Sister Silencia—I named her that for she spoke nary a word—came to tend to my self-inflicted wound after the fight with the bronto. I had been hoping they would send Orsino to me again, but apparently a shallow cut on the leg doesn't qualify for the attention of the First Enchanter. A pity. I wanted to find out if he had done anything on my behalf. Perhaps the next time I would simply have to injure myself worse. Or, if I were lucky, whatever I fought next would do it for me.

I laughed at myself and the morbid gallows humor that had seized me. Gallows humor? That set me to laughing even harder. "Hey, Sister. Did you ever hear the phrase 'gallows humor'?"

The silent sister said nothing but smiled pleasantly.

"You get it though, right? Gallows… The Gallows." I chuckled alone at my stupid pun while the Chantry sister cleaned and bound my wound. "People who have gallows humor are finding something funny to laugh about on their way to be hung." As I explained the joke, it stopped being funny so I shut my mouth and let her do her job.

When she finished, she stood and squeezed my shoulder companionably. I mouthed the words "thank you" to her. She mouthed back "you're welcome". I giggled because she wasn't hearing impaired and I was pretty sure her mouthing the words was technically cheating on a vow of silence.

I slept fitfully that night. Waking and then worrying that I would miss an important message from Anders so I tried to force myself to sleep. Yeah… that so doesn't work. I finally fell asleep as the sun rose until several hours later when a pair of templars let themselves into my room.

"Get up!"

One eye popping open, I viewed the two templars in full armor, including helms. It was a bad way to wake up, so I pulled the covers over my head and hoped for a better start to my morning. Sadly, it took a turn for the worse. One of the templars pulled the covers off my bed, leaving me stilled curled in the fetal position, shivering in my smalls. It was a humiliating position.

"Get out of bed, sluggard!" one said, his voice muffled by the helm. "Ser Alrik wants to see you immediately."

I stood, indignation rising. "Get out and let me dress!" I grabbed a blanket they'd pulled off my bed and wrapped it around myself, regaining some of my dignity.

"He didn't say anything about that. He just said to bring you right away," muffled-yelling-templar said.

I collected myself, trying to keep from yelling back. "I bet," my voice was slow, quiet and gentle like I was talking to a very young child, "he thought that you two were so intelligent that he wouldn't have to state things that are so fucking obvious." I couldn't quite help that the last two words detonated like explosive expletives.

They looked at one another and then shuffled out of my room closing the door. "Hurry it up then."

Rude! Simply rude. I pulled a baggy, black robe out of the armoire, and some clean smalls. No peep-show for these tin heads. I went behind the bookcase I'd moved and changed there.

The two templars marched me down the hallway, but where we normally go left when they take me to the black dome, we went right. I tried to pay attention to my surroundings, just in case I could get a message out. The only problem was I didn't know how the building was situated. What direction were we walking? I slowed down a little to take it in, and got an ungentle push from the templar behind me.

"Keep up," he growled.

Too bad you can't kill people for being rude, I thought, malevolently. Of course, half the world's population would be dead within a day, and everyone else would become extremely polite, which suited me just fine. For now, I would simply have to satisfy my anger by visualizing all the ways I could take out two fully armored templars without magic or weapons. Well, without regular magic. I could always do what I'd done with the bronto. Then, when they were bleeding to death, I could snatch their keys and remove the strangler. After that I'd crow-up and fly—I looked around the hallways, no high ceilings, and no ornate architecture to hide in—Okay, scratch crowing-up.

My daydream of curing these two templars of rudeness ended abruptly as the one ahead of me stopped in front of an open door and I collided with him. He grunted with annoyance and pushed me into the room where Ser Alrik sat at a desk looking amused at my clumsiness.

"Ah, I hope we didn't wake you, Elissa. You look a bit—tousled." He rose from his desk and gestured to a chair sitting in front of it. "Please, come in and sit down."

While I seated myself, he went to the door and shut it.

"Tousled," I said, punctuating it with a snort. "Your two goons weren't even going to let me dress." The comment made me reach up and try to smooth down my hair, but it was impossibly mussed from a restless night of not sleeping.

"We do have something to discuss. You remain a bit of a mystery, frankly. I've heard reports of, hm, unusual abilities that you've shown. Burton and Earnest swear they saw you translocate from one spot to another. Then there was the matter of last night's fight. How were you able to puncture the skull of a bronto with a pair of daggers?"

"As I said, Warden secrets—"

"And I said there can be no secrets between us. Did I not make that clear? There are no Wardens here to punish you for revealing your secrets. There is, however, me, and I don't care for evasions or lies." He cut me off, speaking quietly, but the threat in his words was palpable.

I sighed and looked down, trying to look like I was wrestling with a burden. "Wardens take the taint into their bodies and it gives us speed, strength, and endurance beyond the norm." I paused for dramatic effect and then met his eyes. "If we survive, that is."

He steepled his hands, fingers tapped together rhythmically. "Hardly news. The Wardens labor under a delusion that their doings are secrets, but what I saw was something more, and that hardly explains the eye witness accounts of translocations."

"Are you simply looking for a good excuse to make me tranquil?" I asked.

His eyes danced with amusement. "An excuse? I don't need an excuse, my dear." He placed his hands on the desktop and pushed himself up from the chair. "The Rite of Tranquility is practiced here prophylactically. I am trusted with the task of determining those who are fit, or not, to join the Circle, or to nullify any threat to the safety of the people of Kirkwall."

As he spoke, he walked to the door, and opened it. The two templars who had escorted me were waiting outside. He spoke in a low voice to them and then returned to his desk.

"Then what do you want from me?" I asked. "You told me if I passed your test I could join the Circle and I have. What more do you want?"

He walked behind my chair, putting his hands on my shoulders and rubbing them like he was trying to loosen up a prize-fighter, or massage a race horse. "I want you to show me the girl who killed the archdemon. I want to see how you did it." His hand slid down my neck in something that resembled a caress, one that turned my stomach. "I want you to impress me."

Pulling away from his creepy massage, I stood up and backed away. "Why? What do I get out of this?"

"Survival. Your mind left intact. You live to fight another day. Surely that is something you treasure, no? Your accommodations are comfortable, are they not? If you need something, you only have to ask for it."

"My freedom." The words popped out of my mouth without consideration.

Shaking his head he tsked at my hopeless request. "I think your problem, Elissa, is that you don't fully appreciate what we've given you here. He walked back to the door and opened it. The two templars who had woken me had between them a woman of perhaps thirty years. Obviously a mage, judging by the robes she wore.

"Please, Ser Alrik. I've done nothing wrong," she said in a trembling voice. She threw herself to the ground and groveled at his feet. "I'm a harrowed mage, ser. I will do anything you like." Looking up into his eyes, she was clearly offering herself to him. "Anything!"

My mouth fell open as I watched the woman beg. A harrowed mage. Hadn't Anders told me they were never supposed to be made tranquil? "You can't do that!" I stepped toward the woman on the floor and one of the templars stepped in front of me.

"I can. I have, and I will." He gestured at the woman. "Take her to the Hall of Tranquility and prepare her. We will join you shortly."

"No," I said, shaking my head adamantly. Cold terror gripped my spine at the realization that I was the cause of this through my obstinacy. "I'll tell you what you want, Ser Alrik. Don't do this. You've proved your point."

He didn't react, but stood there looking pleased with himself and watched the two templars marching off with the woman being half-dragged between them.

Desperate to get him to stop, I began to confess. "I can teleport. Short distances. I… I sort of step through the Fade."

"Ah, good. Confession cleans the soul, Elissa. Go on."

"I learned arcane warrior magic in elven ruins we found in the Brecilian forest. It makes me faster, stronger, harder to hurt."

His fingers twisted the ends of his mustache as he pondered what I was telling him. "This teleportation sounds like translocation, is it the same?"

I nodded.

"And how did you kill the archdemon?" His intense blue eyes were implacable.

"I didn't kill the archdemon by myself, you know. There were scores of elven archers, mages, dwarves, knights, troops and such. I merely made the killing blow."

"Fascinating. So it wasn't magic, per se, but your abilities as a warrior augmented by magic?"

"Plus," I said, "the enhanced abilities of a Grey Warden. Our stamina and speed are superior." It would seem he knew nothing of my shape-changing abilities and I wished to keep at least that private. Perhaps what I had told him was already enough to appease his curiosity.

"And this is all due to taking the essence of impurity that pollutes the darkspawn?" he asked, looking at me questioningly. "How is it you do not become one of those foul creatures?"

"If it doesn't kill you, you somehow master it and it makes you stronger." He was extremely curious about our Joining ritual and the calculating look on his face was unsettling.

"And do the Grey Wardens know who will master it? Are strong warriors more likely to survive? Do mages die more frequently?"

I shook my head. "I think everyone has their theories, but the mage I spoke to—who had studied the taint most closely—had no real idea."

"And what is your theory?"

"Genetics. You either have the ability to fight off the toxin, or you don't. Like how some people don't die from a plague even though everyone around them does." I knew the idea would mess with his mind.

"Where do you get these genetics?" he asked.

"You can special order them from an online retailer, or you're born with them." I shrugged. "Personally, I think you're born with it."

"So it is simply another way of saying it is your destiny?" He was beginning to look cross. Perhaps he had figured out I was bullshitting him.

"Yes, your genetic destiny."

"Is there no reason that someone else might consume this essence of taint and gain the benefits?"

I could see where his calculations were taking him. Did he intend to make his templars become like the Grey Wardens? "No reason whatsoever. Other than the fact you might die a horrible, but swift death." I decided not to tell him about the expiration date that would be stamped on his forehead. All these templars going extinct in thirty years seemed perfectly acceptable.

"And how do I prepare this essence?" he asked.

"Oh right. I get it. I tell you how to do it, even after warning you repeatedly about how dangerous it is, and then I'm the one who gets blamed when someone dies." I shook my head.

"We serve the Maker, my dear. The darkspawn were mages, magisters, who were cast out of the Golden City by our Lord and Maker. They were turned into the vile monsters they are today. If a mage like you can tolerate the essence, then surely it must be the case that the righteous servants of the Maker would survive easily."

"Oh dear." I shook my head yet again. It seemed the man's hubris and idiocy marched in lockstep. "If choice of occupation were the deciding factor, then it could be carpenters or swine farmers that have the advantage. No one knows."

It seemed I hit a nerve. His bland, unemotional façade melted into a sneer. "Serving the Maker isn't an occupation, mage, it's a calling." He advanced on me and seized my upper arm. "Let's go see to Cecilia."

"The mage? You're going to let her go right? I told you what you wanted."

"Come. You can deliver the good news yourself." His smarmy smile returned, unsettling me as it always did. I knew that smile concealed a hatred of mages. He thought of us as less than human, and probably wouldn't mind seeing us reduced to drooling pseudo-pods.

He didn't drop my arm, but held it firmly in his over-sized mitt as he escorted me out of his office. I was outwardly complacent with the handling, but nervous. That didn't ease up in the least when we entered the Hall of Tranquility. It was long room with stained-glass windows showing pictures of serene people—mages, I supposed—in bucolic scenes with frolicking lambs, gamboling foxes, and… was that a hedgehog? They had the Chantry's sun symbol emblazoned on their foreheads. One window depicted a smiling Andraste looking down from the sky, her hands spread as if she were blessing the entire spectacle. It was hideous, especially in the context of a mage strapped down to a stone alter, crying and whimpering in terror.

"Well, give her the good news, Elissa," Alrik said, look at me with his characteristically pleasant face.

My eyes shifted from Alrik to the woman, Cecilia. "They're going to let you free." The woman's terrified face turned to look at me and I could tell she didn't believe it. Of course, what I didn't know was whether I was going to be taking her place. Alrik's hand, still clamped firmly around my forearm wasn't reassuring in the least. Then Alrik flicked his head toward me while looking at one of the other two templars. That made my heart leap into my throat and pound. "What are…" I said, trying to figure out what was going on.

"Take care of her," Alrik said, clearly meaning me.

"No!" I tried to pull away from him, but his hand was now firmly gripping me, fingers digging into my muscles. I began to struggle furiously, convinced I was destined to be the one made tranquil.

"Take her!" Alrik thrust me at a templar whose arms pulled mine behind my back and held me firmly locked against his metallic exterior. I struggled furious, even trying to smash my heel down on the templar's foot. Little good it did against his steel boots.

"Elissa lied, Cecilia. You'll still be made tranquil. And you," he said, turning toward me, "will watch and see exactly what lies in store for you if you're not cooperative."

My breath caught in my chest. "You're a fucking liar, Alrik!"

"Silence!" he thundered. "Shut her up." He glared at the templar holding me still as if he'd been remiss in letting anything escape my mouth. "I certainly don't need my concentration broken."

I fought against the templar as he tried to stuff a rag into my mouth. Unable to scream the insults I wanted to, I kept my mouth closed. The second templar came to the assistance of the first. He pinched my nose shut so I couldn't breathe without opening my mouth, and then they just waited until I took a gasping breath and jammed the cloth into my mouth.

Tears leapt to my eyes as I nearly gagged on it. They were tears of pity for the mage on the table, tears of rage, tears of hopelessness. This could just as easily have been me and would be, if not today then tomorrow or the next day.

There was a smell I recognized, raw lyrium. It was a chunk of frozen blue metal, a brand. Cold steam sublimated off the metal device like dry ice. Muttering seemingly random verses from the Chant of Light—all the ones that were the most punitive and mage hating—he approached her slowly as she whimpered and twisted, trying to get free of her binding.

"The one who repents, who has faith, unshaken by the darkness of the world. She shall know true peace." The brand hovered over the forehead of the bound mage and Ser Alrik closed his eyes, summoning some templar power, perhaps robbing her of the last of her mana, and then it made contact with her forehead. "Know peace now, Cecilia. Peace and acceptance."

Her eyes met mine, panicked and pleading. Intervene, they seemed to beg me. What could I do? Even if I weren't being held in place and gagged, my intervention would just end with me in the same position she was in. I had so many reasons I couldn't: a son, Zevran, Anders, my toilet factory. There was a good life for me in Ferelden, if I could just get back to it.

A piercing scream ripped through the hall as the brand seared her forehead with cold lyrium. Raw lyrium was dangerous to humans. I could imagine the poisonous metal seeking out whatever part of her brain connected her to the Fade and severing that connection. Like the lobotomists on earth who performed this cruel procedure, whatever they destroyed in the brain, it took the personality with it.

I stopped struggling as the panic faded from her eyes and she relaxed against the stone. That was the moment when Ser Alrik removed the brand and I could see the sunburst icon that was left on her forehead.

"Another mage liberated from her corruption." He smiled at the woman as she stared at him woodenly. "How do you feel, my dear?"

"I feel fine." That was all she said. It was as if the last terrifying hour of her lifetime had never happened. She would never again disobey an order, fail to be pleasant, oversleep, eat one too many sweetmeats, fall in love, cry over the death of a kitten, or express a preference for one color over another. All that had been stolen from her while I looked on, unable to act, unwilling to act.

"Let her go," he said to the templar restraining me as he pulled the cloth from my mouth.

My arms ached from the tension of being twisted behind me and of witnessing what I'd seen. My heart ached from the unnecessary cruelty and my inability to do anything about it. The threat of tranquility was real now, completely real. Before, I don't know, a part of me thought it might be a lovely vacation from stress and unpleasant emotions. But the woman before me wasn't on vacation; she was empty of all the impulses that make us what we are. She was animated flesh, but was she still human? Anders's warning finally took on a reality I hadn't fully accepted until now. My struggles ceased as I saw my own future reflected from Cecilia's blank eyes.

I said nothing and walked quietly back between the two templars who had so rudely awakened me that morning.

~o~o~o~

That night there was another fight. The crowd had swelled once more and I saw fat purses of sovereigns exchanging hands. Ser Alrik said nothing to me. He didn't have to. I would give him what he wanted if it would buy me another few hours, another day.

There were gasps and then shouts when I stepped through the Fade and teleported from one end of the cage to the other and killed my enemy with a strike from behind. The Saarebus, mage of the Qunari, died with my daggers buried in his back. The cheering was immense. Apparently my style of magic wasn't quite so repulsive to the templars. I was showing them how a warrior uses magic. I could just imagine how quickly their estimation of me would change if I shape-shifted.

This fight took a toll on me. I had a burn on one leg and a far more serious cut this time. Perhaps this was serious enough to require the skills of the First Enchanter.

My gallows humor from yesterday was gone. I needed to get out of here.

~o~o~o

Notes: A funny thing happened when I was writing chapter 28. I had it nearly finished and I realized it really should be chapter 29. Other things needed to happen before what was happening there. So, here we are at a new chapter 28!

Thanks for beta-reading, Biff! She's got a great Mass Effect epic in progress. You should check it out if you're into ME. And also thanks to Zevgirl who gives me moral, and sometimes immoral, support and always excellent feedback.

AndAgain, glad you're back to reading! Zevgirl, your reviews always rock. Jenna53, thanks for the words! Biff, absolutely right about Doria. She could detonate at any moment. 1Scarylady, Karl seemed like a decent replacement for the missing Anders. DalishMage, I wonder that all the templars aren't struck blind by now. They were a pretty randy lot in Kirkwall.

To all the others reading, drop me a review, I'd love to hear from you. Just click that little button right there on the bottom of the page. Woot!

Next chapter needs a bit of revising and such, so hopefully it won't take too long. There's a little romance brewing in my own life, so my time isn't 100% my own any more. Woo hoo! That means I might progress a little slower. You never know how the muse will react.