Chapter 20
Solas woke up with a jerk. His hands pawed at a stinging sensation in his chest. Firm hands guided him back to the ground before he could pull at the oblong tube he found lodged in the center of his torso. As his vision cleared, Solas made out the distinctive buzzcut of Clarel de Chanson, the lead commander of the Orlesian branch of the Grey Wardens.
The tough woman was pulling out an oversized needle, ignoring his twitching muscles as she applied an antiseptic and a bandage over the wound. Adrenaline Solas realized, as he tried to steady his breaths.
"I'd give you a pain killer," Clarel said in a gruff Orlesian accent, packing away her medical supplies, "But it might fuck you up."
Solas managed a small nod, as the Warden checked his pulse and listened to his heartbeat, the cold metal of the stethoscope grating against his skin. It felt to Solas as if he were on fire, his limbs spasming on the floor. Judging from the pile of discarded lyrium bottles, Clarel had also used her mana to knit together his bones and muscles. The way his lungs expanded and contracted in his chest like a taut balloon made him think she had also repaired his organs.
"We don't know what they gave you, a toxicology report will be back soon." She soothed in her best attempt at a bedside manner.
"Where am I?" Solas choked out. He tried to make the shapes out in the room. The light was so bright, a series of small round windows opened to a clear blue sky. On either side of his body were aisles of cushioned seats in various configurations.
"Thirty thousand feet above the ground," Clarel smiled. "Do you remember jumping off the cliff?"
"Barely," Solas muttered, realizing that the clothes he still wore were damp. The Grey Wardens stealth unit must have been nearby Alexius' estate if things did not go according to plan. He flashed back to a foggy memory of a man in high tech gear, suspended from the plane, pulling him out of the ocean.
"Your digital goods?" Another voice in the background asked. Solas recognized the husky voice of Ser Jean-Marc Stroud.
"I took dummies, agents cleared my suitcase before travel," Solas replied, the protocol of going undercover all too familiar to him. He had been skeptical of this mission, thinking it too easy, but when he had brought up his fears to Leliana, she had brushed them aside as paranoid. "If any survived the fall, look in my blazer's breast pocket."
Solas had been in Minrathous for less than twenty-four hours before he had fled out of the dining room as fast as his Fade step could carry him. When they arrived, Alexius had been a doting host, escorting Solas around his sprawling estate on the top of one of the hills outside of Minrathous. The front looked over the city, while the back had an ocean view. The home itself was a labyrinth of dusty halls, covered in frescos of half-forgotten mythologies and filled with trinkets from Tevinter's ancient days. Solas had lost count of each different room they toured. The magister, dressed in a tight gray suit paired with a tight black t-shirt, had picked up any number of artifacts highlighting how many years it had been in his family.
"One of the preeminent mage families of Tevinter. Never a generation without a mage. Who were your people?" He had asked Solas over dinner later that evening.
"I was a ward of the state," Solas shrugged. The answer had enough truth to it that he could say it convincingly.
"The elves simply don't have the stability the old Tevinter families do. It's a shame because the magic runs more deeply in you."
Solas could only politely smile over his glass of red wine, clenching his fist under the table in response to the cutting words, silently cursing.
The first night, Solas wondered if Alexius was suspicious of him. His reputation as a former Inquisition member was well-known. Still, his anxiety lessened when the magister took him on a tour of his lab, explaining the theoretical underpinnings of his newly developed time magic.
"Have you attempted to use it yet?" Solas asked. He was curious enough, but thought that Alexius could very well lie if he had.
"Not yet," Alexius admitted, pointing to a whiteboard covered esoteric alchemic notations and glyphs. "Although I have developed several hypothetical scenarios to evaluate its capabilities."
Looking at the amulet in front of him, Solas noted the design in honor of old Tevinter gods, two twisting gold ropes with two dragon heads holding a fade crystal. between their two moths. A fade crystal large enough that it would have cost half of the Orlesian GDP. It was probable that Alexius had taken the rare material from an item amongst his family's collection.
Solas had to suppress a shudder. Dreaming in the Fade and peeling back the layers of history was one thing. Hypothetically, an adept mage could travel just far enough back in time that they could power up the amulet just enough to keep going backwards. Returning forward might be the only tricky part.
If the Evanurius got a hold of such a thing, it would be easy to slip far enough in the past to be able to find the foci needed to tear down the Veil. Such an outcome had to be stopped. He had thought to slip the magical equipment into his jacket and run out the door, when Alexius shut the case, and walked it back to the safe.
When he went to bed that night he spent hours staring at the lavishly painted ceiling. Solas wondered at what research collaborations he might offer Alexius that would entice him enough that the Inquisition could get their hands on the technology.
He also wondered how a certain Dr. Ellana Lavellan was doing, trying to push away the image of her hazel eyes gazing up at him. If he was going to make it through this mission, such thoughts had to be put out of mind.
At breakfast the next morning, Solas was sipping coffee from a porcelain cup when his trained ear could hear soft footsteps behind him. Standing he turned to make out Alexius holding a large vial of smokey red liquid.
Solas brought a wave of blue magic to his fingers, ducking as Alexius threw the vial, shooting back a pulse of magic in the mage's direction.
It hit the wall behind him, sheets of plaster cascaded to the ground.
Solas was about to exit the door when Alexius was joined by half a dozen figures, all dressed in black, wearing face masks. The group circled him. Solas could feel the mana in the air gather together as each of the mysterious figures' pulled from the Fade. He was about to thin the veil-use their own magic against them, when he felt a sharp jab in his shoulder.
The piercing sensation surprised Solas, the toxins coursing his veins. The room around him seemed to shake and constrict. Wheezing, he could feel what he thought was Alexius summoning a spell to knock him out for good.
Run, he urged his magic, a fade step aiding his exit out an elaborate hallway. He made it to the end, when he felt himself roughly grabbed and pulled into a wardrobe.
Bringing up a blue ball of mana in his hand, Solas was about to fill the interior with bolts of electricity, when the figure whispered the Grey Warden code word, "Griffon Watch," to indicate he was not a threat. Even though his head was spinning, Solas could make out the face of a young man, no older than thirty, his head shaved, a thin brown mustache on the top of his lip. Dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, Solas guessed he was an agent that Leliana had planted there.
"My father gave you a sedative, no doubt of his design; you only have a few more minutes before you go unconscious. We'll have to hurry if you don't want him and his minions to catch up to us."
Father? Solas thought to himself. Alexius had not mentioned his son. He must have misheard as sleep was already taking hold of him. Using the rest of his mana, Solas summoned a healing spell, attempting to will his body to simply walk.
The young man wasted no time, gripping Solas' arm tightly, as he used his magic to rush them to the front door, past the ornate ionic columns and frescos of historic Tevinter battles, and out to the edge of the estate's yard, at the edge of a cliff that fell hundreds of feet to an angry sea below.
"How do I know I can trust you?" Solas asked him.
"I don't know if you have a choice!" The young man laughed, clearly amused by the thrill. "Only, if you don't jump, you're going to be overtaken by a gang of Venatori, and that will be most unpleasant. My father wanted to offer you to their elven partners."
Solas had reluctantly walked to the edge of the green yard, falling to his knees as the sedative wore away at his resolve. At the very least, he'd be unconscious when he plummeted to the swirling water. If he were lucky, the fall itself would kill him.
Ellana, a voice in the back of his head had repeated.
Solas was a man of broken dreams.
"Wait!" The young man shouted when Solas had put his arms out, steeling himself for the drop.
Walking forward with a rakish grin, the man summoned a green wave of magic that flickered in the air before surrounding Solas' entire body in a warm protective layer of magic.
Barrier Solas realized gratefully. It was strong. If he were lucky, it would be enough.
"Best of luck, friend!" He could hear the man shout as Solas flung himself off the edge.
Solas didn't remember hitting the water.
He was glad to wake up.
How long had he been unconscious?
The pressure in the cabin was changing as the plane began to descend. Stroud helped Solas up and guided him into one of the passenger seats, nodding for Solas to fasten his seatbelt.
Solas clenched his eyes, his limbs ached. The change in pressure made his head hurt even more, his ears popping as the plane began to land.
A few minutes later, feeling the plane hit the ground, Solas looked up to see Stroud holding out a sweatsuit, the kind that Warden cadets wore when training. It would look ridiculous on him, but he couldn't very well depart with his ripped open shirt and tattered pants. Pulling off his clothes, Solas pulled the dry cotton over his skin with a sigh of relief before tightening the string belt at the waist.
"Weird not to see you in a suit," Stroud grumbled as he escorted Solas off of the tarmac towards a large SUV, opening the door for Solas to climb into the front seat. Clarel soon followed, carrying a medical bag, and an IV, that she rigged up, skillfully inserting the needle into Solas' vein for the car ride,
"This should help clear out the toxins. Our agent on the ground confirmed it was only a sedative."
"Was the agent his son? What did Alexius get himself into?" Solas asked as he reclined the seat back, putting his hand to his pounding head.
"Leliana will tell you more," Stroud said as he put the car in gear. "The son doesn't want the father to get involved with the Venatori."
Solas shook his head. Alexius had gotten himself into a complicated web of lies and deceit. The Venatori were a secret order of Tevinter fanatics that had attempted several coups. To overthrow the democratic state and restore a mage-only government. He had thought the terrorist organization had been disbanded years ago.
"Sleep," Clarel barked from the back seat. "We have a long drive ahead."
Solas followed her orders without complaint.
Besides, if he were lucky, he'd be back to Val Royeux in time for Hallow's Eve party.