Title: Ghosts
Author: May Chang
Warnings: general, adventure, AU
Pairings: M!Shepard + Ashley, M!Cousland x Zevran
Disclaimers: Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect are the property of BioWare.
Author's Note: Shepard is a Paragon/Earthborn/War Hero/Infiltrator.

Ghosts

Part Eleven

He wasn't sure how much time had passed before Shepard finally decided to return to the world of the living. His head still felt like it was going to explode and Shepard let out a pained groan as he slowly opened his eyes.

"Shepard! Shepard, are you alright?" Leliana asked anxiously.

"...ow," Shepard replied, shutting his eyes close as he raised a hand to his temple. "That's going to leave a mark on my brain." It took him a moment to realize that he was outside, lying on the ground with his head in Leliana's lap. It was already night and a campfire was burning nearby. Blinking he moved to sit up and was hit by a wave of dizziness, feeling the bard gently push him back down.

"You hit the ground hard," Leliana explained. Shepard made a noise as he closed his eyes and tried to make the darkness stop spinning behind his eyelids. "You've been unconscious for a good few hours. It was a good thing Rhys and Mithra came with us or we would have still been in the cave." She ran a hand gently through Shepard's hair and he squeezed his eyes as he tried to get his bearings.

"What happened, Shepard?" she asked. "What did the beacon do to you?"

"Uh..." Shepard opened his eyes and blinked up at Leliana. "The beacon, it uploaded into my brain a lot of information. Some of it I already knew, but it seems like they put in other information like the Prothean culture, religion and, uh, I think some farewells letters of sorts." He took another moment before slowly sitting up, dropping his head into his hands with a groan.

"Frankly I kind of wished that last part didn't happen," he groaned. "It's like a damn punch in the gut." There was the sound of shifting beside Shepard and he peeked through his hands to see Rhys and Mithra taking a seat by them. Mithra held out a skin of water and Shepard gratefully took it, drinking it.

"The place was very old," Mithra said slowly. "How long ago have these Protheans been here?"

"A long time ago," he replied as he handed back the skin. "If my translations and visions are correct – and it's pretty iffy to me, sorry – I think the Protheans arrived at the end of a war. I'm not sure about the history here, but when the Protheans came it looked like some person was being crowned." Shepard rubbed his temple as he looked up at the others before continuing.

"Wait." Shepard looked at Leliana who held up a hand. "A coronation? Where? Here?"

"I have no idea," he replied with a shake of his head. "Probably. I just know that he was a blond hair, blue eye fellow with silver armor on and—"

"Maker's breath, it can't be. The Protheans were there to witness the crowning of King Calenhad?" Leliana exclaimed. Shepard blinked. "Shepard, that was during the Exalted Age, almost four hundred years ago!"

"Uh, okay? Who's he?" The looks the two Dalish leveled at Shepard made him pull back a bit. "Sorry, I wasn't thinking about learning history when I first woke up in Highever."

"King Calenhad, also known as Calenhad the Great or the Silver Knight, was the man who united the barbarian tribes into the nation of Ferelden," Leliana explained. "He in the first Theirin on the throne and it is his line that has remained on the throne. In fact the current king of Ferelden is of Theirin blood."

"When did they die?" Rhys asked. Mithra elbowed the elf and gave him a glare, cowing him slightly. Shepard scratched his head, frowning as he thought.

"I think the last of them died a hundred years later," Shepard said softly. It wasn't a vision, more of a memory to the commander, of walking down the corridors slowly as the lights slowly turned off one by one until he had reached the beacon. The last Prothean sat down next to the beacon as the light overhead turned off, the room barely lit by the beacon and quietly sang a lullaby to himself before darkness claimed him.

It was a peaceful and sad end in comparison to how Shepard was going die.

"Shepard? Are you alright?"

"Huh?" The commander looked up to see a concerned look on Leliana and he realized that tears were spilling from his eyes. "Shit. I'm fine. Really. It's just—uh, damn, sorry." Shepard quickly wiped his eyes and cleared his throat, embarrassed by the whole scene.

"It was strange to them though," Shepard added thoughtfully, "that they lived that long. They were expecting to die within the next thirty, forty years. Huh, I wonder if that means my life is extended as well." He trailed off, thinking about his life expectancy – humans in his universe already lived to 150 on average, was he going to have to tack on another hundred?

"Was it a village?" Mithra asked, changing the subject. "Or a city square? I didn't see any houses for them to stay." Shepard blinked and looked up at the elf, confused by the question before realizing what the Dalish was asking about.

"No, it wasn't a village," Shepard said with a shake of his head. "This was an ark."

"An ark?"

"Well, I think that's the closest definition of what we saw," Shepard amended. "That place was created so that the Protheans there could escape from the Reapers. The technical parts escape me but it sounded like they were trying to phase out so that the Reapers wouldn't see them."

"What does that mean?" Rhys asked. Shepard rubbed his chin as he tried to think of the best explanation.

"They were trying to hide in another dimension," he said. "By shifting the ark into another dimension the Protheans would have practically made themselves invisible to the Reapers. The problem was when they shifted it didn't work the way they hoped. They did get away from the Reapers but instead of putting one foot into the other world, they jumped feet-first into the other world."

"So it's like they were trying to step partway into the Fade, but instead they crossed into the Fade," Leliana summed up slowly. Shepard nodded in agreement at the analogy before he rubbed the back of his neck.

Well, at least now I know why demons can't see me, Shepard thought with a tired sigh. I'm out of sync with this world. Somehow the thought wasn't very comforting to Shepard at all and he wondered what being out of sync would do to him during his stay in Ferelden.

"It's been a long day," Leliana said. "Perhaps we should get some rest before we head back to the Dalish camp, yes?" Mithra and Rhys both nodded and got up to roll out their sleeping bags. Shepard also stood up, pausing to make sure he wasn't about to keel over before he looked around and found his pack.

Sleep – real sleep and not when he was unconscious – was definitely welcomed.

Word came from Vigil's Keep that most of the banns had attempted to kill the Warden-Commander. Fergus gave a frustrated sigh before finishing up the letter to be sent to the Warden-Commander. He was glad that Nathaniel had made it back to Vigil's Keep before the whole attack went down to help defend the arlessa, but Fergus felt that the attack should not have happened at all.

What did Rendon Howe do to make these banns so loyal to him? Fergus gave another irritated sigh as he folded the letter and placed it into the envelope before getting up from his desk.

Highever was doing well now, the attack by Howe finally being pushed into the past. The town had finally finished rebuilding, the few survivors from Lothering had finally settled down, and the minor problems in the alienage had been resolved. With the coins coming into the treasury, Fergus was able to sit down with Sir Reilly to finally work out what was needed for their army.

There had been a mass desertion when Howe took the castle and the madman had taken upon himself to hunt down all of the men and put them to death. Unfortunately Howe had been able to kill most of them and when the castle was returned to Fergus, the few surviving men crawled back. The one good thing though was the fact that the survivors were the ones with the most experience and who had served under Fergus's father faithfully. Sir Reilly and Captain Eoin had been two of the first to return, to swear fealty at Fergus's feet and to help rebuild the ranks of both the army and guards.

Fergus wasn't sure what he would have done if Calum, Sir Reilly and Captain Eoin hadn't been there to help rebuild Highever – perhaps having a minor heart attack and heavy drinking would be involved.

"We need more archers," Sir Reilly said, a frown on her face. "We may need to hire someone to teach archery and train at least a good thirty men. We also need a couple of ballistas in case, sire."

"Alright," Fergus said slowly, pen scratching on the paper to make note. "Weaponry?"

"We have crossbows for the men, but we don't have any longbows," the woman replied and shook her head before continuing in a dry tone. "Most of the young ones seemed to prefer using the sword than shooting people." Fergus gave an amused chuckle as he looked up to see a thoughtful expression Sir Reilly's face.

"Perhaps we can get Master Shepard to help with the archery training," she said slowly.

"Hm." Fergus toyed with the idea before nodding. "An excellent idea, Sir Reilly." He scratched down a note to ask Shepard when he returned from the Circle. The man had been rather modest about his marksmanship, but from what Fergus had seen Shepard was extraordinary. Before the commander had left Shepard had started working with the longbow, a weapon that took people years to use well and he seemed to have a good handle of it in a week.

Thinking about Shepard made Fergus realized that he hadn't heard from the man in almost two months. He'd recently received a letter from the First Enchanter that Shepard had joined a couple of templars to help in a situation but after that there was nothing. He hoped that the commander was doing okay before he returned to the matter at hand.

They made it back to the Dalish camp in a day thanks to Mithra and Rhys. Arriving right as the sun began to set the Keeper had asked them to stay for the night as setting off for Denerim and the Tower now would be stupid. With a glance at the setting sun and exchanging a look for Leliana, the two humans agreed to stay the night though Shepard was a little leery as more of the Dalish elves seemed to want to shoot him full of arrows.

"Why do I get the feeling that Aedan wasn't very popular with the Dalish?" Shepard muttered as they put away their packs and started over to the campfire for dinner.

"Oh no, the Dalish liked Aedan," Leliana replied. "I guess they just don't know what to make of you."

"An innocent human with funny eyes?" She laughed at that as they sat down by the fire. Food was delivered to them – some sort of meat with cooked vegetables and a light soup coupled with water – and people began to talk about the hunt, stories of the past and curious looks thrown at Shepard.

"This is delicious," Shepard said before taking another bite. One of the female elves blushed and gave the commander a shy smile at the compliment and he smiled back.

"I have notice that you seem to enjoy the food since you've arrived," Leliana noted. "I'm surprised you can even eat the food made by Fereldens, half the time I'm not even sure what's in it." There was some laughter from the elves as Shepard chuckled at that.

"Well, it's hard to get fresh food on a ship," Shepard explained, "and this is going to sound terrible but even on shore leave we don't have fresh food like this."

"Why is that?" one of the elves asked. Shepard made a contemplative noise as he thought about it.

"For one, there were too many people where I grew up," he started slowly, "so most of the food was... not what you think it is. Secondly was most of the food on the Citadel were shipped from different worlds so they had to be frozen. We didn't have time to stop planet-side and the few times we did, the welcoming reception was, well, not very nice."

"Worlds? Planet-side?" Lanaya gave the commander a puzzled look and Shepard gave her a sheepish look.

"Ah, yes, uh, would you believe that my people came from the stars?" he said, gesturing to the sky. The looks Lanaya and some of the other elves gave him caused Shepard to give a shrug. "It's the truth – our ships are created to fly through the stars and believe me, the universe is a pretty big place."

"You have met the people of different worlds?" one of the younger elves asked.

"Oh yes, they're all very, very different from us," he replied. "For example, there's one race of people who all look like blue-skinned women and can live to a thousand years."

"Surely they're not all female," Rhys asked. The tone in his voice and the narrowing of his eyes caused Shepard to chuckle in amusement.

"Oh no, they are," Shepard answered with a smile. "I'm not sure on how they procreate, but they're the only race that can have little blue baby girls with anyone in the universe – kind of creepy now that I think about it. There are also the turians, salarians, elcors and many other races but most of those races don't really look human at all."

"What about magic?" one of the younger girls asked curiously.

"We actually don't have magic," Shepard replied. "Well, not magic like yours anyway – there's a lot of scientific explanation that goes way over my head." The commander scratched his chin as he made a thoughtful noise.

"The ones that I think would be closest to having magic with be the biotics," Shepard continued thoughtfully with a slight frown. "The thing is those people were exposed to a substance that gives them their powers, and even then there's no talking with spirits and throwing of fireballs. Although now that I think about it there is some throwing of people involved with their powers."

"Force mages then," Lanaya said. Shepard made a curious noise as he took another bite of dinner. "Those types of mages have the ability to throw people around or to slow them down by making them heavy."

"That sounds about right," Shepard replied slowly.

"Do they have to go to the Circle? Who teaches them their powers?" another girl asked.

"What if they're possessed by demons?" a young hunter piped up.

"There's a branch within our military that is specifically geared to training biotics with their powers," Shepard explained. "Most of them are still kids when they're sent over so in a way it's like the Circle but with a more military application to their powers. As for demons we don't really have that problem, unless you count the demons of alcohol, drugs and gambling."

And probably sex, but I think that was just Kaidan's problem, he thought to himself. The rumors about Kaidan's past had provided some amusement to the commander much to the lieutenant's embarrassment.

"They're all still very mortal in the end," Shepard continued with a shrug. "A well placed shot in the head will take them out just as easy as anybody else. The only real problem I had with the biotics I worked with is that they tend to eat like they haven't had a good meal in days."

"That sounds like the two Wardens," an elderly Dalish commented and Leliana laughed at that.

"I thought for sure Aedan and Alistair were going to eat all of your food," she said. "I still remember Zevran and I having to pull those two away from the campfire before they started to eat the soup pot." Lanaya and the other elves also laughed at that as Shepard chuckled.

"Do you have any stories from your world?" one of the children asked. It took Shepard moment to realize that the little ones had somehow managed to congregate around him without him realizing. He rubbed the back of his neck with a laugh before answering.

"I have some stories, what kind would you like to hear?"

Lanaya had set up an aravel for the two to stay in for the night and Shepard found the wagon to be rather comfy. It sort of reminded him of the romanticized 19th-century Earth that some of the younger girls had read back in school with a dreamy sigh. While the wagon and the notion of living out in the prairies sounded cool to a child of eight to twelve years, Shepard can now personally say that roughing it in the wilds is tough. Tents, water-purification tablets, a lighter – they all seemed like a luxury now that Shepard was here in Ferelden.

"You know, Shepard? I think with some training you'd be an excellent bard," Leliana mused as they started to get ready to go to sleep. Shepard was sitting on his bedroll, facing away from Leliana to allow her some privacy as she changed.

"A bard? Oh, no, no, no, no, no" Shepard said, shaking his head and waving his hands. "Bards sing, I don't unless you want me to render people deaf." Leliana laughed at that before going quiet as Shepard pulled off his shirt. He paused to look over at her, seeing her eyes looking over his scars.

"It's not as bad as it looks," Shepard said, watching as Leliana looked back up at him. He gave a shrug as he raised an arm and looked down at the scar tissues. "Well, it doesn't hurt anymore." Dropping his arm, Shepard tossed the shirt into his pack before sitting down on his bedding, carefully not looking at Leliana as she turned away to undress for the night. Idly Shepard wondered if he should put on a clean shirt for modesty before deciding against it.

"You can look now," Leliana said. Shepard glanced over his shoulder to see Leliana with a light shirt on before turning to get off his blanket so that he get under them. Leliana also crawled under her own blankets. "So you will be heading back to the Tower tomorrow?"

"Yeah, I should let Wynne know that I'm still alive," Shepard replied as he settled down. "And then I should head back to Highever since I know what happened."

"Did you find out how to go back home?" Leliana asked, turning to face him. Shepard stared at the ceiling of the aravel, hands folding under his head.

"Yeah, about that," Shepard said quietly, "I can't go home."

"What?" The bard rose slightly as Shepard tilted his head to look at her.

"The Protheans never expected to cross completely over," Shepard explained. "So when it happened, they couldn't reverse the wormhole, portal thing because the machine they used fried. They tried to fix it, but they didn't have the right materials to fix the machine.

"Do you know of any stories of ghosts in the forests?" Shepard asked, turning to look at Leliana. "When they figured out they couldn't go home, the Protheans decided to see what was going on in this world. I've got accounts about giants with horns, a land of mages and some of the ugliest monsters I have ever seen. Some of them weren't careful enough and were seen in forests, and trust me, they do sort of look like blue-glowing ghosts."

"Ghosts in the forest." Leliana bit her lower lip as she thought about it. "No, no, I do not believe I have heard of any. Perhaps Lanaya may know."

"Hm." Shepard shifted his gaze back to the ceiling. "Well, better get some sleep. Tomorrow will be here soon."

So out of curiosity are people okay with slash or no? My Shepard's usually bi to start with so I can go either way when I go into the romantic section. I will be delving into Dragon Age 2 as well so yes, you will be seeing Hawke and company later (I just have to decide on Hawke's gender and who the LI is going to be.)