Anxiety. Elissa knew it well. She was oftentimes left behind at camp in favor of another party member, left to wonder if this time would be the time. The time Aedan didn't come back, or the time Leliana wouldn't.
And again, here she was, separated from the only two people in the world she cared about, unable to protect them or even see for herself if they were safe.
Why could she prove herself so many times, and yet, still be left behind? What was she doing that wasn't good enough? Why was Aedan still trying to protect her?
If anyone was capable of protecting themselves, it would be her. Maker's sake, she was fucking possessed, and Aedan didn't trust her.
She didn't even care if she went into the Alienage with them. She didn't care if she accompanied them to find Alistair's sister; all she wanted was to be there when Leliana confronted Marjolaine. The woman had framed her for treason, left her for dead in Denerim's jails, and was now trying to assassinate the lot of them.
But Aedan had told her to stay here. For some godforsaken reason, he hadn't wanted her to come. Elissa just wanted to be there, and she couldn't even do that. She didn't even know why she wanted to be there—she just figured...well, it would probably be nice to be there, wouldn't it? Or comforting, or something. Elissa thought if their positions were reversed, she would've wanted Leliana there, not Alistair and Wynne. Who were they, anyway, to be sticking their noses into her business?
Aedan's making it their business.
Elissa loved her brother, but he could be dense. Or was she the one being dense? Just because Leliana was the only person in their party she talked to, didn't mean Elissa was the only person Leliana talked to. She could've told anyone else about this, and Elissa wouldn't have even thought of it. Who else did she tell?
The jealousy settling in Elissa's mind made her sick.
Leliana was a human being. She was her own person, and she existed before Elissa did, and would probably continue to exist after as well. She lived her life just fine without her, just as Elissa did before they met. And just because Elissa wasn't particularly social didn't mean Leliana couldn't be, but something about the idea of sharing this experience with someone else made Elissa jealous anyway.
And there she was, making everything about herself again.
Elissa sucked in a deep, annoyed breath. She liked to credit herself with becoming a better person, or at least trying to be, but what had changed? She talked a little more? Was that all she thought it took to be a good person? She was jealous because Leliana might've been friends with someone else, and Elissa had the audacity to think she'd improved herself?
It was disgusting.
She still had some unravelling to do. Whatever issues she had managed to work through, there were more, and the thought of it made her want to die. Just thinking of how she acted when she had first joined the Wardens embarrassed Elissa. How she must act now was probably not much better.
How Leliana put up with it, Elissa would never understand. She still, in many ways, acted like a child. This jealousy was a good example. Forgetting she wasn't the only three-dimensional person in their group was another. Turning many conversations into something about herself was the biggest one.
She didn't want to seem so self-centered. She just didn't understand how to think of other people, or act around them, and it was difficult to correct it. It didn't make it right and it wasn't an excuse, but she knew the lack of any real interaction growing up was the main reason behind it. And maybe it was whiny and annoying to always blame her stupidity on it—and essentially, her father—but it was the truth.
The only thing she really needed to accept was it was still her fault for not changing. How long had she been free of that environment, and how long did she let this continue? How long could she keep retreating in on herself before she couldn't fix it?
Leliana didn't deserve to put up with this shit. Elissa was a mess and was not in the state of mind to be supportive of someone else, let alone herself, but holy fuck, would it be more selfish to end it now, after whatever's happened with Marjolaine, or would it be worse to stay with her?
Elissa groaned and fell back in the dirt. Sam lifted his head and whined inquisitively.
"I hate existing," she explained. The mabari just stared at her, head cocked to the side, big brown eyes wide open and focused only on her. "For once in my life, Sam, I just don't want to be a shitty person." He whined again, nudging her hand with his nose, and she sighed. He scooted closer as she rubbed his ears. "I wish my life was as simple as yours."
Overhead, snow-white clouds swirled and mixed with each other, creating rows upon rows of various shapes and sizes. The sun tried desperately to shine through them, but they were so thick. It was strange that in the rest of Ferelden, there were snows up to her knees. Highever never got much snow, and Denerim got even less. It would never stick either, so while Elissa had seen the stuff before, coming down from the mountains had been a shock.
She looked down at Sam, eyes closed, and sighed again. Everything would be so much easier if she was a dog. She wouldn't have anything to worry about. She would just eat, sleep, and repeat everyday, and she would be perfectly happy with that.
Elissa's mind ran blank with boredom. The sounds of the city, all the voices and laughter, the sounds of animals braying, it was all drowned out. She couldn't even smell her dog laying beside her when she finally realized something was wrong, but when she sat up, she wasn't behind Eamon's estate anymore.
As a matter of fact, Elissa didn't know where she was at all. She was confused, dazed like something had hit her in the head. Her eyes were trying to water, but they were so dry they burned, and no matter how many times she blinked no relief came. Her mouth was as equally dry—she tried to call out for help, but she barely managed a cough.
Every muscle in her body ached. Her legs didn't want to, couldn't, support her weight. Her knees buckled, and when she tried to catch herself on her hands, her arms screamed in protest. Her knuckles were bruised, split. She could feel the smoke and wind on her neck, her shoulders, everywhere. Her clothes were torn. It was then Elissa realized the thing suffocating her was her chestplate, dented from some unknown force, and digging into her sternum.
It took so much effort to find the buckles and release them, but oh, that first breath, it was like heaven. The air was heady and smoky, but she could breathe, at the very least.
Her hands shook as she tried to stand again. Confusion swirled through her, mixed with a strangely large amount of desperation. Something had happened. Something had gone wrong, but she could hardly remember what it was.
When her vision came into focus, she saw bodies everywhere. Darkspawn, humans, elves, dwarves. So many dead, and even more fighting. The darkspawn were winning. All of the fights she could see, the beasts were slaughtering them. There were just so many. Too many. For every person Elissa saw, there were three darkspawn.
And there, so very close and so far away, was the Archdemon.
It was grounded and looked every bit as beaten and battered as she felt. Several large holes adorned its ribs and one of its wings was torn nearly in half, and while its eyes were closed, she knew it wasn't dead.
Somehow she knew. She knew she had to be the one to kill it. Aedan was going to be king. Alistair had to rebuild the Wardens. Riordan was nowhere to be found, and who was she? Nobody. Just some unlucky fool to be recruited into the Grey Wardens. This was all she was, all she would ever be, and if this was how she would have to redeem herself, Elissa was prepared to die.
Using what little energy she had, Elissa stood. She could feel blood on the side of her head, but what would that matter? She was going to die.
She couldn't find her sword. Where was it? How was she supposed to kill the Archdemon without a fucking weapon?
There it was. It was hard to see. Everything was burning.
Her swordarm was deadweight. Broken. She scooped her sword up in her other hand; it didn't feel right. She wasn't left-handed.
She had tunnel vision. Every step she took felt like a machine's. This wasn't her walking—it was the last bit of conscious thought she had, telling the rest of her body it could rest soon. There was one last task, one last quest that she refused to let Aedan take charge of.
What use would she be to Ferelden, anyway? They would need him when the Blight was over. Anora would need him.
She staggered, tripped over a bow, and fell to her knees at the front of the dragon's snout. Hot air blew from its nostrils as it took a labored breath, and it opened one eye. It was bigger than her fist. And in those eyes she saw an understanding that she was glad couldn't haunt her for much longer.
Elissa had to use her sword to stand. None of her limbs wanted to work.
She sucked in a breath. Her hand was shaking so violently she feared dropping her sword, but that big eye closed, and as soon as it did, she plunged her blade into the dragon's head.
The world went black for several long seconds, but by the time Elissa had fought off the throes of the dream, she had already managed to get her thoughts in order. That wasn't real. It was a nightmare, but it left her feeling exhausted, and her heart was racing. The pain she'd been feeling, it lingered for quite a while, and she had to sit back up to try and relax.
What the hell had happened? She hadn't even fallen asleep. This thing had just taken her. Elissa wasn't tired when she had collapsed. It got her while she was awake, and the thought of that terrified her more than what she'd seen.
The exhaustion creeping up on her now was similar to the feeling she had after casting a spell, so it had to have been magic, but how? Every time she had one of these dreams, they had been just that. A dream. Not something that attacked her during her waking hours.
Sam nuzzled her again, worming his head into her lap, but she couldn't pay attention to him.
Killing the Archdemon was a death sentence. That much had been clear. She'd thought of another man, Riordan, and how he couldn't take the killing blow like he'd wanted, so he must've been a Warden. She only thought of Aedan and Alistair, and she had felt resigned to killing it, like she had known it had to be her to do it. It had to be a Grey Warden to defeat the dragon.
And it would kill them in the process.
She had just been talking to Aedan about what she would do when the Blight was over, but now...now she knew she wasn't going to live to see it.
But then, she'd seen Aedan die before, been to the place he was supposed to die, and he was still here.
To counter that, though, none of those dreams had ever been so literal. She had never seen or heard of something or someone she hadn't already been introduced to. When Elissa had watched Aedan's death, it had been at the hands of darkspawn, and when they got there, it ended up being Marjolaine's assassins and herself. When they were children, she had seen a hooded man chasing them up a tree, not a bear.
No, this, this was real, and this was inevitable. It felt final. Elissa was going to die.