You have grieved as I have.

You, who made worlds out of nothing.

We are alike in sorrow, sculptor and clay,

Comforting each other in our art.

Trials, 1-8

They let her sleep, after that all – there was not much they could have done, nor, they discovered, was there much to say; in different ways, Sera, Bull and Dorian found themselves haunted by the words they had so lightly spoken just a few nights before.

How many abominations have we slain? Dorian had said, then, with more confidence than he should have demonstrated. It was simply that he'd decisively put the possibility of Veldrin actually losing herself to her demon meld out of his mind. This woman, he thought, distractedly caressing the sleeping elf's hair, had survived the fade Mark unchanged; she'd survived Solas' betrayal unchanged, she had…Not even the blood magic had outright changed the basic nature of her being.

Until now.

He unconsciously adjusted her makeshift pillow, willing himself to neither notice the bruises on her face, nor the Bull's bandaged fists. He felt void.

'You can still go,' Dorian said, blankly; the Qunari warrior grunted.

'Are you?' the Bull asked.

'I…no,' the Magister replied, softly. 'I don't know. I feel…'

He looked down at Veldrin. 'Deceived,' he ended. He took a sip of his rum. 'Awed. Unsure.'

'Do you still think she knows what she's doing?' the Bull asked. 'This feel completely out of whack for me, Kadan.'

'Well,' Sera muttered, 'I'm freaking beyond shock right now; thing is, tho', an' I hate to even hear myself sayin' it…But she does look like she knows what she's doin'.'

'If she did, she would have given the swords to Skin, and not you, Sera,' the Bull matter of factly observed. 'You are not that kind of rogue.'

'It's fucking symbolic,' the blonde elf said, shaking her head, and drinking her glass in one gulp, scowling horribly at Dorian's arched eyebrow and Bull's incredulous smirk. 'Them things don't need a wielder – I held 'em for a second, trust me, they'll be flying at Solas on their own.'

Dorian sighed and nodded. 'That is the frightening part, Sera. I'd always known Veldrin had pactised with lust demon,' he shrugged, 'but Imshael…'

He ran his fingers through his hair, not minding that he was breaking his carefully side parted, briantine held hairdo. 'Lust demons are the most insidious of the lot, because, contrary to what the name denotes, they can arise from any too long denied desire. My own ascension test…what you, in the south, call a harrowing, involved a lust demon, too.'

'If you'd been a Qunari…' the Bull said, beginning to catch on; Dorian decisively nodded.

'Or, well, held the Qun's view of sexuality,' the Tevinter replied, adding a slight correction, 'it would not have been lust; as was, I was a teenager, unsure of myself, torn between the intuition that the inklings of my deviancy that I was already guessing, the love I bore my father and my own ambition. If I had not been ashamed of my sexuality then, my test might have been pride. Or rage. I was ashamed, ambitious and conflicted, thus…'

'Whatever came to you, offered a path to resolve all,' the Bull nodded. The Magister simply shrugged.

'Pride demons may be the physically strongest, but desire demons are versatile, and well, Veldrin has a lot of desires, in many respects. Still…Mages fight possession; it is almost unheard of that one would actually invite the demon to stay.'

'Unless, of course, Veldrin has already decided she won't survive this,' the Qunari replied, with a smirk. 'I'm gonna have words with Dalish,' he futilely promised. 'There's a time to push, and a time to hold, and this was the mother and grandmother of all times to hold.'

Dorian sighed. 'Pragmatically,' he brought himself to say, 'no, it was not. I am terrified by Vel's choices, here, but if I distance myself from the fact that I do care for her, very, very much, and accept that she really has no intention of surviving this – which is why she fought my presence, all of our presences tooth and nail – Imshael is a disturbingly intelligent choice.'

'My arse,' Sera mumbled, refilling her keg.

'Check the chief's fists, Sera,' Dalish tiredly put in, approaching the three to join them by the dying embers of the small fire. 'She should be dead after that pummelling; instead, the chief broke both his hands – 'twas like watching him hit a granite wall.'

'Pride demon skin,' the Bull said, in barely subdued annoyance. 'She wouldn't even have gone down if he hadn't left.'

'How is she?' Dalish asked, cranking her neck to take a glimpse of Veldrin.

'Just peachy,' Dorian reproachfully muttered. 'She looks like a basket of dewy spring flowers, she will wake up light headed and rested as a babe, and she most definitely doesn't have cackling voices in her head; we can also rest assured than when she does wake up, she's going to start telling us all about the best parts of our natures, and help us form tight, lasting and warm bonds with those we love most…I don't get you,' he blurted. 'Isn't blood magic frowned upon in the wilds? You are so at ease with it as if you were of Tevinter, Maker forgive me.'

Dalish apologetically smiled. 'Varies from clan to clan. Don't forget that the creation of the vallaslin is blood magic, by the very same rules which are tolerated in Tevinter…'

'Blood of willing participant, for fuck's sake, yes,' Dorian snarled. 'I'm starting to think Solas was more correct than even he knew he was – we do inherit all of this crap from Elvhenan.'

'Inherited is one word to use, perhaps,' Dalish said, with a little unreadable smile.

'We're all drifting on the very thin fringes of madness, here,' the Qunari dryly said. 'And I am very unhappy with you, Dalish.'

'I understand,' she nodded, 'and I would apologise, but…'

'Ya not particularly sorry,' Sera snarled.

'I did not know what it was in advance. You keep forgetting who we are we are about to face, I think,' the blonde mage thoughtfully said. 'You also forget what difference in our various casting powers the Forbidden One's presence caused.'

'Forbidden One,' Dorian said, rolling his eyes. 'Maferath's tiny balls, I find I really do prefer calling it Imshael. It's just a tad less ominous.'

'Not gettin' this,' Sera said, softly shaking her head. 'We did kill the fucker, why is he still…?'

Dorian assessed her though the corner of his eyes, and noted that she was, indeed, not as frightened or squirrelly as he'd expected her to be; he felt a small sting of shame, and a gentle touch of comfort – it seemed like his calculated risk had been worth it, after all.

'Imshael,' Dalish replied, instead of Dorian, 'is one of the spirits educated mages call the Undying. According to Chantry legend, he is one of the Maker's first creations, and one of the first to envy the dwellers of the unchanging world; according to our legends, he truly is a spirit of choice, his existence predating even Elvhenan. His vessels have been slain countless times through the ages, but he can always return to the beyond and wait for another to call him; his continued existence is akin to the immortality of the elvhen of old in uremthra1 , only the unchanging vessel he returns to is not his own, as he never had one.'

'Any good news in that charming expose?' Dorian frowned.

'He is wicked but fair,' Dalish responded, 'and he is truly compelled by the choices of those who deal with him in a manner or another. He cannot harm Veldrin, and he cannot harm us, unless we actively make choices which may lead to harm. He won't tell us which ones they are, of course.'

'It is also,' she added, after a deep breath, 'that at the last Arlathvhen2 I attended, there were rumours…well,' Dalish uneasily followed, 'accounts, of a host having been possessed and survived the Forbidden One's departure.'

Dorian frowned. 'Was Vel there?'

'Uhm, no; I think she'd already gone. But the Keeper of clan Lavellan was, thus…Thus, perhaps we should not lose hope,' she gently ended.

'Forget if Vel was there or not,' Sera muttered. 'I'd care more if the chick or dude who survived the visit was there. So, ya know…'

Dalish helplessly shrugged.

'Effing great, Dalish.' the Bull muttered. 'Even if Vel knew about this, going on dalish rumours…' he angrily shook his head. 'I don't know why I am getting the feeling that every time we think we are saving the world, we just end up making a larger pile of bullshit out of it.'

'Yeh,' Sera picked up. 'We killed Corypenny, we got Solas; if we beat Solas, we're gonna wake up his mother, I betcha. Does this cycle never end? Like!'

'Does he lie?' Dorian asked, his thoughts wound tight as a horsehair bow string; he looked down to Vel, and pointlessly arranged her pillow once more. He didn't want to hear the answer to that one, he thought. He really, really did not.

Dalish looked away in her turn.

'You mean, what he said about Solas?' she inquired back, clearly hiding from the answer.

'Yes,' the Magister said.

Among other things, his thoughts silently completed; Dalish, whose chaotic miseducation of the subject of ancient spirits was far better than Dorian's disciplined learning on the same subject, did not hurry to answer.

'The girl who was apparently the surviving host of the Forbidden One was of clan Thelhen. They…'

She bit her lower lip.

'Something massacred them horribly, leaving none but children aged of no more than eight summers alive, in exactly the way that the Forbidden one described; this was at the dawn of the Orlesian Civil war, though, so we assumed it had been the Shem'len…'

'Dalish,' the Bull said, frowning, 'if it had been humans, why would they have let the children live? And how do you simply assume?'

'Ask the last of clan Lavellan why we always assume it is humans,' Dalish said, dryly. 'The Arlathvhen was called, though it was a time of grave danger, so that the children would be divided amongst us – they were…shaken, and none had the desire to linger until they spoke. The Orlesians were gathering all around us – we decided that we would know more at the next clansmeet and parted hastily. Alas, I…'

She shook her head. 'If there should ever be another Arlathvhen, I fear the tale I shall bring will not be pleasing, for I…'

'You believed Imshael,' Dorian said, narrowing his eyes.

'Think on it, Dorian,' Dalish said, softly. 'The chief is right – if it had been humans to massacre them, they would not have left the children behind. They never do,' she whispered. 'If it was the Forbidden One, however, it makes cruel, but perfect sense – however clan Thelhen offended him, they made a choice to do so, so he spared…'

'…those who could make no choice,' the Bull said, letting out a heavy breath. 'Shit.'

'The other thing that makes sense,' the blonde elven non-mage followed, 'the other connection…is that clan Thelhen was very reclusive and known to delve deeply into lost knowledge and artefacts. Shortly after, Marquise Briala, who is known to have accompanied Empress Celene in her brief flight though the Dales, when her cousin's armies were upon her, acquired access to the eluvian network.'

'Watcha sayin'?' Sera frowned.

'Eh,' Dorian groaned, hiding his face in his hands. 'I think know where this is going, Dalish.'

The elf briefly nodded.

'Clan Thelhen discovered an eluvian,' the Magister said, 'but they could not empower it. Then someone, with knowledge of how, but not enough power, taught them how to summon and bind something who had both the knowledge and the power to unlock the mirrors.'

'The Dread Wolf,' Dalish said, her words no louder than a breath.

'Eh, but that would mean that Solas,' the the Bull began, shaking his head, 'it would mean he tricked both the demon and the dalish clan, and that he knew what would happen once Imshael did get out of the box. It would mean he purposefully allowed them to die, so that…'

'The eluvian network is priceless,' Dorian softly said.

'This does not sound like our Solas,' the Qunari refuted.

'No,' the Magister replied, a drowning man clinging to a straw, then abandoning even that. 'But we did not know him at all, and frankly, it makes Vel's pact with Imshael, whatever its terms are, an even clearer pragmatic choice. If all knew how to build an eluvian they would be popping up like mushrooms after the rainfall; Veldrin must have chosen him because…'

The options were too grim to consider, and he refused to follow his thoughts to their logical conclusion, or at least refused to speak the conclusion out loud – Verldrin had accepted Imshael because he was the only entity who could have taught her how to create the travelling mirror, and Imshael had answered her call because there was only one guilty part in his humiliating imprisonment that he had not yet been able to punish.

Solas.

'This is all speculation,' he briskly said. 'We cannot know if this, or, indeed any tiny part of this is true. We're basing all this on the truthfulness of dalish tales and a demon's words. Demons lie, Dalish.' He said; it was almost a plea.

'This one is not known to lie very often, Dorian,' the blonde mage said, gently; Dalish looked to Veldrin, with deep sorrow in her eyes. Dorian simply looked inside himself, and withheld a shudder; the world was all of a sudden resting all his weight on his shoulders – he assumed it was his own heavy heart, his own fear, causing the sensation.

He was wrong, though he did not know why; all that would follow wound not be his fault, either.

1 Elvhen reverie – essentially the spirit leaves the body and goes in to the Fade, where it can (could) stay for very long periods of time. Given the inherent connection to the weave elves had before Solas broke everything, they somehow managed to feed off Fade energies and keep their physical bodies alive for millennia, then wake up fresh as daisies.

2 Clansmeet.

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