Thanks to Cobar713 for betaing this chapter! :)
The repository fell away behind them as they set one after another foot upon the stairs that led to the uppermost chambers of the Tower. It had been an easy enough task when they had fought their way through the Sentinels that guarded the phylacteries. They were grinning at each other, their breathing fast and excited as they approached the final door. Almost free of the shackles that had bound them for so long, Rina felt the shadows of memory lifting for the first time in what seemed like forever.
Then, the door opened and the smile fell from her lips, adopting an old mask. There were six Templars backing the First Enchanter and the Knight-Commander. Her stomach twisted and her hand gripping her staff hand lowered even as Lily and Jowan gasped in horror.
So close!
The emotion of anger rippled through her, but she stamped it out with the ease of careful practice. They had been close, but there was a chance, still a chance.
Rina stepped forward, placing herself between the Templars and her friends. A smile twisted her lips and her eyes held the cold edge of amusement as she began in a measured cadence, "It was my fault, First Enchanter. I convinced Jowan and Lily to help me try and escape." She paused to judge the shocked expression on the First Enchanter's face, then continued, "I did not wish to spend my life in a gilded cage to be controlled by the whims of shiny jailors that claim to be carrying out the will of the Maker." All the while, her fingers tightened subtly around her staff and sparked a little with magic, though not enough to make the Templars act.
Irving was shaking his head and began, "Rina, all mages are-"
"No, I'll not hear it," she said flatly. "I've heard enough of it for three years. I know where I stand. Allow Jowan and Lily their freedom. It was I that started the rumors of him being the Blood Mage in the first place, after all."
A vein was throbbing in the Knight-Commander's forehead as he absorbed the deception played by the newly Harrowed mage. "You needed accomplices. Why ask for their freedom now?"
Jowan started at that, but wisely kept his mouth shut. He had known her long enough for him to know when she was spinning a tale that would keep him and others safe and place the blame squarely on her shoulders. For the moment, he slid an arm around Lily's shoulders, knowing this wasn't the extent of the plan.
Rina merely shrugged, the motion hiding a subtle pulse of magic that traveled through her fingers into the staff she held. "My game has been caught. I see no reason to drag them further along into it."
"Ah, Rina," Irving sighed. "That is not how these things work. The pair of them will be punished alongside you to discourage future, foolish escape attempts like yours."
Lily whimpered and pressed herself into Jowan's side. He tightened his arm around her and watched the other mage, sure that there was something more, something else.
A smile played about her lips. "I know," she said and that was the only warning they received before the staff activated and slammed a paralysis spell down on Irving, preventing him from moving as lightning danced about her fingertips and lit the air around them with a stunning light. It bought them only a moment, and in that moment, she grabbed Jowan and Lily and shoved them towards the door, trusting they would get the hint and that they would be able to overpower the few Templars that stood in their way.
Jowan breathed his thanks and she smiled grimly before they took flight and the power of six Templars crashed into her, sapped her magic, and forced her to her knees. Greagoir was already shouting orders to his men to retrieve the escaping mage and former initiate, but she staggered to her feet and stood in their way. They wasted precious seconds subduing and binding her and by the time they were satisfied that she was no longer a threat, her spell had worn off of Irving and there was no sign of Jowan or Lily.
On her knees once more, she watched them from beneath a veil of red hair, wearing a small, grim smile. At least one part of the plan had worked. Amell, Jowan, and Lily would go free, even if her life was forfeit. Greagoir paced angrily back and forth even as Irving tried to talk him down from sending her to her death at the mage's prison, Aeonar. But he ignored the Senior Enchanter's words as he stopped before her and caught her steady gaze.
"Your antics have made a mockery of this circle!" he growled. "What are we to do with you?"
"Do what you like. I stand by my decision to help Jowan," she said calmly, tilting her head back to study his glowering features.
The vein pulsed a little more in his forehead at her answer. He had always had a soft spot for the girl. She had been a little older than the normal apprentice when she had arrived and the circumstances that surrounded her "capture" were questionable if only because she had surrendered and walked away from her burnt out hovel of a home. Two years had been all that was needed for her to find a place in their tower and two years to become so proficient at her studies that she had impressed the First Enchanter enough to let her take her Harrowing three years before anyone was even allowed to be considered for it.
She was bright, quick, and proficient. Greagoir had found it hard to resist her charm and had turned a blind eye to some of her harmless pranks when she proved to be as obedient to their ways as a Tranquil mage. Of course, he thought bitterly, of course she would have buried the rebellious streak in her nature to be called upon only when she needed it most. She was far too clever to have done otherwise.
So, instead of dwelling on his own failings, he ranted. "You helped a blood mage escape! All our work for naught—because of you!"
She made no response. Her eyes simply slid over his shoulder and focused intently on something there. Before he could continue, a cultured voice interrupted him. "Knight-Commander, if I may…" he didn't wait for a response before continuing. "I am not only looking for mages to join the king's army. I am also recruiting for the Grey Wardens. Irving spoke highly of this mage, and I would like her to join the Warden ranks."
Irving frowned and stepped forward. "Duncan, this mage assisted a maleficar, and has shown a lack of regard for the Circle's rules."
"She is a danger to all of us!" Greagoir said sharply.
It was a rare thing when the Knight-Commander and the First Enchanter agreed on anything, she reflected with irony, even as she locked eyes with the Warden Commander. "It is a rare person who risks all for a friend in need. I stand by my decision to recruit this mage."
"No! I refuse to let this go unpunished," Greagoir snarled. Rina simply laughed.
"If the Grey Wardens will have me, then I will gladly go," she said, working the sleeves of her robes. "I would have gladly left with them before this entire mess." With a slight flick of her wrist and a quick *snick*, she rose gracefully to her feet as the ropes slithered to the ground. They watched in shock as she produced a dagger and slid it back into the arm of her robe and flashed them a satisfied smile. "I am more than just a mage," she told them. To Duncan, who was smiling slightly, she gave a slight bow. "There is nothing more for me here. I am ready to leave when you are."
His eyes were keen as he searched hers before nodding. "There is one other we must retrieve before we leave this place," he said.
She only gave him a measured, weary look before she shrugged. "If the Wardens desire my skills, I'll follow," she said. Irving looked like he wanted to say more, but Duncan had already taken her elbow and turned her away, placing his body between her and the Templars and First Enchanter. Together, they left the tower and never looked back.
The Inn had a dining room that smelled of old cabbage and unwashed bodies. It was almost full and the noise simply kept climbing as the barkeep kept supplying ale and taking in more coin with an almost satisfied smirk on his lips. Rina wrinkled her nose at the smell and covered her mouth with the sleeve of her robe. "Is she really in this place, Duncan?" Rina asked.
Duncan barely blinked at the lack of title. "If she held to her end of the bargain, then yes she here. I suspect she has not left, at any rate," he answered.
The city elf was there, in fact. Frozen, hidden in the shadows she knew so intimately. Her eyes were wide, fixed on this elf- this mage- who was quite literally her double.
The odds that this woman had no relation to her were minuscule, yet Rose desperately held on to that rationalization. Surely, if she had family, a sister or a cousin, they would not have left her in slavery. At the very least, she was certain her master would have sought them out as yet another tool to guarantee her cooperation.
She forced herself to inhale, to steady her spinning head, and then to take a few cautious steps forward into the common room.
Duncan saw her before Rina, a strange look passing over his features. He glanced sidelong at Rina as she spotted the other elf across the room and froze at the sight of her. "Demon?"
"Recruit," Duncan corrected her mildly and she returned the sidelong glance.
"Right, I'm not going to ask," she muttered even as an odd look flashed through her eyes.
"Yes. This is Rina," he said and then glanced at Rina again to say, "This is Rose."
Rina raked her fingers through her hair, the sleeve of her robe falling from her wrist to allow the room a look at the thin, white scars that traced her arm. She smiled in a mirthless kind of way. "Like the flower, hm?" she asked. "Easy enough to remember."
Rose was tacing the contours of Rina's face, trying to find something different enough to convince her that she was right. "Yes," she said. "Like the flower."
The other elf's gaze flitted to Duncan, who had already moved away before Rose had said anything, before Rina followed after him. Her steps were deliberately placed, like she was fighting to stay standing as they walked out the door. Duncan's pace seemed to moderate itself as she matched his steps away from the tower that had been her prison.
The beaten road was strewn with bodies, some groaning in pain, others lying still in pools of red. Three remained, an archer and two rogues. Rose pulled her daggers from the freshest casualty and began to move for the archer.
The rogue closest to Rina brandished his axe, laughing. It made one wonder if there was anything taking up the space between his ears. "Look at the little mage, waving her stick around! Pretty sure I could snap you in half, if I tried."
Old reflexes had her spinning to face the bandit. Power gathered at her fingertips as she drew breath to shout orders to her companions before she realized who she traveled with. Flash of scent, fragments of voice. The magic dissipated from her hands and Rina laughed, high and clear as she threw her arms wide in invitation to the lumbering brute. "Come and try," she said in a voice that was both amused and cold.
Duncan could only spare a single glance as his recruit taunted the brute and paused in the motion of wiping the blood from his blade. Then, pain blossomed in his thigh as an arrow sunk deep into a rip in his armor. A quick jerk of his dagger had the shaft removed with the arrow tip still lodged in place. Then, he was engaging the archers, one dagger flicked from his hand to sink into the throat of one as the other dove for cover and fumbled with his belt.
There was a sickening crunch from the remaining archer at the hands of Rose just as the last bandit ran at Rina with a fierce battle cry. He held his weapons before him, ready to slice her open.
She brought the butt of her staff down onto his foot, released it, drove her elbow into his unprotected gut, and jabbed her palm into his chin. Stepping away from the dazed bandit, she gathered magic into her hands and released the lightning into his body.
He convulsed, foam running down his chin. The smell of singed flesh filled the air and he crumpled at Rina's feet. Rose walked up to her, sheathing her daggers. "Nothing good on the other ones."
Rina's eyes were curiously dead as she glanced at the other elf. "His leathers were shoddy protection, and none of the blades seemed to carry proper balance," she responded, turning to another corpse and bending to kneel beside it. "Better than what I've got now."
"You prefer blades to magic?" Rose asked.
As Rina's hands flew deftly over the buckles that held the straps together, she almost chuckled. "Its how I was trained," she said even as something stabbed at her heart. "Magic and blades combined are more potent and lethal than the merely defensive stance that most mages tend to favor. Leather armor is also best since lightning can fry skin to metal unless otherwise enchanted, and it and protects better than robes."
Rose nodded approvingly. "I've never seen anyone combine blades and magic- not the same person, anyway." She paused, and her eyes flashed, as if something unpleasant had occurred to her. "I prefer blades. I was never any good at archery."
Setting aside the mostly undamaged leathers, the mage snorted and started on prying the blade from the dead man's grip. "As far as I know, I am the only mage that fights as I do."
Duncan sat on a rock five feet from them with his wounded leg stretched out before him, his hand steady as he dug the tip out of his thigh with the tip of his dagger. For all that he was intent on the wound, he appeared to have half an ear on their conversation.
"Who taught you, then?" Rose asked abruptly, as if she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to ask at all. Her expression was guarded.
The dagger now free of its former owner, Rina twirled it around her fingers, caught it, and stabbed it into the ground. With a slanted, darkened gaze, she answered, "Those that fought with everything they were rather than with weapons. They were no one you would have known."
Duncan looked at Rina, his hands pausing in the act of tying off a bandage around the wound. "You were raised among dragons," he said, one eyebrow climbing above the other.
The rogue stepped away from Rina, her eyes darting between her companions. She swallowed. "The dragons?" she said quietly. "The... sentient ones?"
For a moment, Rina appeared to not have heard them before her fingers wrapped around the hilt of the dagger and she rose with a fluid grace that made her silken robes ripple. She gave them both an oblique
glance as she slid the dagger into its sheath she had pried from the bandit's ruined belt. "Yes, they were the sentient dragons. I was with them up to the last day before the war."
There was a long silence. "Have you been at the tower since then? It's been three years, hasn't it?"
Sliding the dagger into her sleeve, she crouched to look over the armor again. "No. It's been three and a half years, actually. I spent six months tracking down the Lanshae that survived that battle."
Duncan stood, tested his weight against the wound, and asked, "What are the Lanshae?"
"They were a race sensitive to fire that fed off the life-force of mortals," Rina answered automatically. Duncan nodded his understanding.
"Not all are so easily killed," Rose added.
Rina leveled an even look at her as she considered those words. "I never said they were an easy lot to kill," she said finally. "And they aren't a well known race to begin with."
Rose betrayed no emotion. "And not all Alienage elves are uneducated."
The mage's gaze was cold, and while Duncan seemed to note the tension building between them, he did not rush to interfere. Rina's gaze was hard as she studied her look alike. "Its not a question of where you came from or how educated you are. How did you come by your knowledge of them?"
Rose shrugged in answer. "Travelers talk, especially when there's free drink to be had."
Something flashed through Rina's eyes as thoughts flickered across her mind, her own knowledge of the race, of their deaths, of the times they had screamed beneath her hands. In the other's face, in the tilt of the lips, the shift of the eyes, she saw the desire to back away from a hastily made statement, a carelessly uttered word. "Why would you want to know in the first place?"
Rina stepped towards the other recruit, tension humming in every movement of her body. "Rina," Duncan said, his voice all sharp edges and commanding. She looked at him, even reluctant as she was to let the topic slide away. "Enough," he said and she stiffened. "You are one of my Wardens now, and I will not tolerate violence among our ranks. You have an issue with another recruit or Warden, then you bring it to me,"
Her lips peeled back into a snarl, but she spun away from them, gathered the armor, and stalked away, leaving them behind. From her place among the trees, Rina heard Duncan say, "Get your gear together and clean your blades while she gets changed. As soon as she's back, we're on the move again."
When the mage emerged several minutes later, Rose hadn't moved. She stared after Rina, her eyes sharp and features devoid of expression. Finally, Rose turned away to do as her Commander ordered, with a new, guarded set to her shoulders that wasn't there before.