By Gods Forsaken

by inwardtransience

One day, the shadows will part, and the skies will open wide. When he rises, everyone will see. (How do you do a summary for something this big? Total retelling, Mahariel!Warden, mage!Hawke, Dreamer!Trevelyan!Inquisitor, worldbuilding, too many OCs, serious plot edits, primarily F/F.)

17. Broken Circle — IV

9:30 Nubulis 22

Kinloch Hold, Danesmouth, Highever, Kingdom of Ferelden

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Light spread over the land, warm and orange-gold, leaping from hill to hill, stymied by thin trees and blocky homes for a moment before spreading on. Like paint being brushed across a surface, color advancing over the hills. The water far below, a dull featureless blue-gray, was still in shadow when the light struck the tower, the sun peeking over the horizon a bright orange, the chill of pre-dawn banished in an instant.

Lýna blinked, dazzled by the unexpected brightness, ducked to rest her forehead against the fence. She'd thought the sunlight would spread all the way to the water, at least, before reaching up the tower, she hadn't expected to get a faceful of it so early.

Once her eyes had adjusted to the morning a little, she looked up again. The land was spread out below her, the details much clearer than they'd been before the approach of morning. The shore was nearby, so close Lýna nearly had to lean over the edge to make out the strip of water to the northeast, rising in gently curving hills. There was little in the way of tree cover — a few patches here and there, yes, but mostly strips of brush, fields of long grasses wiggling in the wind, from this distance the motion only visible as the faintest flicker of color and shadow. Save for a narrow strip along the shoreline, which was left unbroken, there were large sections of land that didn't seem to have much growing on it at all, open earth so dark it'd been black in the night, didn't seem much lighter in the morning either. Farms, she knew, alternating with grassy patches and bands of brush and strands of trees, dotted here and there with rectangular buildings, tiny little blocks at this distance, too small to make out any of the finer details.

The land below her seemed so far away, so small, and yet...

It was starting to sink in just how large Ferelden was.

She'd known the Alamarri were many, but... She'd imagined the lands of the Chasind, but...more of it. The city in the south, she'd thought, surely the cities of the Alamarri couldn't be so much larger than that one — they hadn't come near enough to Gwaren to see, but they'd passed villages at the outskirts, farms spread randomly across the countryside, and that hadn't seemed so different. Aesthetically, yes, but in the general shape not so much.

And then, travelling with Duncan and the other recruits, she'd seen South Reach. The place was, quite simply, the largest concentration of people she had ever seen in her life. Looking down on it from a nearby hill, it'd been hard to believe, all those little houses and larger stone halls, that people lived in all of these, hundreds and hundreds and thousands. An unimaginable number of people. Wary of being around so many strange humans, Lýna had refused to step foot in the city itself, instead promising to go around and meet the others when they came out the other side. There were just so many, and...

South Reach wasn't even the largest city in Ferelden.

The army at Ostagar had been large, yes, undoubtedly the greatest assembly of the like she'd seen in her life. But that hadn't been surprising. After all, there were more Alamarri than there were Chasind, and the approaching darkspawn were a threat to them all — it only made sense that the Alamarri would put together the largest force they possibly could. But it hadn't been the largest force they could possibly gather. Lýna knew now, there were many more soldiers in the country. The army at Ostagar had been...maybe a quarter of their fighting men? Those that had the training and the experience and the equipment all ready, Alistair claimed they could muster up even more if they really had to, given a few months to prepare. The numbers Alistair threw around were, just, staggering.

According to Alistair, there had been roughly twenty thousand warriors at the Battle of River Dane — where the Alamarri under the command of Loghain handed the Orlesians a crushing defeat despite being outnumbered nearly two-to-one, thirty years ago only a day's trip north up the river from here. Lýna couldn't even imagine what an army of twelve thousand soldiers would look like. She certainly couldn't imagine fighting that many, as Loghain had.

At Ostagar there had been...two thousand? three? Something like that.

According to Alistair, throughout the entire kingdom, the men they had equipped and ready to go at a moment's notice, including city guardsmen and the like, came out to around eight to ten thousand. With a few months to prepare, to organize the people they had and distribute arms, they could get that number pretty close to thirty thousand; if they had a year to manufacture arms and train up recruits, they could maybe gather as many as eighty thousand, but at that point they'd start having problems keeping everything else running the way it was supposed to.

In the worst of emergencies, when the entire country was threatened — like during a Blight — they might be able to get together a quarter million, maybe even more. They wouldn't be equipped very well, no armor and carrying wood axes and work knives, branches fashioned into crude spears, but if it came down to it and they had no other choice. A quarter million.

And even that was only a fraction of the population. A rather large fraction, relatively speaking, but still.

Lýna couldn't imagine that. It was completely unimaginable.

She knew the word for a million — only in Deluvẽ and now Alamarri, it'd never come up in Avvar or Chasind — but she'd never actually had to use it before. It was just...

Looking out over the countryside, here, there were no cities in sight. Leaning around and looking to the north, over a narrow curve of land sticking into the lake, she could make out the mouth of the river, there was a village there — not a particularly large one, maybe a little bigger than Lothering. Spread across the land, hills rolling away to the horizon, farms, here and there and there, dotted all over the place. An enormous range of fertile land, easily dozens lived only on what she could see now. And they would grow enough they could probably feed hundreds more. This would be a significant fraction of the fields along the river in the south. She couldn't say what fraction exactly, more than a tenth, less than a quarter.

It was a tiny speck in Ferelden.

Lýna couldn't make the comparison, exactly. She didn't have the figures she would need, she'd never really considered how large the south was, or how many people lived there. But she didn't need to know the exact figures to know Ferelden was very large. Their journey north, when they'd finally decided to flee, they'd been going in practically a straight line for weeks, and...

Ferelden was larger than the entire south, she was pretty sure. And millions of people lived here.

She couldn't imagine it.

The wealth they had in people, all that they could do with that many hands... The forge in Redcliffe, it might well have been the finest she'd ever seen — the only one she could really compare it to was the one in the city. And the Alamarri had a dozen just like it, more. No wonder their warriors wore mail, and solid plate, she couldn't even imagine the resources that required. She couldn't imagine the wealth they had, in food and metal and leather and wood and cloth...

In magic. A tiny portion of a people had magic — one in twenty was about right among the People, a little rarer among the Avvar, maybe one in a hundred for the Chasind. According to Alistair, they were even rarer among the Alamarri, closer to one in ten thousand. Which wasn't a surprise, given what their faith said of magic, Lýna had noticed that there was practically no sign of magic in Lothering, in Redcliffe. The Alamarri appeared to be a people without magic at all, which would seem to have them at a disadvantage...except they weren't, they simply concentrated their magic all in place, in these Circles.

Alistair said there were two hundred mages in Kinloch Hold, give or take.

Two hundred!

Having spent so much time around Mẽrhil, Ásta or other Avvar shamans, Lýna was very familiar with what a single mage could do. People coming together for safety against the Blight, she had some familiarity with what a dozen mages working in concert could accomplish, amazing and terrible things.

But a hundred? She couldn't imagine it. She simply couldn't imagine it.

Leaving her People to walk among the Alamarri, she'd thought... Chasind, that they were like the Chasind. They spoke a language she didn't know, and had some peculiar beliefs, and there were more of them, but they were practically just more Chasind. Not so different.

Lýna was starting to realize that she'd horribly underestimated how alien the north was.

This was not her home, this was nothing like her home. And if she were to do what needed to be done, here, she would have to...accept that.

She wasn't with her clan any longer. She was living among the Alamarri now. There was no place for a hunter of her People here. If she truly meant to face the Blight with these people, she needed to adjust, to learn.

If she couldn't, she might as well throw herself off of this tower right now, for all the good she'd do for anybody.

The wind, cool and thick with the rains to come, brushed over her, her hair dancing. Her thoughts drifting, she wondered what Ásta would have thought of the wind gusting just then — she'd probably insist the Lady of the Skies was trying to say something to her, which was ridiculous for a whole list of reasons. Not the least of which being it was early spring, the wind was going to be blowing around a lot like this. She didn't know why the thought had occurred to her, it was silly.

Ásta had been dead for a year now. She really didn't know why she'd thought of her.

With a last, long look at the land far beneath her, Lýna pushed herself to her feet. Putting her back to the dawn sun, she made back for the door into the tower, started down the stairs.

Yesterday, Esmond had decided to put up the Wardens in the lower Enchanters' apartments. Lýna hadn't been informed as to his reasoning, but she assumed it was just because they were available — several of the Enchanters were dead, and those that weren't were either injured, under questioning, or attending to the children downstairs. The only place the Wardens could be put where they wouldn't be crowded by Templars or mages was up here, so that was where they'd ended up.

As much as Lýna didn't care about having space to herself as she'd noticed a lot of Alamarri did, she was glad it'd turned out this way. There was a lot going on downstairs, being put in relative isolation as they had was probably the only reason Lýna had gotten any sleep at all last night. It had been slightly unnerving at first, being put on the same floor as that last abomination, but she'd gotten over it.

She still didn't like sleeping surrounded by solid stone on all sides, but she'd been very tired.

The first few levels she passed through were still and silent — they'd been cleaned up a little in the hours after the end of the battle, but nobody was up here at the moment. Lýna was just stepping onto the last flight of stairs when she picked up the first sign of activity. It sounded like somebody was in the middle room on their level. A high scraping rustle, that was the turning of a page, somebody was going through a book down there. Maybe Leliana, but Alim was most likely.

The middle room on their level (the one the abomination had been in) was filled with furniture for sitting, some for a single person and others for two or three or four, the underlying wood hidden with layers of cloth, padded enough they were soft, gave a bit under a person's weight. There was enough seating for twenty to thirty people, which was odd, because there wasn't sleeping room for that many Enchanters on this level, but okay. There were also a few shelves here and there, little tables, filled with rows of books, the covers leather in a variety of muted, earthy colors, some looking smooth and new, others starting to age, white creases running down their sides.

Alim was perched on one of the little tables, a book open in his lap, paging through more quickly than Lýna thought he could read. He was out of the armor he'd been given at Ostagar, only in pants and a short-sleeved shirt of a pale cloth of some kind — linen, she was pretty sure, the Alamarri kind, like what she'd gotten to line her things. His hair was a mess, sticking up in all directions, flattened a bit in the back, where he'd been lying on it overnight.

Lýna noticed bite marks along his left ear, a bruise forming low on the side of his throat. Lacie had ended up staying, then.

"Good morning, Lýna," he said without looking up, flicking by another page. "You're coming from upstairs?"

"Yes. I watched sunrise."

"Ah, right, I didn't think there was anyone up there right now. I think the kitchens will have breakfast in a few minutes."

"Yes." Lýna glanced around at the chairs, frowning to herself a little. The bits of armor she'd fixed to her things had seemed like a good idea — and it was, every little bit of extra protection made it that much less likely she'd get killed one day — but she hadn't realized how soft Alamarri furniture was. If she sat in these she might end up tearing something. So she leaned on the edge of one of the nearby tables instead. "We need to talk."

Alim's lips twisted with a grimace, one of his ears even twitching. "Yes, I... I thought we might. Give me a second though, I was looking for something."

"What?"

"Did the Archdemon speak to you last night?"

Blinking at the apparent change in subject, Lýna shrugged. "Yes. But I don't understand. Most times it is...angry. I don't know what this was." It'd been mostly just confusing. The weird Blight dreams she'd gotten ever since the Joining were never very clear, mostly just a lot of blood and fire and hateful screaming, nothing really stuck out enough to be worth remembering in the morning. This one had been quieter, but she couldn't really say she'd taken away much.

"It was dreaming. I mean, remembering things from before, I think— Yes! Here, take a look." Alim held the book out toward her, hanging open, his thumb holding it at a particular page.

...He was aware she couldn't read, right? It looked like there was a drawing taking up most of one of the pages, so Lýna took it anyway. She wasn't really sure what that was supposed to be. There was no color in the drawing, and the image was somewhat flattened, the shapes not quite right. But it looked like...bushes? Flowering bushes, some ferns there, above looked like some kind of roof, but segmented, the lines formed by the sections forming an angular, repeating pattern, like the floor tiles in the tower but overhead. She couldn't pick out much more than that. "What is?"

"The Glass Gardens of Asariel. Built in Seven Oh Nine Ancient, damaged in Two Thirty-Five Ancient, during the First Blight, but soon restored based on the original blueprints. They were destroyed when the Qunari conquered Asariel in Seventy-Two Steel, nearly fifteen hundred years after they were first forged — and the Qunari burned the city archives, so they couldn't be rebuilt."

"...Okay?" Lýna didn't know what Asariel was — a city, probably, but she didn't know where. Also, those were year numbers, she was pretty sure, but the Alamarri used a different calendar than the People. To her, it was the seven-hundred eleventh year of the Exile; she knew the Alamarri called this the thirtieth year of the Dragon, but she didn't know what came before the first. And she knew practically nothing about the Qunari. "Why do you look for this?"

Alim took the book back, snapped it closed with a sigh. "The Archdemon was dreaming of the Glass Gardens."

Lýna didn't remember much of anything, but she'd take his word for it. "So?"

His voice going low and flat, Alim muttered, "I think I've identified our enemy. I believe we face Urthemiel, the Old God of Beauty — his priests designed the Glass Gardens ages ago, with inspiration from him in dreams."

...She was all but certain "Urthemiel" was an elven name. Though it was hard to tell, Alim's pronunciation wasn't very elven-sounding. Maybe graceful, or sweet-dreaming, she wasn't sure, but definitely elven. The name must have been what the Ancients had called the dragon god, the Tevinters had just kept using it. "Okay. And what use is this?"

"None, I guess." Setting the book aside, Alim let out a heavy sigh. "I was just thinking... Some of the Old Gods were cruel, yes, but for all that we can tell Urthemiel was harmless. He was, you know, the patron of artisans, and weavers, and musicians, and painters — he taught people dreaming in the Fade how to make beautiful things. That was it. And twisted by the magic of the Blight, he... I guess it's just sad, is all."

"...Yes." Honestly, that thought had never occurred to Lýna. The stories said the archdemons had been gods to the Tevinters before the Blight twisted them into what they were now, and... She couldn't imagine how horrifying that must have been for them. Lýna wasn't inclined to pity Tevinters, given what they had done to the People over the ages, but still, she could only think, if it were someone like, say, the Lawgiver who had been corrupted into a mad, murderous monster... The Avvar would not deal with that well.

If it were the Lady of the Skies, they might as well just all kill themselves — there was no fighting the Lady, they would never see their deaths coming. So, it could be worse, at least Tevinter's dragon Dreamers could be fought, but she could admit it must not have been pleasant for them when they first turned.

But she really didn't have anything else to say about that. Nor did she really know what to say next. "Lacie came."

"A couple times, I should think." Her head tilted in confusion, and Alim forced out an awkward little cough, his eyes tipping away from hers. "Ah, yes, she's still asleep in there," he said, nodding toward the room he'd been put in. "I didn't say anything, but I...didn't think you'd mind?"

"Why should I?"

"Well, you shouldn't, I guess. I didn't really think... Never mind. Why do you ask?" He sounded slightly wary, one eye narrowing a little, though Lýna couldn't imagine why.

"You and Lacie are..." She trailed off, frowning to herself. "I don't know how you say it, in Alamarri. Now I know mages can't marry — this is your word for gal-sýtala, yes, bonding?"

He blinked. "Um, I don't speak Dalish at all, but I assume you have the right idea."

It was slightly irritating that Leliana could speak elvish — not the same elvish Lýna did, but still — while Alim couldn't at all, but that wasn't really her business. "I don't know the word. Not married, but lives together and... Is there Alamarri word for this?"

"Oh, I don't think so, no." Lifting a shoulder in a lazy shrug, Alim said, "Unless you're trying to say 'lovers'? But I don't think that's it. It sounds like you're trying for something that has more of an implication of commitment than that, but I don't think there is such a word. In Orlesian, yes, but not Alamarri."

"...Okay." She knew 'love' was latha, so 'lover' would be laƫe...or lathĩje? Those might be the same word in Alamarri — she knew they were in Avvar and Chasind, so it seemed likely. Except, Alim said it like it was they are lovers...but that was confusing in context, she wasn't sure how to translate that. Oh well, Alamarri was weird. "I ask only as she marked you."

"What?" Seemingly without thinking about it, his hand came up to his throat. "Yeah, I thought that might have happened, I haven't looked..."

"No, I mean..." Lýna reached over and flicked his left ear, the one with the bite marks on it. He twitched, cringing away, half reaching up to cover it before stopping himself, hissing between his teeth. She barely managed to keep herself from laughing at him — she was remembering parents and the like teasing their newly-bonded children, it was just vaguely adorable. "Did you not know? Is very red."

"I wasn't really thinking... You ask about us because of that? Is that...something elves do?" he asked, the words coming slow and awkward. For some reason, she couldn't really guess why.

Fighting a smile, she nodded. "Yes, that is something elves do. Think, you put a mark anywhere, who knows, but on ears? Everyone see those."

"Yes, good point, I didn't think of that." Shifting his shoulders a little, uncomfortable, Alim cleared his throat again. "I don't think Lacie really meant anything by it, the way you're thinking. She's a little annoyed with me at the moment — it's possible she did it just to embarrass me."

If that word meant what she thought it did, she didn't see what was embarrassing about it, but it also didn't seem important enough to ask. "Does she come with us, when we go?"

Alim just stared at her for a second, expression blank with surprise. "Uh. I wasn't planning on it. You're saying, if I wanted her to come along, you would be okay with that."

"Yes. Why not?"

"I..." His mouth fell closed, he blinked at her a couple times. "She has no intention of joining the Wardens, you know. She doesn't... I don't think she would do well, long term."

Giving him a crooked smile, Lýna said, "Maybe we say to Templars she is with us, but she need not have Joining, you see."

"...Ah. Jowan and Solana?"

"They will be Wardens. If Lacie does not wish to, she need not."

"I understand." Slowly folding his arms over his chest, Alim looked away, staring up at the ceiling for a moment. Finally he sighed. "No. No, I don't think so. I'll ask her, but I think she'll decide to stay. She's safer here."

Lýna scowled. "She is?"

"If we weren't going out to fight darkspawn, I might have to think about it longer, but as things stand now, yes."

"Okay." Given what she'd been shown of the Circle the last couple days, she seriously doubted any mage was safe here — at least against the darkspawn, they would be free to fight back — but it wasn't for her to say. If Lacie didn't want to come with them, that was her decision to make. "We are leaving with only Solana, then?"

"And Wynne," Alim said with a nod.

"Wynne is only to heal Eamon, yes?"

"She might stay with us after, we'll have to see. She did help at Ostagar and, um..." He trailed off, turning away from her again, his shoulders hunching a little. "She is... You can't let any of the Templars know this, they'll kill her, but she's an abomination."

"Völva."

"What?"

"She is völva, not abomination. She and her spirit Beyond are not one, but they speak, the spirit works by her. I don't know word for this." She wasn't even certain there was an Alamarri word for it — she'd assumed their Mothers and Sisters were shamans, but Leliana had made it very clear that they weren't supposed to be, and she couldn't think what else to compare it to.

Alim shrugged, the motion somehow looking almost painful. "We don't have a word for that distinction, I don't think. We would call people like Wynne fadewalkers, I guess, but it's not normal for a fadewalker to have such close ties to a particular spirit. Hence why the Templars would consider her an abomination."

"...This is stupid."

"Yeah, I don't disagree. But anyway, as I was saying, it really isn't safe for her to stay in the Circle, as things stand, and she was motivated to leave and help with the Blight in the first place, so she might end up coming with us. If she doesn't volunteer you should ask her — she really is the best healer you're likely to find, and she's been around forever, she'll probably have useful advice about things. Especially since we'll be needing to get an alliance with the dwarves, and we have the Landsmeet to deal with, you know."

Lýna nodded. "After Eamon, and we know what is next, I will talk with her. And Solana?"

"What about her?" he asked, frowning a little. Then his eyes widened again, twitching with an, "Oh! Have you talked to her yet?"

"No. I did not much... Yesterday, I was tired."

"Right, um." Alim grimaced, a little, his lip curling, warily leaning away from her. Not a lot, but enough for Lýna to tell he was uncomfortable with whatever he was about to say. "Are you all right? I mean, Alistair said you were in and out yesterday morning, and I was looking for you last night and your room was empty..."

"I sleep with Alistair."

His eyes gone wide, voice oddly thick and shaking, Alim blurted, "What?!"

Her head tilting, Lýna frowned up at him. That was a...very strong reaction, to something so simple. "Yes...?"

"You with..." Alim blinked to himself for a moment. "Do you mean literally?"

"I don't know this word."

"Right, sorry, of course not. You mean, you two got in the same bed, and you slept, completely innocent, you just slept."

"Yes? What else do—" What Alim was implying finally clicked, Lýna's frown grew heavier. "You think I mean..." She didn't actually know how to say that in Alamarri. "Alim, Alistair is human."

Laughing under his breath, "Yeah, I did notice that, thank you — that royal bastard's huge, it'd be hard not to. But that's not... I don't wish to alarm you, Lýna, I realize you are very Dalish, but you do know there are people who don't care about that, right? Which race their lover is, I mean."

...Lýna had the vague feeling Alim was mocking her with the I don't wish to alarm you part. "I don't... I knew warriors, Avvar, who...married? This is how you say it, they are married? Yes. Elf and human."

"Oh, well, you can't do that here, actually — I mean, I guess you probably could, if the local Mother agreed to go along with it, but technically it's not allowed. Because elves and humans can't have children together, you see, so the Chantry says there's really no point in intermarrying. But people love who they love, you know."

She was not surprised by that at all. In fact, she'd always been confused by those warriors being bonded, for that exact reason. "I am saying, yes, I know. But, I don't, and I don't mean to sleep this way. And Alistair knows this. Yes?"

"You mean there was no misunderstanding between the two of you, yes, I got that. I'm just—" Alim let out a little laugh, shaking his head. "I'm just saying, don't tell people that. That you slept with Alistair, I mean — it's a common euphemism, if you say that they'll think you're lovers."

"Yes, thank you, I didn't know." That was sort of new territory to her — the People, Avvar, and Chasind tended to share idioms, ways of saying things spread around, so that sort of misunderstanding didn't happen very often. She was going to have to be careful with that. "How do I say it? Sleep only."

"Um...you don't, honestly." Alim let out a thin sigh, his eyes tipping up to the ceiling for a second. "I'm guessing what you grew up with, I don't know much about what your life would have been like before coming here, but I think this is one of those things that are different. It's a consequence of the way we build things, and how we handle property. Most of the time, only close relatives share private space, at home. In more public spaces, where you'll have people who aren't family — public baths, army barracks, that sort of thing — those spaces are split by sex, men in one and women in the other. Not always, but almost always. You might have noticed the dorms here are split too. This is just...the way we do it, it's normal — if you were to suggest space where people are likely to be in a state of undress shouldn't be split by sex, well, there are a number of people who would be scandalized by the idea.

"What I mean is, it doesn't matter how you say it. If a man and a woman are sharing a bed, no matter the circumstances, the assumption is always going to be that they're lovers. The only exception is close family, siblings and cousins, which obviously you and Alistair are not. Even I, who know how very Dalish you are and that it was extremely unlikely, even my first assumption was that you two were fucking in there. Just, something to keep in mind."

Lýna was scowling hard enough she could feel the skin pinching around her nose — that was just...very silly. Though, she guessed it did sort of make sense? The Alamarri had all these buildings, space to put people in, to split them up, in a way people back home simply hadn't. When she thought about it, Lýna suspected she'd slept alone more nights since she'd joined the Wardens than she had in the rest of her life put together. It wasn't normal, for her People. When she'd been a child, she'd slept with her parents, and after they were both gone Ashaᶅ. And then she'd been with Muthallã, but after he'd died she'd normally slept with the other hunters. And, Chasind lodges were always open, so that counted too — Lýna usually kept somewhat to herself, since it was mostly humans around, but there was nothing intimate going on between the Chasind there either. She'd actually slept with Avvar warriors — that is, bundled up together, sharing warmth — on dozens of occasions, she couldn't count the times. That that sort of thing was so alien to Alamarri they would make the exact opposite assumption was...

Weird. It was weird. This probably wasn't something she'd be admitting aloud, but she didn't really like sleeping alone. At first, she just hadn't been comfortable with the Warden recruits, but she'd since gotten the impression that Alamarri preferred sleeping alone, so it hadn't seemed appropriate to just... And now she knew that for certain, she guessed. And it was weird. Just another thing she'd have to get used to, she guessed.

"You keep saying Dalish. That I am very Dalish, you know."

Alim frowned. "Yes?"

"Why?"

"Oh, well," he said, shifting a little awkwardly, "I had the feeling the possibility might not have even occurred to you. Because the Dalish are very serious about their people only being with other elves, you might not even notice any subtext going on with humans."

...She didn't know what 'subtext' meant, but she thought she got what he was saying. "You are not one of us, is what I mean. Do you mean you... I don't know how you say it. Are lovers with humans?"

"Have human lovers, um..." Alim turned away again, almost seeming to cringe.

She didn't need help interpreting that expression. "I don't... It is matter of loyalty, with my people. With your bonded, you have duty, and if your bonded is not of us, of people who hurt us before, we worry, you see? With you, here, there is no matter of loyalty. I ask that I'm...curious only."

For a long seconds, Alim just frowned down at her, looking an odd mix of surprised and...concerned? Wary, maybe — she didn't know what that was about. "Oh, um. Yes, I have..." He trailed off, letting out another sigh, one hand coming up to rub at the side of his face. "You can't control who you're attracted to, you know, it just happens. We find that people mostly prefer their own race — elves with elves, humans with humans, dwarves with dwarves. Even people who prefer the same sex, it usually works out that way. There are exceptions to every rule, of course, but most of the time. Myself, it depends on who we're talking about somewhat, but I tend to find elven women more attractive, but human women are pretty too sometimes.

"So you can understand my jumping to conclusions," Alim said, lips tilting in a smirk. "I'm not so appreciative of the masculine form myself, but even I can see Alistair is a very handsome man."

There'd been a lot of big words in there she hadn't understood, but Lýna was pretty sure Alim was making fun of her. Which was fine, he could have his fun, she didn't mind. "...He is?"

Alim giggled. "Yes, Lýna, of course he is. You have seen him."

...She'd thought, when Alim and Morrigan (and Marian before) had joked about Alistair being pretty, they'd been mocking him for being the opposite. His face was all square and blocky, and his jaw stuck out weird, and his eyes were tiny...but human faces tended to all be like that to some extent, the men rather more so than the women. Lýna wasn't saying he was offensive to look at, but she hadn't thought he was pretty either, so maybe she just couldn't tell at all? That was a weird thought. Also, he was just big. She realized a lot of human women liked large men — she'd heard enough cooing and giggling from Avvar women and girls watching their warriors practicing to figure that out herself — but it'd always seemed very strange to her.

Alistair was a lot bigger than Muthallã. It seemed like that would be...bad. Thinking about it was making her very uncomfortable, like icy cold water dribbling down her back, so she was just going to stop now.

"I sleep with him because..." Lýna trailed off, biting her lip. Part of her didn't want to admit this, though she wasn't sure why — she seriously doubted Alim would think any less of her for it, so. She pushed herself back on the table, so she was sitting on it properly, lifted her feet up to prop her heels on the edge, her arms wrapping around her ankles. "You know, when you are near sleep, that step in the middle, when this," waving a hand vaguely for a second before putting it back with the other, "is not all real. Like the dusk, not day but not yet night, colors deep and shadows strange." Not her poetical words, she was paraphrasing something from a story she'd heard.

Clearly confused, Alim drew out a long, "Yes?"

"I get there, and start to fall toward Beyond and... I hear it. The demon. I know it is not there, it is dead, but..." Lýna shrugged. "I thought, it will be easier if I am not alone. You were with Lacie, and Lèlja was out, so I go to Alistair."

When she glanced back up at Alim's face, it was to find him looking weirdly guilty. She didn't have to wonder what that was about for very long. "Yeah, I meant to...apologize for that. For what I said in the dream, I mean. I don't... I wouldn't have talked to you like that if I didn't think it was necessary to pull you out of the demon's influence. I thought, given the vulnerabilities it was leverag— Shit, sorry," he cut himself off with a groan, apparently realizing she wasn't going to understand him if he used too many big words. "The places in your head, the weakness the demon was pulling at, I tried to pull somewhere you were strong instead. I thought even as I was doing it that it was a cruel thing to do, what I was saying, but, it was the only thing I can think of."

Despite herself, Lýna felt a smile pulling at her lips. "You say the right thing already, before."

"...What?"

"The demon wanted me to give up, so you say I am not finished yet. I have duty, this is true, but is not mine alone." Lýna paused for a moment, idly picking at the laces of her boots. "True now, it is...heavy, at times. I try not to think of it, and the demon pulls it up, but it is there. I do miss my clan, Mẽrhiᶅ and Tallẽ most so. Ásta. I do miss the south. But I am here now. The Wardens are my people now. You, and Alistair, and Perry, and Keran, and soon Jowan and Solana, our friends in Lèlja and Fergus and Wynne. And this, this is not so bad."

Lips twisting and head tilting in a smirk — but a thin one, hiding something else with it — Alim said, "Well, I'm glad to know it's not so bad."

"Sèt, you know what I mean. You say the right thing before, when you say I'm not alone in this. It is okay. You need not apologize now." She was pretty sure she'd pronounced that right — even when she did pick up the big words, it was hard to say them correctly sometimes.

"Okay, it sounds like you're the one reassuring me, somehow."

"But I am — you look so guilty, before."

Alim rolled his eyes, but the exasperation was as thin as the smirk from before. "Yes, well, I don't enjoy making girls cry, you know. Forgive me for feeling like an ass about it."

...Oh, she had cried on him in the dream, hadn't she? She'd forgotten about that. Right, she was just going to...skip right over that and move on. "This is what I want to talk about, here."

"...Me making girls cry? I didn't realize I did that often enough it's a problem we need to talk about."

Lýna sighed. "No, Alim, what I say before. That this is my home now. I am Warden of Ferelden now, but I know little of this land, the people who live here. If I am to stay here, to do what is needed of me, I must learn."

"Oh! I was thinking about that earlier, actually, about, um..." With a long hum, one of Alim's hands came up to run through his hair, frowning off toward one of the rooms — Lèlja's, she thought. "Never mind, it's not— Right, well, that's a very good idea, actually. Um. Solana and Wynne would probably be good to ask about that, and Wynne even does a lot of teaching here at the Circle, so—

"Hang on a second." Alim tipped his weight back forward, skipped off toward Lýna's right. He poked at one of the little bookshelves dotted across the room for a moment before moving on to the next. At the third, he apparently found what he was looking for, straightening with an, "Ah ha! I thought I saw one of these around." He sauntered back toward Lýna, once he was within a few steps held out the book toward her.

He was aware she couldn't read, right? Where would she ever have learned that?

"This is Mother Alfled's History of the Kings of Alamar — it's not just about kings and teyrns and arls and whatnot, it's actually pretty good about focusing on what was going on on the ground, you know, gives a much better picture of what these times were actually like than foreign historians tend to do. The best history of Ferelden you're likely to find, starting all the way back during the War of the Crowns, most scholars consider this a cultural backwater, so they don't bother. It is a little outdated now — it was written before the Orlesian occupation — but a lot of the background will still be applicable, and these are stories people learn just growing up here, and it'll be helpful to get some of the economics and politics going on. If that makes sense?"

No, apparently he didn't realize Lýna couldn't read. "Alim?"

"You should definitely go through the Chant at some point. I'm not saying you have to convert, just, it'd probably be helpful to know about it, is all. If I can, I'll find you a copy of Tsjekkö's Journeys — it's a sort of journal by a dwarf noble exiled from Orzammar, finding his way on the surface. Most of it is in Ferelden and the Marches, and it's relatively modern, it's all about cultural stuff and people's day to day lives and whatnot, I think that'll be really helpful, but while there are dozens of copies of the Alfled lying around there aren't as many of the Tsjekkö, and I'm not sure the Circle would be happy about us—"

"Alim!"

The over-excitable mage broke off with a full-body twitch, blinked down at her for a moment, seemingly dazed. "Ah. Yes?"

"I can't read."

"...Oh." His eyes sliding away from her, Alim's head tilted a little, blinking to himself some more. "Well," he said with a little smirk, his arm folding, hugging the book against his side, "I guess that's where we should start then, huh?"

Despite herself, Lýna felt a smile twitching at her lips. "Maybe. Is it so much use?"

Alim let out a little noise that seemed halfway between a chuckle and a scoff. "You'll need to know how to read eventually, Lýna. Besides, it's something practically everyone in the country knows — everyone's taught as children, so they can read the Chant. And, if you can read, we can just pick you up books, and you can catch yourself up on whatever you need to know in your downtime, without having to find someone to teach it all to you."

She supposed that made sense. Honestly, she'd sort of considered being able to read and write as...well, special and sort of impressive, but frivolous, with no real practical use at all. But that was still thinking along the lines of how things worked back home — almost nobody knew it, only those who had a teacher available and the free time to spend on it (so basically just Keepers and their apprentices, and Chasind law-speakers), and there was no real point to learning, since it wasn't like there were very many books lying around. As suggested the dozens of books all around this room, and the hundreds elsewhere in the tower, things were different here. "Okay. We do this now?"

"I was thinking breakfast right now, but I wasn't thinking I'd be the one teaching you. Come on, let's talk to her quick." Alim sauntered away again, this time heading for one of the doors out of the circular room, then across the hall towards one of the sections on the outside ring — this one had been given to Lèlja, she was pretty sure. He walked right through the first room, with more padded seating and bookshelves and a blocky wooden thing on four legs which Lýna wasn't really certain of the purpose for, knocked on the next door a few times — there had been a faint muttering of a voice from the other side, cut off immediately at the sound — before pushing it open a crack, sticking his head in. "Morning, Sister. Lýna and I needed to talk to you about something, unless we're interrupting?"

"No, it's alright, I was only singing matines. Come in."

The bedroom Lèlja had been given was no different in its form from Lýna's or Alistair's, though it did vary in minor details. There was the bed — very soft and covered in quilts, large enough for two people to lay down without touching each other at all, could easily sleep four or five in a pinch — a couple more chairs and a little table in this corner, shelves with more books, another of those odd tables Lýna didn't know the use for against a wall over there. Things were in slightly different places, and the books weren't the same, and the little trinkets here and there varied — personal items belonging to the people who'd lived here before, Lýna assumed.

She'd left all of it untouched, herself. They did mostly seem to be personal items with little practical use, and it also seemed a little rude, since many of the previous residents were dead now. Not that she minded claiming dead people's possessions in principle — that was how she'd gotten her father's dagger in the first place, after all — but she didn't know these people. Presumably, there were friends or apprentices or someone still around who'd prefer to go through it all without Lýna mucking it up first.

Lèlja was in her new pants and shirt, a fine-woven linen a pale off-white — at some point yesterday, she'd disappeared down into the Templars'...lodges (not the right word) and returned with boots, gloves, and replacements for her increasingly stained clothes folded over her arm. The boots were heavy leather, armored a bit with scales in strategic spots, which was good, Lýna had been wondering about her fighting in those flimsy little cloth shoes.

Her hair was still mussed from sleep, uneven and frizzing a bit over her left ear, she clearly hadn't properly risen for the morning yet, but she still smiled at them as they walked in. "Good morning, Alim, Lýna." (It'd only taken a couple Deluvẽ lessons for Lèlja to start pronouncing her name correctly.) Pushing herself up to her feet — she'd been kneeling at the foot of the bed a moment ago, for some reason — she plucked up a nearby candle, set about using it to light a lamp. "What can I help you with?"

"Lýna doesn't know how to read."

Lèlja gave Alim an amused look, one eyebrow ticking up, before turning to Lýna. "Did he think you could?"

Shrugging a little, Lýna said, "Yes."

"I don't imagine you had very many books available in the far south."

"No."

"How did he think you would have ever picked it up?"

"I don't know."

"Yes, yes," Alim sighed, rolling his eyes, "I'm a complete fucking idiot, can we move on to the point, please? Lýna says she needs to know more about Ferelden and the Alamarri, so I started giving her a reading list, and, well."

Lèlja nodded. "You want me to teach her."

"I would do it myself, but I just about died of boredom the first time around, and that was when I was the one learning it — I think if I tried it wouldn't work out very well for either of us. Also, I thought you could talk about the Chant? I don't think she knows really anything about it at all. No offense, by the way," Alim added to her, "I doubt there are many Andrastians down there, but it is sort of important around here."

It took Lýna a second to realize Alim had been concerned she might think he was calling her stupid. "I don't know your Chant, but I know little of Andraste. From stories of the Liberator."

"That's what you call Shartan, yes?" Lèlja hesitated for a second, before adding, "We don't remember much about him, I'm afraid — many works referencing Shartan and his rebels were altered or destroyed after the March on the Dales."

Lýna couldn't say she was surprised. "That's not his name. Sharthã is...kind of teacher. One who shows how to be by doing, you see?"

"Oh! See, like that, I didn't know that! What was his name?"

"We don't know." He lived over a thousand years ago, there was no telling what people had actually called him at the time. Lýna seriously doubted their prophet had really been called 'Andraste' either. "You know I am not... I will learn, but..."

For a second, Lèlja frowned, confused, before her face was again taken over with that warm, gentle, slightly distant smile of hers. "You don't intend to convert — don't worry, Lýna, I didn't expect you were. I promise I won't try to convince you, either," she added in a wry sort of drawl, her lips curling at one corner.

Letting out a little sigh, Lýna nodded. "Yes. Good."

"Okay. How about we get started on the reading, then?" Lèlja asked (more as a statement than a real question), drifting toward the weird table. "We'll have plenty of time to talk about the Chant on the road, but it won't be so easy to write."

Before Lýna could even consider responding, Alim said, "They should be serving breakfast right about now, you should probably wait until after to get into it."

Lèlja set the lamp on the table, started spreading out a roll of paper, the crinkling surprisingly loud. "Mm, I thought we'd go through the alphabet quickly, and come back to it a little more in depth later. It should only take ten, fifteen minutes or so. Unless you wanted to go down to breakfast first?"

It took a second for Lýna to realize she was asking her. "No, I can wait."

Alim's lips quirked a little, seemingly amused for some reason. "Right, well, you two have fun with that. I'm gonna go wake up Lacie."

"You have fun with that." There was a playful sort of lilt on Lèlja's voice, clearly suggesting something, though Lýna wasn't really sure what.

Whatever it was, Alim rolled his eyes with a little huff. "Uh-huh, I'll be lucky if she doesn't toss me into the wall — Lacie is not a morning person." Without another word, Alim turned on his heel and sauntered off, disappearing back into the rest of the tower.

Lèlja was watching Alim leave, a warm sort of smile on her face, her eyes almost seeming to dance in the lamplight. Glancing up at Lýna quick, she muttered, "Those two are adorable." Then she turned back to the paper on the weird table, plucking up a feather from a little jar nearby, started scritching at the paper with the point. A trail of ink was left behind by each scratch of the feather, forming the blocky shapes Lýna recognized as Alamarri writing, though rather larger than normal. "Now, there are two different scripts used by humans in Thedas. The one used to write Alamarri, spoken in Ferelden and much of the Free Marches, is adapted from dwarven letters — they aren't quite the same, but they are very similar. There's also a Tevene alphabet that's used to write other languages, including Orlesian, but it's almost never used to write Alamarri, so we won't trouble ourselves with that one right now.

"Each of these symbols here stands for a sound. Starting from the beginning, we have..."

---

9:30 Nubulis 24

Kinloch Hold, Danesmouth, Highever, Kingdom of Ferelden

---

Their time at Kinloch Hold ended up running much longer than Lýna had originally expected. If the circumstances were different, she might have found herself growing quite impatient — she'd never become accustomed to sitting around idle, without something to occupy her time Lýna sometimes got frustrated. There were things going on at the Circle, but they weren't things she could really participate in. Mostly aftermath from the battle here a few days ago — cleaning up messes that had been made, making repairs to furniture and fixtures and the stone itself, dealing with the remains of the dead. (Lýna noticed the mages killed in the fighting didn't get a funeral, cremated in a pile at the back of the little island; the dead Templars got a ceremony of some kind, but the mages weren't invited.) The Templars also interrogated seemingly half the mages, a long, tedious process that took days. She'd offered to help with the cleanup, but they were worried about damaged enchantments or spilled potions stuff, didn't think it was safe for anyone who wasn't a mage or a Templar to be doing.

Lýna needed to speak with the leaders of the Circle before they could leave — Wynne had already agreed to come with them to wake up the Arl, and Esmond had said the Circle would face the horde with the rest of them when the darkspawn advanced, but there were still details to arrange. And so, for days, Lýna and the others were mostly left to their own devices.

The others had something to occupy their time with, for the most part. Alistair was helping with the cleanup, and Lèlja with the dead — the Chantry people at Redcliffe hadn't wanted her help, but for some reason she didn't seem to bother the Templars here as much. (Lýna had no idea why, and it hadn't seemed quite right to ask.) She wasn't sure what Fergus was up to, but she knew he'd spent a lot of time talking to various mages and Templars, she hadn't overheard enough to guess what about.

Unlike the others, Alim hardly left the rooms they'd been given, relegating himself to the floor the Wardens had been put in, only leaving to get food or more books from one of the libraries. When she'd asked, Alim had said he didn't trust the Templars — Esmond had said he was free, that he wasn't to be harmed, but the Templars hated him enough Alim was worried one of them might hurt him anyway. Lèlja and Alistair thought he was being silly, but the impression the Templars here had left her with suggested to Lýna that was a perfectly reasonable concern. Enough she might have been uncertain about leaving him up there alone, but he was regularly visited by groups of mages, people he'd known growing up, and Lacie was with him pretty much all the time, so she tried not to worry about it.

But Lýna had practically nothing to do. The first day after waking up, she'd worked on her clothes. She'd gotten some splints from the smith to fix to her legs, the plan had been to rivet them in place when they got back to Redcliffe — luckily, she'd carried them with her onto the boat, bundled together at the bottom of her bag, because she had far more free time here than she'd expected. It'd taken a significant portion of the day to finish the job, but once it was done it was done, and she was out of work to do again. So she had to find other things to occupy herself with.

It turned out reading wasn't complicated — some of the letters were kind of similar, and people had different handwriting, but it usually wasn't too difficult to figure out which each one was supposed to be — it was just extremely tedious. There were twenty-three letters in all, which were too many for Lýna to look at once and just remember. After a couple days poking at it, she thought she mostly had them memorized...mostly. Lèlja had given her a few things to practice with, stories she'd written out, which Lýna would struggle to get through word by word. Sometimes she would forget a letter, and she'd have to reach for her scroll from that first lesson — Lèlja had made little drawings next to each letter, things that started with the sound the letter meant — but she'd had to do that constantly to start off with, and after a couple days it was only every once in a while.

Though, just because she recognized all the letters didn't always mean she'd be able to read the word. Sometimes, two letters next to each other made a different sound, but she wouldn't be sure if she was supposed to use the two-letter sound or the one-letter sounds one after the other. And the vowels were stupid — apparently, dwarvish had fewer vowels than Alamarri, and instead of just making up new letters the Alamarri would use the same letter for multiple sounds, or stick two letters together to suggest the right sound, but there was no particular way this was supposed to be done, people just made it up as they went along, so it could get extremely confusing. Lýna had to attempt to say each word aloud as she went just to figure out what it was, and sometimes she had to play with switching out the vowel for similar ones until it sounded right. And her Alamarri wasn't great to begin with, which made that whole process much harder. Sometimes she wouldn't be able to figure it out at all, and she'd have to try to guess what the word was supposed to be from context, which she couldn't always do.

Put it all together, and it was slow, and awkward, and frustrating. Lýna could only tolerate trying to read for so long before she was just done, had to go do something else for a little while — and by the time she quit, every time, she was stuck with an annoying headache. She kind of hated it.

Lèlja said she was doing well for someone completely new to this, but Lýna wasn't sure whether she should believe that or not.

After a day or two, Lèlja made a comment about maybe learning elvish writing at some point, so Lýna had been forced to admit that she couldn't read that either — she knew what her blood-writing said, but only because she'd been told. That conversation made her feel like an idiot (despite most of her People not being able to read), she changed the subject as quickly as possible.

When she wasn't struggling through learning to read, there really wasn't much for her to do. The big enchanted door separating the mages' tower from where the Templars lived was propped open the whole time (except during the night), so she could leave, but there wasn't really anywhere to go. By the end of the second day, she'd explored almost the entirety of Kinloch Hold — there were a few areas that were locked, or that Templars didn't want outsiders traipsing through, but everything else.

She could go outside whenever she wanted, though there was little point in doing so. The island the Hold stood on was tiny, hardly further across than the building itself. There was a shooting range behind the tower, but Lýna didn't really need the practice — especially since the range wasn't very long, the tiny island didn't allow for more, hitting a target that close was dead easy. She did drag Lèlja down to practice at one point, but her shooting had improved significantly from those first awkward moments at Redcliffe, it wasn't much of a challenge for her either.

Lèlja wasn't the best human archer she'd ever seen, but she wasn't far from it either. Lýna hadn't questioned her coming along, because rejecting help when a god offers it is a stupid thing to do just on principle, but apparently she would be useful, so, good.

And she was pretty much stuck on the island. The Templars were guarding the boats, to prevent escapes while the big enchanted door was open, so she'd have to convince them to let her through — they would, but she preferred to avoid talking to Templars if she could help it. Asking the sailors on the boat they'd come here on to take her across the short distance to land would be slightly ridiculous, and while there were these little rowboats, Lýna had never been in one before, and didn't want to make an idiot of herself trying to figure it out under the watchful eyes of the nearby Alamarri.

She was certain she could swim to shore from here...but she didn't really think it was worth the effort — what would she even do on the mainland once she got there? (Besides sleep under the trees, but she had to accustom herself to the Alamarri way of doing things anyway.) Also, the water was cold. She'd learned that very well on the fourth morning, when she'd gone down to the shore to bathe.

It wasn't so bad, she'd had worse. Some of the streams up in the hills back home were freezing in the spring, and the wind often had a chill to it, making it seem even colder. The lake was warmer than that (if not by much), and the air had started to soften with the changing season, the morning sun quickly burning the cold away. It was actually rather pleasant. Really, the worst part was the Templar guards watching her — they were staring at her like she were doing something very peculiar, Lýna had absolutely no idea why.

Lèlja informed her an hour or two later: apparently, a woman stripping down and washing up out in the open with men around wasn't something the Alamarri ever did. She did vaguely remember something about that, something Alim had said a couple days before — that women and men were isolated from each other whenever clothing would be removed, including bathing. Looking back on it, her time at Ostagar and with the Wardens since, Lýna might have guessed Alamarri were private about this sort of thing, but she didn't really care. If the men by the docks weren't Templars, whose existence made her uncomfortable to begin with, it probably wouldn't have bothered her at all.

Trying to get Lýna to understand, Lèlja had explained it was partially a matter of modesty — Lýna had needed that concept explained too, it was completely alien to her (which seemed to exasperate Lèlja a little) — but also, sometimes, one of safety. Lýna outright laughed when she figured out what Lèlja was implying — if one of these men decided to be such an idiot as to try to rape her, she would kill him first, and she suspected they knew it. Now that she understood how...alluring what she'd done was by Alamarri standards, she thought the fact that none of them had even so much as spoken a word to her while she was 'indecent' suggested as much.

(Men had tried before, and she'd killed both of them before they'd managed it, but she didn't say that part out loud.)

The latter part of that conversation was taken up by Lèlja trying to convince her to keep to the Alamarri way in this, if only to avoid drawing unwanted attention. Lýna refused. Their indoor bathing areas sounded unpleasant (and also impractical, carrying water in like that), and Lýna didn't care if people saw her nude. That was a sticking point for Lèlja, she thought Lýna was lying for some reason, or being intentionally provocative — Lèlja wasn't listening, this 'modesty' concept was just completely alien to her, that was all. She didn't entirely understand why it should bother her, and she didn't see what was provocative about just...existing, going about her business. Outsiders weren't supposed to see certain parts of her blood-writing, true, but most of her clan had broken that rule at some point or another, fighting or fleeing from the Blight with Avvar and Chasind, so it hardly mattered now. She might be more careful about being out of sight when she bathed from now on, but that was the only concession she was willing to make.

Frustrated, Lèlja had eventually given up.

When the time came her wait was finally over, later on the fourth day, Lýna was lying on the bed in the room she'd been given, painfully picking through one of Lèlja's stories. Trying to read with other people around made her weirdly self-conscious, so she always did it in private if she could help it. This was practically the only thing she did in here, she hadn't actually slept in the bed — the nightmares hadn't stopped, so she was still sleeping with Alistair. Which, now that she knew how Alamarri felt about covering themselves, was probably very uncomfortable for him, but he hadn't complained.

It was late afternoon, she thought, when there was a knock on the door — probably Lèlja or a mage, the sound wasn't sharp enough to be made by a gauntleted fist. "Are you awake in there, Lýna?"

She frowned. That was Alistair, he must just not be wearing his gloves. "Yes. What is it?" Alamarri liked to put it in places it wasn't really necessary, she'd finally figured that out these last few days.

There was a brief hesitation, and then the latch turned, the door pushed open. "We were invited to have—" Alistair spotted her — lying across the bed on her stomach, propped up over the papers on her arms — and his eyes immediately turned up to the ceiling. "Oh, shit, sorry, I thought you..." He cleared his throat, shuffling in place a little, unusually awkward.

It took her a moment to realize it was because she had stripped down to her shorts — the bits of metal she'd attached to her clothes would tear up the soft cloth on the bed something awful. This much of a reaction was quite silly, considering they'd been sleeping together the last few days, Alistair should be used to it by now. Hiding her exasperation with Alamarri making a fuss over silly things best she could, Lýna stood up, the bed dipping under her feet, hopped down to her clothes. "It's okay. What is it?" she asked, as she started doing the laces up her legs.

"Ah..." Still staring up at the ceiling, Alistair shuffled some more. "We were invited to have dinner with Greagoir and Irving, probably to work out a deal with the Circle. We were meeting up to decide who we want to send and what we want to say."

It took a moment for Lýna to remember those were the names of the leaders of the Templars and the mages here — she'd met Greagoir twice, briefly, and she hadn't spoken to Irving at all. She nodded. "Good idea." How many people had been invited? Lýna should be there, certainly, and Alistair was decent at translating her awkward Alamarri into something other people could understand...but Alim knew more about magic stuff, which was important to the matter at hand...but they might not react well to having a scary blood mage at their fire. Hmm.

"Right. We'll be in the middle room." Alistair retreated, pulling the door closed behind him. She shook her head to herself — honestly, she'd be walking right back out in a couple minutes, there was no reason to close it...

Back in the middle room, the others had pulled a few chairs around, forming a circle. Lýna was the last to arrive, Alistair and Lèlja already sitting down — neither of them were in armor, wearing freshly-washed linen instead — Alim restlessly pacing nearby. Surprisingly, Lacie was here too, sitting in a chair in the circle. Frowning to herself, Lýna paused a couple steps into the room for a second before shrugging it off. Lacie wasn't a Warden, but she was with Alim, and they weren't going to be speaking of any secrets anyway.

"Good, you're here," Alim chirped, whirling around with a bright grin. It was false, she could tell, he was nervous about something. "We can get started, then."

"I was thinking about this earlier," Alistair started, while Lýna plopped into the chair next to Lèlja — it was solid wood, without the cloth and padding the others had, probably meant for her. "The Templars weren't going to be happy about letting mages out of the tower in any circumstances, and the rebellion only complicates matters."

"Why?" The rebellion meant the mages were fewer, yes, but the threat of the Blight remained regardless.

Scowling, Alim snarled, "The Templars aren't going to want to let anyone out. Not until they're convinced they're loyal — and that could take years, paranoid bastards..."

Alistair nodded. "Letting mages out of the Circle for any reason is always a risk, since security is much more difficult to maintain on the outside, and it's only worse when they're going to war. War is chaos, it's all too easy for a mage to slip away from an encampment, or even during a battle. And it's an opportunity for them to hone their skills with dangerous magics, and the confidence they gain can sometimes convince them to organize a revolt once they get back — exactly like what happened here, with Uldred and the others."

"Oh really, you mean people are less willing to return to captivity after seeing just a little bit of freedom for the first time in their lives? Who would have guessed!"

Turning in his chair to shoot Alim a glare over his shoulder, Alistair said, "No need to get snippy with me, Alim — I'm just trying to explain what they're probably thinking right now. And would you sit down, you're making me dizzy."

Alim glared at him, fists clenching and shoulders tensing, but after a moment he obeyed, slipping through the circle of chairs to sit in the last open one, between Lýna and Lacie. As he sat, he let out a little sigh, his eyes tipping to the ceiling for a moment. "I'm sorry, being here again is making me... Ugh, I just need to get the fuck out of here, that's all." His eyes darted to Lacie, just for a second, an expression flickering in and out so quickly Lýna didn't catch it. "What did we want to talk about, exactly?"

"Our negotiating position with the Circle. I thought it would be best to work that out between us before we talk to them — and maybe come up with how we're going to convince them, because the Knight-Commander will need to be convinced."

"Yeah," Alim said, sighing, "that makes sense. So, what do we want from them, exactly? Wynne offered to heal the Arl, but she's an Enchanter and has already been cleared, she doesn't need permission to come with us. There's Solana, but we don't need their permission for that either."

"Solana?"

The whole group turned to stare at Lýna, a mix of surprise and confusion on their faces. With an odd, dragging note on his voice, Alim said, "Um, yeah? Solana Amell? She's the one I told you about, the blood mage who agreed to be Conscripted out of Templar custody?" Alistair's nose scrunched up a little at the reference to blood magic, but he didn't say anything.

"Ah. Yes." Alim had also said she'd make a good advisor for dealing with Alamarri and dwarves and whoever else — the nobility were apparently taught all kinds of things growing up, and Solana had been a member of a wealthy, powerful family before her magic had been discovered. (At which point she'd been enslaved, so she wasn't nobility any longer, not that Lýna was entirely clear on what 'nobility' was to begin with, or why she should care.) Lýna had meant to talk to Solana at some point over the last few days, but she'd still been very tired from the abomination when Alim had talked to her about it, she'd forgotten. She wished she hadn't, it would have given her something to do, at least for a little bit... "We take her when we leave, against the Templars change their minds."

Alim nodded. "Yes, that's a good idea. I wouldn't trust some of them to leave her alone if they had the chance."

"Well, she did kill two people with blood magic," Lacie said, sounding rather snappish.

Rolling his eyes, "Yes, yes, you two don't like each other, I know. I still think you're both being completely ridiculous, you're very similar people."

Lacie let out a harsh, disgusted scoff — apparently she disagreed.

"I'm sorry, I don't understand," Lèlja said, slowly, the accent on her Alamarri more noticeable than usual. "You have someone to help the Arl, and a new recruit. Was there anything else you needed from the Circle?"

Alistair shook his head, his brow furrowing. "The Wardens are too few in Ferelden, dangerously few. If we'd all died at Ostagar, there wouldn't be any left at all." Neatly side-stepping the fact that Alistair had protested Duncan putting their group somewhere they could retreat easily, specifically to prevent that from happening. "Except Riordan I guess, wherever the hell he is now. But we could always use more Wardens, especially with a Blight on, we should be recruiting at any chance we get."

"And a good mage is as effective as a dozen common soldiers, easily. If more are willing to leave with us, that can only be a good thing."

Lýna wasn't certain of that. Mages were vulnerable to being easily killed with a lucky shot at range or by being distracted and flanked — it took a force of a certain size to protect them, prevent common soldiers from overwhelming them. With the addition of Jowan and Solana, their group was back-heavy already. But she did agree with what Alim was saying in principle — magic was extremely useful, more magic was always better than less — so she didn't say anything.

There was a crooked, reluctant look on Alistair's face, probably considering the same problem, but after a moment he shrugged. "I'd want to see if we can pick up a few more swords in Redcliffe, and maybe Orzammar too. But yes, it'd be worth asking for volunteers, as long as we're here. Greagoir would have to be talked into it, but..."

Scowling, Alim said, "Asking for volunteers is a terrible idea. No matter what we say, Greagoir isn't going to take volunteers from the entirety of the Circle. He'll only make the offer to people he's comfortable with letting out, which will be limited to the Loyalists, maybe some Lucrosians, or just the ones he thinks are less dangerous to let outside Templar supervision. And since we're going to be fighting darkspawn, that's a shit idea. I would really rather get another mage who's going to be any good in a battle — I don't know if any of you noticed, but I'm the only one we have right now."

"Uh, I don't know if you noticed, but that crazy Chasind witch turned into a bear."

Alim rolled his eyes. "Shape-changing is really neat magic, and it has all kinds of practical uses; its utility on a battlefield is limited. If Morrigan tried that shit against darkspawn, she might get herself killed, and would almost certainly end up Tainted. I asked her about it, and she said she's an excellent duelist — she claims she can handle a single darkspawn mage one-on-one without too much difficulty, and let me tell you, those Blighters are fucking scary, I'd be very impressed if she does it — but she doesn't have the mobility or the talent with large-scale elemental magics to take out groups. She knows a lot of neat combat magic, but they're single-target curses, mostly."

There were words in there that Lýna didn't know, she wasn't sure if she'd followed very well, but Alistair was nodding, one hand rubbing thoughtfully at his cheek. "Right, that makes sense. And the others?"

"Jowan's a decent healer, and an excellent enchanter and alchemist — he's also a shit fighter, if we throw him at darkspawn he'll probably just get himself killed." Lýna was already aware of that, she'd decided having access to potions and custom enchantments on their things was more than worth taking him on anyway. "Wynne, assuming she stays with us, is the best healer in the Circle, and she'd good enough with defensive magics to help keep the non-mages from getting killed, but she won't be doing much damage. Solana is better, and a vicious, ruthless bitch, but she's not even as good as I am."

"Is that really saying much, though? You held your own pretty damn well in the fights we've been in so far."

Alim gave Alistair a cocky grin. "Oh yes, I am very impressive, I know—"

"At least he thinks so," Lacie grumbled, smirking a little.

His lips twitched, but Alim seemingly ignored her. "—but I'm barely a full mage. Our first skirmish with the darkspawn in the Wilds was literally the first real fight I'd ever been in in my life." What, really? But he was older than her, by at least a few years, Lýna couldn't even imagine that... "I've just been making it up as I go, which has worked out so far, but I'd feel a lot more comfortable if we had a more experienced mage along. One who can actually pull their weight in a proper battle. Two or three or even more would be ideal, by the time we're facing the horde."

"And you don't think those are the ones who'll step up if we ask for volunteers?"

"That's not the problem, weren't you listening? The people we'd want to join us Greagoir won't let volunteer in the first place. He'll give us people like Jowan or Wynn — useful skills, yes, but not great in a fight. And they'll all be Loyalists or Lucrosians too, so they'll also be fucking annoying."

"What is this?"

Alim blinked at her for a second. "What?"

"Loyalist, Luco..." She couldn't remember the word, oh well. "What are these?"

"They're Fraternities in the College of Enchanters."

That was not helpful at all, Alim. "Okay. And what is that?"

He gave her a slightly irritated look, then glanced at Lèlja, and let out a thin sigh, his eyes tipping to the ceiling for the second. "Right, you're not from the Circle, you wouldn't know these things. In the city of Cumberland, in the kingdom of Nevarra — which is west and north of here, across the Waking Sea — Enchanters from all the Circles associated with the White Chantry gather to meet, in something called the College of Enchanters. It's supposed to be every six months, but sometimes sessions are called more often than that. There, the Enchanters discuss issues going on inside the Circle, and make recommendations about how to address them. Note I say recommendations — the Templars and the Chantry don't need to follow what the College says, but they do sometimes just to keep them happy.

"Within the College, Enchanters with similar beliefs, goals, and criticisms band together to form groups, who will usually vote together, and tend to stick together back in their home Circles too. These groups are called Fraternities. With me so far?"

Slowly, Lýna nodded. "I think so." Basically, it was like the Circles were all scattered clans, and the Enchanters were their elders sent to Èlvhal — they just did it much more often than the People did. They didn't really have something like these Fraternity things, she didn't think, but she thought she understood the idea.

"Okay, so. At the moment, the College is controlled by an alliance of the Aequitarians, Loyalists, and Lucrosians, who together have more than half of the votes. The Loyalists are pretty much exactly what they sound like — they support the Circle as it currently exist, with the Templars in control and the Chantry running everything. Some of them are really extreme too, and make excuses for Templars and the Chantry when abuses come out, the boot-licking cunts. If a Loyalist gets sent with us, they'll be arguing with me constantly, and Morrigan will probably end up murdering them in their sleep." Alistair snorted, amused, but nodded in agreement.

...Right, so, no Loyalists, then. "And the others?"

"The Aequitarians are inspired by the magic exists to serve man idea from the Chant — they believe magic should be used to improve the lives of people throughout the world as much as possible, by any means they can think of. They buy some of the Loyalist line, in that they think the Circles should exist at all, but magic can't do people any good if mages are locked up in towers like this one, so they also think we should have more freedom to leave under certain circumstances, so they'll end up siding with Libertarians sometimes. Sort of in the middle, if that makes sense. Wynne is an Aequitarian, one of their leaders.

"And then Lucrosians, they're harder to explain." Alim paused for a moment, eyes turned up at the ceiling, humming to himself a little. "Okay, see, we're not allowed to leave the Circle just on our own, but the Circle can let us out to go do a particular thing if they want to. Help out with a construction or enchanting project, do some healing, whatever. Sometimes, some big important person, a noble or a successful merchant or the like, will ask the Chantry if they can borrow a mage for one project or another, and the Chantry might pick someone and hand them over, temporarily. Lucrosians want to be let out to do this more often for a wider variety of reasons. They have some overlap with the other two — Loyalists tend to be let out the most often, because the Chantry trusts them best, and Aequitarians are all about going out to do good in the world — their major difference is they want to see some benefit for it, payment or other special privileges of some kind."

Lacie had scowled through most of the explanation. When Alim paused for a moment, she said, "They don't care what happens to the rest of us, as long as they get to live in comfort."

"Yeah, fuck the Lucrosians, honestly."

...So, if Lýna understood correctly, these three groups were the mages who supported their own enslavement — the Loyalists on principle, the Aequitarians if it benefited their people, and these Lucrosians if it benefited themselves personally. Yeah, Lýna could understand why Alim might find Loyalists and Lucrosians annoying. The Aequitarians, at least, sounded like they might have a half-way reasonable argument...so long as one was willing to accept the mages' enslavement in the first place.

"Now, there are two other Fraternities that are mostly in alliance with each other, against the other three. The smaller one are the Isolationists. They want to be able to study magic freely, without Templars watching over their shoulders, but they want to do so far away from common people, so nobody can get hurt from a spell going wrong or abominations turning up. Basically, they want to do what your people do — go out in the wilds far away from everybody else, where they won't bother anyone and won't be bothered.

"The last are the Libertarians, who are the second-largest Fraternity in the College at the moment, after the Aequitarians. They wish to be free — it's in the name and everything."

Noticing Lýna's confusion, Lacie said, "Lībertī is Classical Tevene for freedmen, former slaves."

Alim nodded. "Yes, and they're not shy about the comparison, Libetarian Enchanters are the only ones who will come out and call the Circle system slavery. Which it obviously is, the Chantry will even rent us out to nobles when they feel like it, honestly..."

Right, Lýna was going to go ahead and guess Alim was with these people, then — or at least he would be, if he were one of their elders.

Nodding along, suggesting she was one of them too, Lacie, said, "Some people take Andraste's dictum that magic should serve man a little too literally."

"Far too literally. Maybe three-quarters of Libertarian Enchanters, and other mages with Libertarian sympathies, are women, disproportionately elves — I'll give you three guesses why, but you'll only need one."

Lèlja let out a gasp about halfway through Alim's comment, one hand coming up to cover her mouth. Her voice slow, slightly muffled by her fingers, she said, "Do you mean..."

An odd look crossed Lacie's face, uneasy, her eyes sliding away from Lèlja. Alim just stared at her, flat and cold. "Yes, Sister, I mean exactly what you think I mean. Are you really surprised? Templars are told from the time they're children that magic is a curse, that mages are evil, somehow less than they good, devout, pure Andrastians. With their abilities, they can make mages helpless, easily, we're incapable of resisting. And we don't have the right to resist — if a mage fights back against assault at the hands of a Templar, they will often be killed, or accused of practicing forbidden magics and then killed. And in most cases there's nobody who can do anything about it, the Enchanters are powerless to protect us and the Templars stand by their brothers. No, you shouldn't be surprised this happens even a little bit — it's exactly what you should expect in the circumstances."

Honestly, Lýna found just how horrified Lèlja looked kind of ridiculous — she meant, they'd already learned the Templars could decide to just kill all the mages if they wanted to, how was this any worse? Somewhat shakily, she turned to her right, muttered, "Ser Alistair...?"

He gave her a weak, sad sort of smile. "It's not ser, Sister, not really. I may have been trained as a Templar, but I never took my vows. This is one of the reasons why."

"I never thought of... How common is it?" Lèlja asked, her voice rasping a little.

Alim tilted his head to the right, one eye widening a sliver. "It's somewhat less common in our Circle than others, especially over the last seven or eight years or so, since Esmond got here — he's far more likely to take the mage's side than most Seekers, and is unwilling to tolerate any of that kind of nugshit from his Templars. But even here, about half of the grown women in the Circle have been raped at some point, and maybe a sixth of the men."

"What?!" They all turned to look at her, a mix of surprise on their faces. (Except Lèlja, who hadn't turned away from Alim, her eyes glimmering with unshed tears.) But she barely noticed, just staring back at Alim, she... She'd thought he was talking about, she didn't know, beatings or something, she hadn't realized... "Truly, this is so?"

"Um...yes?" Alim glanced away for a second, sharing a confused glance with Lacie. "Best I can tell, anyway. I mean, we don't exactly keep a tally, and it's not something everyone is going to come talk to me about, but that sounds about right."

"It's less common for mages our age, but more for the older ones," Lacie said, gaze tracing along the wall behind Lýna's head, still avoiding Lèlja's eyes. "Seeker Esmond really does try to help. But it still happens. Especially since most girls don't want to tell anyone — even if the Seeker punishes the one who did it and send him away, they worry the other Templars might retaliate somehow, so, some still go unnoticed. It's better here than most Circles, at least according to Anders, but." She shrugged.

"You come with us."

Startled, Lacie actually jerked back in her chair a little, blinking across the circle at Lýna. "Uh. What?"

"When we leave, you come with us." Lýna's eyes flicked for a second to Alim's ear, still visibly bruised, she wasn't sure if it was obvious enough for anyone else to notice. Not that she cared if they did.

"Lýna, we talked about this." Alim sounded slightly annoyed for some reason, though Lýna wasn't sure why.

Also, she didn't care. "I know. I changed my mind." At the time, she'd (mostly) trusted Alim when he'd said Lacie wasn't in any particular danger. Lacie hadn't been marked as part of the rebellion, and she was supposedly pretty good at avoiding the Templars' attention. But Lýna hadn't known the Templars used the abilities given to them by their magic-hating god to rape the mages, or that they did it so often as Lacie and Alim were saying. They clearly thought the risk was small enough to be worth taking. Lýna did not — Lacie was with Alim, which made her one of Lýna's people, and she would not leave her here. "You don't stay here, Lacie, you come with us."

"Lyna, you can't just recruit mages because..." Alistair trailed off, glancing at Lacie. Still not perfect with human faces sometimes, but she thought that was guilt — the Templars wouldn't think because she might be raped (by you) if she stays was a good enough reason to bring her with them, but Alistair must realize that was a horrible thing to say with Lacie sitting right there.

"Why no? If I can, I take all of them!" And she couldn't, they really didn't have the means to bring along hundreds of people, and the Knight-Commander would probably just laugh her off and ignore the demand. That didn't mean she wouldn't empty the Circle if she could, at least the women, at the very least the elves...

Oh, All-Mother have mercy, the children...

"As I can't do that," she said, her voice shaking with barely-controlled fury just a little, "I get our people out, if only. She comes with us."

Alim let out a snort, shaking his head, bright red hair fluttering. "Congratulations, Lacie, it seems you're part of the family now. I guess that's what you get for biting my ears — I'm told that's a thing elves do, you see."

Her head tilting a little, Lacie stared at Alim for a second, eyes narrowed slightly in confusion, before shaking her head and turning back to Lýna. Somewhat delicately, voice slow and soft, Lacie said, "I'm, um...flattered, Lyna. I guess. But I'm not really Warden material, I don't think."

"You need not Join." Lýna shot Alim a narrow-eyed glare — by the sound of it, Alim hadn't told Lacie about Lýna's offer to come with them a couple days ago, like he'd said he would. He flinched, just a little, lifted one shoulder in an awkward shrug. Possibly her anger at the Templars was making her glare harsher than she really meant it to be, she took a second to try to tamp it down, cleared her throat. "Lèlja doesn't Join, or Morrigan. Or Wynne, if she stays."

"I don't think the Templars would let me leave with you if I'm not joining the Wardens."

"They don't have to know," Alistair said, sounding slightly absent. "The Circle doesn't really know all that much about the Joining, I don't think, and we can always just discharge you before your initiation, claim it didn't work out." His voice quickened as he went, bouncier, wide human lips pulling into a crooked smile. "That's a good idea, actually, we can fill out our numbers a little on a temporary basis without needing to risk them to the Joining! And we can't even be accused of putting it off, we don't have the necessary supplies anyway."

They did, actually — Duncan had given Lýna his bottle of the liquor before the battle, for safe-keeping. They could get the lyrium here, and the rest weren't too difficult to find. But there didn't really seem to be any point to correcting him at the moment.

Alim stared across at Alistair, eyes narrowed and mouth tilted in an uncertain frown, his fingers tapping at a knee. "That...might work. The Templars would have questions, but Lacie wouldn't be the first to return from the Wardens." She wouldn't be returning, but they would deal with that later. If they lived long enough for it to matter. "But, I'd be worried about... Lacie might not do so well in a fight."

Turning a glare on him, Lacie said, "I'm better than Jowan. Better than Solana, even, at least with large-volume elemental magic — didn't you just say that was what you wanted not ten minutes ago?"

Alim grimaced. His arms folding over his stomach, he sank back further into the chair, almost pouting. She did have him there.

"So...does that mean you do want to come?" Alistair asked.

"I don't know. I mean..." Lacie sighed through her nose, biting her lip. "I haven't been out of the tower in so long, and at least I'd know if this idiot," pointing at Alim with a thumb, "does get himself killed...and the Blight is going to come here eventually, anyway... Maybe, I'll think about it and get— No, you know what? I will come. Yes, thank you, Lýna."

No thanks at all necessary, Lýna fully planned to Conscript as many willing mages out from under the Templars as she could get away with. Just after their rebellion, it sounded like that wouldn't be very many, but maybe she'd have better luck when they met to face the horde. So she didn't respond with anything more than a nod — and she ignored Alim's surly glare while she was at it. "So, we can't ask Greagoir for more, he will pick badly, Loyalists. Templars and mages will face the horde even so, Esmond says. Maybe this is good, and we don't need more now."

"We are picking up Amell and Lacie," Alistair said, nodding, "and Wynne and that poor Jowan sap too, I think that's more than enough mages for now. We will need to rebuild the Fereldan Wardens practically from scratch, true, but now we're definitely heavy on mages. Maybe when we pick up some more swordsmen we can come back to the Circle, but we would still have the same—"

"Oh!" Alim sat up straighter in his chair again, his face clearing with a big, sparkling grin. "I just figured it out! You know, we can't ask for volunteers because Greagoir will pick them for us, and he's a prick, but there's a way around that! We get the Grand Cleric to come to the Circle and call an assembly, and we speak to all the mages directly, and ask for volunteers ourselves. The ones who step forward we take, and there's nothing Greagoir can do about it, not if it's the Grand Cleric telling him to allow it! It's perfect!"

Alistair hummed, his head tilting a little, one hand coming up to rub at his chin. Lýna could hear the rasping of the little hairs on his face against his fingers from here. "That might work. But only if we can get the Grand Cleric to go along with it — anybody know how she feels about mages? or the Wardens, for that matter?"

"It doesn't matter how this one feels about it — a king can request the Divine to replace the Grand Cleric of their capital, and the Divine usually lets them select the replacement, for political reasons. She must be an ordained Mother, but any will do, I'm sure we could find a cooperative one. The real question is, would Fergus go along with it?"

"Oh, Maker... You're right, we could get as many mages as we need — the Wardens often have trouble getting enough mages, the Circles never want to let them— That is perfect, you sly bastard!"

Alim smirked. "Glad you like it, you royal bastard."

"Oof, I walked right into that one..."

"Maybe that will work, but is there time?" Lèlja had recovered from the talk before somewhat — her eyes were still a little red, and her voice had a little bit of a croak to it, but she no longer looked like she was on the edge of crying or breaking something (or both). "How long will it take for the darkspawn to spill through the country?"

"Oh, uh, I don't know," Alistair admitted. "Duncan seemed to think there would be time for us to organize a defense if Ostagar went badly, but..."

"Darkspawn come like waves." The group all turned to look at her, with a mix of curiosity and wariness, that distant fear everyone always seemed to have when speaking of the Blight. The only exception was Alistair, whose lip had drawn back in faint pain — he'd probably guessed Duncan had told her this, while sharing Warden knowledge with her back at Ostagar. "They rise, they fall, they draw back, then rise again. Many killed in south, at Ostagar, many leaders dead. The horde needs to pull together anew. For more to come from Deep Roads, make new arms, gather around new leaders. It takes time."

News had come to Redcliffe after the battle against the undead that the darkspawn had overrun Lothering a couple days after they'd passed through, ravaged the immediate area. But while some of the little villages and farms between the two had been raided, the darkspawn advance had stalled, seemingly for no reason. Some had feared it must be a trick, an attack must be coming, but Lýna hadn't been worried — the darkspawn must have overextended themselves, they needed to recover before they could press forward again.

"How long?"

Lýna shrugged. "It changes." Duncan hadn't been able to say for certain, it varied from place to place and Blight to Blight. Looking back on it, she could kind of pick out the same pattern over the last years — a hard push, followed by a lengthy stalemate broken only with small raids (for women to turn into more broodmothers, she knew now), and then eventually another hard push — but it was hard to say for certain how much time had been between them, on average.

According to Duncan it took two to three years between a woman being captured and the first darkspawn from her maturing enough to fight. That meant the women taken during the push that had run her clan and Stone-River Hold out of their valley, the same one Ashaᶅ had nearly been taken in, they would be adding to the horde now — and that was no small number, this would be the largest force yet. That span of time, between capture and maturity of the first...litter, was a big reason the cycle worked the way it did, but sometimes they were offset, two or even three cycles going on at the same time. So, the push before that, Lýna had been young, hardly even an apprentice yet. The push after that, the city in the south had been destroyed, and her clan had finally been forced to flee north, and the push after that one had just ended. If the Archdemon had surfaced, it would speed up the process — it could command the horde itself, they wouldn't need as many leaders among them — but they were pretty sure it was still under the mountains to the west. If she was remembering this correctly...

"Shortest, half year. Longest, two years. Maybe one year, most like." If the Archdemon surfaced before then it would be less, but that was her guess.

Looking around the circle, tension was lifting off of shoulders, Alistair slumping back into his chair with a sigh, Alim smiling. Lèlja muttered something, probably a prayer, Lýna had noticed she did that a lot. (She was a shaman, so that was just expected.) His voice a bright, cheerful chirp, Alim said, "Oh, good! I was worried we'd be overrun before we could get our shit together. The Landsmeet doesn't meet to select a new king until Satinalia, if we had to deal with the Blight and a Contest at the same time we'd be fucked. A few weeks to pick a king, a month if things go really crazy, and we'll have that squared away before Haring, leaving a couple months before the darkspawn advance again. It might get a little tight at the end there, but I think we might just be ready when the time comes."

Alistair did seem somewhat relieved himself, but he shook his head. "Even assuming the Landsmeet goes the way we want, and there aren't dissenting nobles afterward, the realm would still need to muster their forces. It'll be closer than you think."

His lips pulled into a brilliant grin, Alim let out a short, sharp laugh. "But that's just the thing! The nobles are already gathering soldiers for the Contest — by the time the Landsmeet is over, the kingdom will have armies and supplies all ready to go, just in time to meet the horde!"

Alistair's mouth opened to respond, but then closed again, his eyes widening. A gleeful twinkle seemed to rise, his lips slowly pulling into a smile. "Maker's breath, you're right! Ha, who would have thought Fereldans' tendency to war with each other would actually work out for us?"

"I know, right? It's fucking perfect, if Lýna's guess is anywhere close even the timing will be perfect."

"Seriously, what are the chances of that?"

Considering the king had been killed at the end of a push, and how far away the day their Landsmeet thing usually picked a new king was, Lýna thought it was almost guaranteed it would work out that way — the Alamarri and the darkspawn would each be using the time between pushes to prepare for war, only one didn't realize they'd be fighting the other. Alim must have had a similar thought, his grin turning a bit crooked. "Really, I almost think we should be thanking Loghain. Duncan hadn't had any success convincing the Landsmeet that a Blight was coming — if it weren't for the Contest, the Kingdom wouldn't be nearly as well-prepared as it's going to be."

Alistair glared at Alim, but didn't say anything. It might have been a tactless thing to point out, especially considering how close Alistair had been with Duncan, but Lýna had the feeling Alim was correct. She didn't entirely understand why it should take the Alamarri so long to prepare for war, but Alistair hadn't argued that point, so.

"Even so," Lýna said, before Alistair could find a response. "This is good, but now we are here. We are to talk with the Circle leaders soon."

Looking somewhat uncertain — of whether she was supposed to be part of this conversation or not, Lýna thought — Lacie said, "But you don't really need anything from them at all, do you? I mean, you said Wynne is going to help you with the Arl, and Esmond already promised to mobilize the Circle against the horde..."

"Yes, but it is..." Lýna trailed off, again failing to come up with the word she wanted in Alamarri. It was samband in Avvar and ferbining in Chasind, which was together-tied in Alamarri, but there should be a single word for it too. "...friendship?" No, that was vinskapur, which wasn't quite right. Oh well, it would have to do. "Our friendship with them is good to keep. We go, speak of what comes, but we demand little."

Nodding a little, one corner of Alistair's lips ticked upward. "Right, but they won't actually be expecting that — Wardens always want more mages than the Circles let us have, so they'll expect us to be demanding more, rebellion be damned. Giving them the impression that we're more patient, reasonable, good little Wardens might make them more willing to deal with us later." His crooked smile spreading into a proper smirk, "And so they might not see Alim's trick with the Grand Cleric coming until it's too late.

"So, this is what I think we should do..."

In the end, the plan went off without a hitch, to the surprise of perhaps everyone except Lýna. Lacie, Solana, and Wynne would be leaving with them, and the Circle would face the horde when the time came. (Fergus, who'd also been there, was a great help on that point — apparently the Chantry was obligated by treaty to help them, Alim hadn't known that.) And their leaders were convinced (and relieved) Lýna didn't want any more mages for the Wardens, so they wouldn't see Alim's trick coming until it was too late. Lýna had a little bit too much wine, which made her more silly than usual, but it wasn't actually a problem. She managed to stop herself from leaning over and hugging Alim at the table in front of everyone — Mẽrhiᶅ had told her that drink made her cuddly, she had warning — so clearly it was fine.

Though, maybe the wine wasn't such a great idea, because Alim convinced her to sleep with Lèlja instead of Alistair that night. The next morning, Lèlja was acting kind of weird, and Alim kept smirking at them, like something funny was going on — something that must be going right over her head, because she didn't know what was going on. Or maybe she would have agreed to the suggestion anyway, because she didn't know what was going on, so obviously she couldn't have prevented it.

Oh well, it wasn't that bad, everyone would go back to normal before too long. It wasn't annoying enough that she wouldn't be getting some of the spices they'd put in the wine for themselves — that stuff was amazing, hot spiced wine was now her favorite drink ever, passing up Avvar vin by a wide margin.

All told, they were done here, finally. They set sail for Redcliffe that morning.

---

völva — How about some more Avvar worldbuilding? "Augur" is a Roman word, and is a similar concept, but Avvar themselves don't use it. The proper term for one of their mages who deals with their gods — the same word rendered "shaman" in Lýna's narration — is völva for women, and völvi for men. (The expected masculine is völvur, but this is the word for a staff, so an alternative word came into use to reduce confusion.) The word is directly jacked from the Norse pagan concept. This is actually a general term for a person in close communication with spirits, a völvi/völva who exercises a religious function in a tribe would instead properly be called a goði/gyðja — völva is something someone is, gyðja is something someone does, if that makes sense.

[it's something practically everyone in the country knows] — Alim is greatly overestimating literacy in Ferelden, for the record.

Alphabet — The Alamarri alphabet is significantly different from the English one, being derived from dwarvish, which has some serious phonological differences from Latin. For this reason, the treatment of vowels is rather different, and the digraphs often aren't the same (for example, "j" is used instead of "h" a lot ("tj" instead of "th", "sj" instead of "sh")). However, for the most part, this is going to be completely ignored in text — any spellings mentioned will follow the expected English spellings, to reduce confusion. The dwarvish script has seven vowels and sixteen consonants (plus a length marker), so twenty-three letters total.

Èlvhal — Canon Arlathvhen. The canon word is pieced together from "ar", a first-person singular pronoun, "lath", love, and "vhen", people; this is extremely silly. Instead, I derived a suffix that sort of indicates a collection of the noun from a couple canon words ("hahren'al": a particular gathering of elders at the Arlathvhen; "vhenallin": Friends of the People), and then just slapped it onto the word for elf, making something like "gathering of the People". (Èlvhy-al - Èlvhal) There's probably a more formal, special, fancy phrase to refer to the practice (with less ambiguity), but this is the one used in ordinary conversation.

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And I'm back. Woo.

I did write through the dinner with Fergus, Wynne, Irving, and Greagoir, before deciding it was completely unnecessary and cutting it. And it was about ten thousand words, so, that's a lot of work I didn't need to do. I did save it, because there are a few worldbuilding points and character moments I want to remember for later, so if anybody's really curious I'm open to sending it to people. Doesn't really need to be here though.

Delay was because I was working on other projects, this happens. Current plan for the next chapters goes: more Unrest at Denerim, waking up and dealing with Eamon, the Hawkes' arrival at Kirkwall, and then the Wardens leaving for Orzammar. But I've been feeling completely terrible all the time lately, so I have no idea when I'll have the next one.

Right, time for me to write some crimes against humanity (elfity?). Woo! How fun!

—Lysandra