He demanded, leaning forward. Fasadé did not falter in the face of his open anger, and instead clasped her hands together.
"We know what the red lyrium does," she explained, "some time ago, mayhap five generations or so, our family attempted to harness its power. It nearly wiped out any hope of our line's sustainability. And the results were monstrous. Some mutated into creatures made of the stuff, and others simply died, burned from within to without from the agony of it. But there were few, like yourself, who bore no outward cues of corruption. But the damage within was costly, foreshortening their lives by entire decades. I see the signs in you, templar, but I see you also beat back the symptoms with the blue lyrium." She smiled warmly, "It will buy you some time, at least."
Samson thought that perhaps he would yell at her, maybe tell her to mind her own business, but in truth, Dorian's tonic for combatting the blighted corruption in him, combined with the blue lyrium were just delaying the inevitable. And he had not breathed a word of it to Hadiza.
"I already knew my time was short. She knows this." He said simply. Fasadé nodded.
"Indeed, indeed. So what happens here has no bearing. But, I wonder, how will you spend the time remaining to you?"
Samson shrugged. "Trying to put things right, much as I can, I guess. Doesn't seem to be going over well, though."
"Your blood being called for, eh?" The old woman laughed and Samson grinned.
"Aye," he affirmed, "my blood and my head too. Can't say I blame them. I've done some unforgivable things."
Fasadé nodded. "Mm, I know," at his startled expression she grinned, "Rivain is not some backwater country with no connections. We've an ear to the ground as well. I have heard tell of you, Red General. Many hear quietly praise your attempt to destroy the Chantry…but I don't think you are very proud of your attempts."
Samson shook his head. "No," he said quietly, "not…not in a way that most people think. I still don't think the Chantry is worth the land it sits on, not when there's folk suffering under their purview. But…I think the way I went about it was a mistake."
"So you hate the Chantry, and yet you cling to the identity the Chantry gave you."
Samson looked up sharply. "I'm not a templar," he protested, "not anymore."
"Aren't you?" She asked him, "Have you ever been anything else?"
Samson was silent. No. What else had he been but a templar? Another expendable body in expensive plate armor? He had been nothing before the Order, and nothing after. The heights to which he soared had been for the wrong side entirely. General had been the loftiest title ever bestowed upon him. He admitted to himself that being held in such high regard had been…heady, to say the least. For a brief shining moment he had been powerful and respected in a way the Order had never allowed him.
But what was he now, if not a templar?
"I'm just an old man trying to do some good in this world before I'm dead," he said simply, "if I can lend the skills the Chantry gave me to a better cause, then…I guess that I have no choice."
"It is something to note that the Chantry expects its templars to serve until they die," Fasadé said, "and even though Assane is loathe to admit it, there have been one or two of our own in the last few generations who found their place amidst the faithful flock of Andraste." Samson's brows rose in surprise.
"Would you like to hear their story?" She asked. Samson nodded. And so she told him, how in the wake of the last Exalted March, House Fayé warred with itself. The younger, more hot-blooded scions sought to dismantle any kind of sympathy for the Chantry in Zazzau, pushing back against the small sect of natives who wished to practice in peace. She told him of the warrior, Esau, who became a templar centuries before, fleeing south to Ferelden where he could practice his faith in peace and solidarity. Samson narrowed his eyes, wondering, refusing to believe.
"So that templar that…" He shook his head, "Small world." He laughed to himself, remembering. Fasadé smiled.
"I hear his descendants are doing quite well for themselves in Ferelden," she remarked, "and one of the young templars was even elevated to Knight-Commander of the Inquisition's Circle Tower."
Samson laughed a little louder.
"Maker's balls!" He said, "Is there anywhere your family hasn't touched?"
Fasadé said nothing, but went on smiling. Samson rubbed at his jaw, sucking his teeth and leaning forward.
"What'd you really bring me here for, old woman?" He asked, "To tell stories? I got enough of those, I think."
Fasadé was quiet a moment, her smile fading as she studied him. Samson was beginning to dislike the harsh scrutiny he'd been subjected to since his capture a year ago. He had only just begun to acclimate to Vivienne's varying degrees of withering gazes, and only after the long months on the road had she begun to warm to him slightly. He sighed, waiting for the inevitable.
"Tell me, templar," she began, "when you were rounding up innocent villagers to farm red lyrium from their bodies…did it ever cross your mind that any one of them could have been a mage."
Samson blanched.
"I know you told Hadiza differently," Fasadé continued, "and I know it was only a half-truth. But what exactly were you thinking?"
He was angry, now, angrier than he'd ever been, but more at himself for having made such a monumental mistake. He knew what he'd been thinking during that time.
"It wasn't a half-truth," he growled, "I knew I was as good as dead once Corypheus was through with me…much as I didn't want to believe it. I knew when it was over, the world would burn and there would be no one left to mourn the dead or to hunt me down to answer for my crimes."
Fasadé's expression was grave, and she regarded him with quiet gravity, letting him run the full gamut of anger, guilt, and shame.
"I knew what I was about," Samson's voice was quieter, limned in guilt, "I didn't care. I just knew that the world would pay for what it'd done to me. To other templars like me."
"No," Fasadé said, "just you. Do not use the pain of others to mask your rage, Samson. You capitalized on the pain of others to bolster your own courage to do what you did. Is that not right?"
Samson looked away, unable to meet her silver gaze. She did not smile. There was no victory to be had in this exchange, but the truth was plain and naked between them, beneath the flickering light of the candles. Night fell, and somewhere in the distance a cock crowed the final hour before sleep.
"Yes." Samson's voice was so quiet it could barely be called a whisper, but he knew she heard him.
"Selfishness, call it," Fasadé remarked, "because had you truly had the conviction to make changes to the foundations of the accursed Chantry, I think you might have found yourself in the Inquisition as one of its forerunners and not its prisoner. But that has always been your problem hasn't it? Lack of courage."
Samson met her gaze then, his own hard. "It's not courage I lack, old woman!" He hissed between his teeth. Fasadé did not flinch or budge in the face of his naked anger. Instead, she watched him war with himself, the lie he'd spun to keep himself motivated, and the truth germinating at the core, unable to be torn out.
"I needed support," he said at last, his voice broken, "I needed…I couldn't…I was one man. Against thousands of years of bullshit force-fed to countless people. The moment I went against it, I was cast out. If I'd had supporters…if others had not bitten their tongue in the face of injustice, things might have come out differently."
Fasadé nodded. "These things are never truly given to us to know, Samson. But you are right: perhaps had your fellow templars spoken out against the Chantry's flawed system, pushed for reform as a unit, you might not have risen from the ashes of defeat as a disgrace." She did not show any sympathy when Samson winced at the words.
"Be that as it may, your actions against the Chantry are the sole reason no one in this house has tried to kill you." As his startled look Fasadé laughed, "Did you think it was the will of the matriarch that stayed any hands? Had you not been the Red General—had you been any other templar—we would have turned you to ash before you breached the front gate. No, Ser Templar, your actions are known in this house, and while I am not like these young bloods, commending you for massacring innocent people for an unjust cause, I understand the why of it."
Samson snorted. "Even as you call me weak and cowardly."
"Because you are." Fasadé said simply. "You ran from your opportunity to stand against the Chantry, begging for lyrium in the streets. You ran from your opportunity to set things to right when the young mage destroyed the Chantry. You have run so much, Samson. And now, yoked to her as you are, protector and lover alike…don't look so indignant, I know it to be true…you run from the promise you made."
"I made no promise." Samson lied but swallowed it the next instant. "I broke it. I didn't run. I simply wasn't enough to protect her from herself."
"No," Fasadé agreed, "you were too full of self-doubt. But I think you're well on your way to being the protector you were born to be. You have freed many mages from the Circle in your lifetime, some have even fled as far as here to study in peace, to hone their skills and turn their powers to do some good in this world. They've you to thank for that."
"I failed Maddox." Samson countered. "One mage who ever called me friend without so much as a blink. He was counting on me, and I failed him."
"Did you?" She asked him, "You think because he was made Tranquil that you failed him? Did he not follow you out of Kirkwall? Did he not serve at your side during your time with Corypheus? And…" Fasadé leaned forward and Samson was startled by the almost preternatural gleam in her eyes, "In the final hour, when Hadiza was close at your heels, the Inquisition at her back, did your friend not sacrifice himself that you could remain safe? Even when you told him not to?"
Samson felt the wound, too deep to be fully healed, open anew, and the pain of losing Maddox to something as senseless as that hurt all over again. He sat still, felt a lump in his throat. Maddox had done what he thought was right at the time, had sought to protect Samson in the same way Samson protected him. He blinked, shut his eyes, and swallowed hard.
"Then you did not fail him." Fasadé said, finding her answer. "Knowing that, do not say you have failed her either. She is alive. She is in pieces, but she is alive thanks to you. Do not let her pick up the pieces alone."
Samson said nothing, trying in vain to close the wound Fasadé had opened with her words. He knew what she meant, and knew what he had to do, both for himself and for Hadiza. He took a deep, shuddering breath, exhaling slowly, ignoring the jagged bits of pain in his body from the corruption's borders, lingering around healthy tissue, trying hard to kill him.
"I think we've done enough for tonight," Fasadé said smiling, "but I will say this: let yourself hurt. Allow yourself the benefit of grieving, and be thankful that you live to do so. Many die without ever given a chance to grieve."
"More wisdom from the family storyteller?" Samson asked bitterly. Fasadé grinned.
"No," she laughed, "but you and my son are more alike than either of you would ever care to admit."
Startled, Samson gave her a questioning look, but she did not answer, rising from her chair and reaching for her cane. Samson watched her go, and when her footsteps fade, he got up to leave.
He found his way back to Hadiza's room, thankful not to have passed anyone in the quiet halls of the house. When he entered he was surprised to not find her already in bed, and glanced around. Her armor was on the stand, but her clothes were scattered on the bed, her boots kicked across the floor. Samson frowned, shutting the door behind him to make his way further inside. He began the process of picking up her clothes, folding them, when he heard a sharp, shuddering gasp from the wash room.
"Hadiza?" Samson called, dropping her clothes and heading toward the room.
He came up short when he opened the door and broken glass crunched beneath his feet. Hadiza stood amidst the shards, bloodied footprints leading away from the now shattered mirror. Her arms and torso were slashed at random, and in one hand she held a large shard, stained and smeared with blood. She stared at her refracted reflection, her face contorted in an anguish no one could fathom, her free hand, red with dried blood, holding her disheveled hair.
"Hadiza!" Samson cried and crossed the short distance to take the shard from her, finding her grasp loose, and tossing the shard aside.
"What the hell happened?" He demanded, gathering her up carefully, leading her out of the bathroom. She did not put up a fight, did not protest, did not rebuff him. "Maker! Hadiza…" He remembered Fasadé's words, and it finally dawned on him what they meant.
In pieces. She was in pieces.
She began to sob.
11 Bloomingtide
"Father, we cannot face her," Babacar said, "not in her condition. Twice I have seen her in the arena, collapsing, swiping at ghosts long after the spar has been halted. She is unraveling at the seams for spirits' sake!" Assane did not answer his son, nor did he deign to do aught else but sip his coffee, content in the knowledge that his initial judgement of his sister's daughter was correct. Babacar seemed agitated at the realization.
"She's been ridden," he pleaded, "without proper training or the aftercare required when a spirit has vacated. We must help her."
Assane still did not answer him.
"Father, I will not be party to murder for your inane pride!"
The silence seemed to take on its own tone, then, like the silence before a violent storm. Assane set down his coffee cup, placed his hands gently on the table, and stood up from his chair. He and Babacar were roughly the same height, and though Assane was well past middling years, he stood as erect and strong as his son, who was a spitting image of his younger self.
Thus, when Assane struck him with a force blast, he felt no guilt as his son sprawled along the floor, and immediately gained his footing. Instinct overrode filial piety, and years of training manifested in the appearance of glowing runes beneath each of his feet, and a ball of blue flame engulfing his right fist. Babacar's body was poised and fraught with potential energy, a bow pulled at full draw, eager to be released. Assange's eyes narrowed, and he stood, his hands at his sides, his expression wavering between aloof pride and tempered fury.
"Murder, Babacar?" He mused, "You have much to learn in the ways of this House if you are to be my successor. She has been allowed to stay by virtue of tradition and the good graces of my wife, and she has made the claim herself that she wishes to face you and the others in the pit to contend for her right to be claimed as a scion. She knows the traditions by way of her whore mother, who ran like a coward, taking our secrets and heirlooms with her. If she dies in that pit, then it is not murder. It will be simply that she was not strong or clever enough to make good on her claim."
Babacar held his position a moment longer, and Assane dipped his head, silver eyes glittering in a silent invitation. After a moment, it seemed as if Babacar would take the invitation and fight his father, but the blue flame faded as he opened his hand, and the runes shrank beneath his feet as he stood upright, his posture relaxed.
"Father," his tone was plaintive, "can you at the very least allow mother to treat her? Look at her…gods above, she'll destroy herself long before she ever sets foot on the sands to face us."
Assane seemed ready to strike his son once more, but the anger cooled quickly as reason prevailed over superstition and fury.
"Very well, then," he said at last, "Djeneba may tend to her if it will ease your own mind and keep you focused on protecting what we have built." Assane snorted derisively, adding, "It would seem your wife is more inclined to do that than you are."
"My wife," Babacar countered, "whom you chose, father, predicates her loyalty on her envy and jealousy of her position. Should she prove not to be what you hoped her to be, how will your grudge against your sister hold up, then?"
Assane stalked toward his son with the ferocity and speed of a feline predator, and before Babacar could react, a vise-like grip closed over his throat. He felt the prickling of ice magic on his skin.
"Have a care how you speak, my son," Assane's voice was a blizzard building beneath the quiet danger of his tone, "and have a care with your position. It is more precarious than you realize. And since you have expressed such profound concern and interest in your lost cousin: you will see to it that she is well-prepared for her trial."
He released his son with a shove.
"Do hurry. Justinian is around the bend, and I'll not post-pone the trial any longer this time around."
Babacar rubbed at his throat, leaving the room with a dark look on his face. Assane watched him go, then turned to the window overlooking the sand pit.
"Maribasse," he muttered, "even now your legacy comes back to poison our House. Let's hope your spawn can prove herself worth the trouble or I'll end your bloodline myself."
A/N: This marks the end of BOOK IV. Rivaini adventures are not done, but we're nearing the end of the story.
Sometimes, you can never tell when someone is suffering until you see them in their most private moments, when they think no one can see the stitches tearing and the seams ripping. PTSD is something I'm intimately familiar with, and even with the dichotomy of appearing fine on the surface and breaking to pieces on the inside. Self-harm and suicide are also scars I bear on my own soul. So this chapter, while not as long, is very important to me. -sigh- Now that I've cleared that up, onto the ending notes and translations:
Ƙaɗan-Ƙaɗan - Bit by bit or little by little. Now you all understand why I cackle every time Bull calls someone kadan. Despite the hooked letters in Hausa making it sound completely different, it still makes me giggle.
As always, leave your thoughts, critiques, and feelings in the comments. Be professional, use your good sense and critical thinking skills before commenting. ^_^
