Daughter of Tethras

Disclaimer: Don't own Dragon Age

A/N:

Chapter 38 (The Duel: House Tethras vs House Cadash)

Bending at her knees and clutching the axe with firm hands, Bianca stared at the man standing several meters away from her. "What did I just get myself into?" The fear demon from the fade was nothing compared to Marcus Cadash. To her, Marcus was the nightmare, the living and walking embodiment of everything she feared.

The power he'd had over her when she was growing up was tremendous; it was as though he held the right for her to live or die in his very hands. Now she was standing here, staring fear in the face and preparing for a fight she never thought she'd find herself in.

"He has no power over me anymore. This duel will end it. Whatever control he thinks he has, whatever leash he assumes he's got on me…" She turned her axe with her hand and glared down at the glittering blades, smiling when she pictured Oghren looking back at her. "With my hero's axe-with my axe-I will sever that hold while avenging my father."

"Hey." Marcus's voice rolled out in a snakelike hiss, and his mouth twisted into a deadly sneer. "Are we going to do this, or are you going to stare at your blade like a lost little child?"

She turned her eyes towards him and shrugged. "I'm waiting on you. Make the first move, if you're so confident." Even with daggers in his hands, she knew his moves. The dagger was only the extension of his fist, ready to smack her or come crashing down on her with nothing but brute force. "I'm ready for you this time. Does that concern you?"

His face tensed and he squatted while grinding his teeth. "Not in the slightest." Marcus was like Lantos, but in the way Varric said, he was much slower and should be easier to dodge. "I'll beat you down the way I always have, because in the end of the day, you're just a scared little girl."

"Not anymore. I'm stronger than you, and I know how to fight back now. You've never had the chance to see me at my best. Now you will."

"Shut up." Marcus leapt into the air, lunging towards her with both blades raised above his head. Her eyes widened and she sprang into action, spinning in the form of a whirlwind.

She twisted her axe around, smacking him like a gnat with the flat end of her axe. A crunching noise echoed from the point of contact on his back and she turned her head to see him fly into a part of the mountain. "Damn it." He hopped to his feet and moved his hand to his back, groaning aloud. "Damn you, you little brat."

"Not fighting like you used to? Can't stand that I'm stronger now? Did you think you were going to be able to overpower and control me all my life?"

Marcus spun the daggers in his hand, moving them between his fingers as he approached her. "Quit your yapping. You're nothing. All you've ever been is nothing. You should never have even existed. The spawn of a mistake, that's all you are, a mistake because your father slept with a mental, crazy, batshit whore."

Varric threw his hand to his forehead and Bianca shrugged. "Well, there's something we agree on. Mother is crazy."

"Heh." Marcus dropped a bomb that sent an explosion of smoke into the air. She covered her eyes with her arm and started to cough. "Bianca." Her father's voice drew her attention and she started moving towards him. "Bianca, behind you!"

Just as she turned her head, she heard the clink of steel against metal, followed by the sense of pressure striking her armor. "There you are." Thinking fast, she swung her axe in the direction of the blow. She felt something heavy hit the end of the weapon and listened to the soft squish of something rolling in the snow.

The smoke cleared away and Marcus was on his hands and knees, groaning as he pushed his trembling body upwards. "Going to have to hit harder than that," Bianca mumbled. "What happened? I remember your punches, they always felt like someone swinging a brick at my head."

"I ought to." He put his hand to his chest and started to cough. "Go ahead and hit me while I'm down."

"No. Get up."

"Dumb little bitch." He flung his hand out and released a cloud of toxins into the air. Her eyes shot open and she threw her hand over her mouth while rushing away from the toxic cloud. "I might be getting old, but that doesn't mean I can't make good use of tricks."

"Your bag of tricks won't last long."

Amelia put her hands around her mouth and called out to her husband. "You'd better win this. If you lose and lose everything, we're through here!" He turned his head to her and Bianca's eyebrow rose.

"Of course she shows her true colors, Marcus. All Amelia's ever been into is power and wealth…I guess you do have a lot to lose." Marcus stood and threw one of his daggers at her with an angry shout.

Bianca raised the face of her axe up and deflected the blade as fast as she could. When she pulled the blade from her face, she saw Marcus running towards her with his second dagger ready.

"No!" She thrust her weapon forward, striking the center of his chest with the flat top of the axe. Marcus stumbled back, flailing his arms and screaming as he started to lose balance. "Too close." She swept the weapon to his legs, striking the blunt face against his knees.

A sharp crackling sound erupted from his left knee and Marcus fell to the ground, grasping his leg tight while screaming in anguish. "My knee, you've busted my knee!"

"I can't believe I was ever terrified of you." This was the man that used to break her arms with a single twist of her limb; the same man that could threaten to crack her skull in a single blow and make her fear his doing exactly that. "Where's the ferocity? Where's the fire? Where's the giant man that could beat a little child without a single thought?"

"Now who's getting all confident?" Marcus reached into a sack on his waist and pulled several small orbs from it. He tossed them at her feet and she peered down in time to see them explode in bursts of fire, ice and electricity.

The elements shot through her body and sent her crashing and rolling onto the ground. She hissed as electricity continued to pulse through her body. "Stupid little girl." Marcus rose and walked towards her, dragging his left foot behind him. He chuckled softly as she opened her eyes and looked up at him. "Always talking back, always trying to be a little smartass. It's time someone cleaned your mouth out, don't you think?"

He raised his right fist and swung it down, striking her in the jaw. "Bianca!" Varric lunged forward, but some of the people nearby held him back. Marcus struck her again and her body flinched as the jolt of pain shot through her. "Damn it what are you doing? Let me go!"

"This is a duel," Marcus said while turning his attention to Varric. "An unconventional way of doing the proving matches of old. You know the rules, no interference."

Varric gnashed his teeth and cried out in anger. "That isn't a duel. You're just beating her like you did when she was a kid. Hitting her when she's down. You're nothing but a coward, Cadash. That's all you are, that's all you'll ever be."

Bianca gripped her axe with her right hand and turned her eyes to Marcus's right knee. "Not necessarily." She closed her hand around the handle and raised the weapon an inch from the ground. Marcus turned to look and Bianca used all her strength to sweep him off his feet.

Once he was on the ground, she rolled over and pushed herself up. "You're right, Dad, he is a coward." Marcus glared up at her and his trembling fingers dragged through the snow as he closed his hands around them. "Sure as he is a coward, he hits me when I'm down. But that's not all he is…he's just a pathetic old man, an old man that has no more bite because the one person he had leashed he can't control."

Marcus threw his hand in the air with a shout, sending a fistful of snow into her face. She staggered back and Marcus jumped up. "I'll show you a pathetic old man." He grabbed her by the neck and used all his strength to push her as he ran for the mountainside.

Bianca felt her body slam into the jagged rocks and cried out as the pain shot through her with a swift pulse. Marcus yanked her back, breathing heavily in the process, and spun himself around-releasing her at the end of his spin.

She stumbled forward and used the shoulder of one of her companions to catch her balance. She clutched her axe and raised it like a club, ready to swing at a coming projectile.

Her eyes narrowed as Marcus charged her like a raging bull. His eyes were red with fire and his nostrils flared out. "This is for the abuse." She swung the axe. Marcus turned to try and avoid the blow at the last moment, but was struck in the back. He caught his balance and circled around, screaming in anger as he charged again.

"This one's for following my mother's orders like a heartless, callous demon." She swung the weapon again, this time crushing Marcus's left shoulder.

He clutched his shoulder and came at her once again, as though ignoring the injuries he already had. Adrenaline was surely to blame for this, and she had to credit him for the determination.

"Then this is for my father, who suffered twenty years because you couldn't do the right thing and give me back." She swung the weapon once more with all her strength, delivering a crushing blow to his chest.

Marcus crashed to the ground and clutched his arm, groaning as he rolled from left to right. "It's over, Marcus." She put her weapon down and approached him, looking into his pain filled eyes somberly. "You're just an old man, I can't do anything more than I already have. You lose."

"No," he growled. His eyes lit up with rage and he began to push himself up, groaning against his own pain. Bianca took a small step back and felt a lump grow in her throat as Marcus started to walk towards her. "No, I won't lose to the likes of you. You're just a weak little child, that's all you are, all you've ever been and all you will ever be."

He grabbed his chest and took a deep breath. A portion of his face started to tense and contort, and a vein began to bulge from his neck. "Marcus, this fight is over." Bianca repeated herself firmly, hoping that he would understand the duel had ended and he needed to calm down. "There's no reason to continue."

"No. I won't accept it. You'd have to kill me before I lose to a pathetic, weak minded child."

Marcus took another step and the tremor in his body grew increasingly violent. His eyes began to move skyward and he fell to his knees. "Marcus?" Amelia turned white and she ran to her husband's side, shrieking as he collapsed into her arms. "Marcus!"

"I-I can't…" Marcus grunted and clenched his eyes. "I can't feel my arm. My chest-my heart…" His lips separated and a gasp drifted away from them before he fell limp. Bianca threw her hands over her mouth and stared with wide eyes as the others approached.

"He overworked himself," King Bhelen said with a soft and quiet tone. "His heart couldn't take any more. He's gone." Bhelen turned to Bianca and crossed his arms. "You were right, he was just too old to keep up the fight. I will see to it his body is taken to Orzammar…and his wife…" Amelia turned her head up and she fell into a seated position as Bhelen shook his head. "You will remain within our prison walls until we have decided what is to be done with you."

"No!" Amelia turned onto her hands and knees and tried to crawl away, but several of Bhelen's guards grabbed her. "No, you can't do this."

It was not long before Bianca was once more in her father's loving embrace, and her tired body was being soothed by his warmth. "Thank god you're safe," Varric whispered to her, "Thank god"

"I knew Marcus couldn't win, he was too set on abuse and brute force…he never expected to seriously fight with me, because he always thought I was weak."

"You're not weak." He tightened his hug and she slowly moved her arms around him. "You are strong, and I am immensely proud of you."

"Thanks, Dad…can we go home now? I just want to sleep…"

"Yeah." He wiped a tear from his eyes and smiled at her. "Yeah, let's go home."

I felt it would be more appropriate that he died of a heart attack, and that Bianca likely would not have taken his life in this instance. What are your thoughts on the duel? What are your thoughts on Shale overseeing the destruction of her very house, although she probably has great disdain for them if she's listened to all that Leliana may have told her. Fighting Marcus may have proved a tad on the easier side for Bianca, but since he and Amelia are in fact just "tools", I felt they should not be overly difficult to deal with compared to Davri and even Corypheus.