My heart is moved by all I cannot save:
so much has been destroyed.
I have to cast my lot with those
who age after age, perversely,
with no extraordinary power,
reconstitute the world.
A passion to make, and make again
where such un-making reigns.
—Adrienne Rich, Natural Resources
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The damned Herald had a death wish.
Something had switched in her, after the cabin incident, so that every skirmish after became nothing short of a headlong rush towards the Void for her. The incident itself had nearly claimed her, yet she did not seem satisfied with the small victory of five lives snatched back from certain death.
It was a terribly mortal thing to do — to put aside oneself to save another. If he had known what she had intended to do, he would have stopped her long before she ever got close to the burning cabin. He would have sooner tasked himself with matter to prevent her from risking the loss of the Anchor. And she would have rued him for it, of that he was certain, but at least she would have been safe.
Yet, in that moment, between the scout's declaration, and whatever choice she'd made within herself, nothing could have swayed her from that course. Nothing could have stopped her from going into that fire — and that perplexed him.
What did she care for the apostates? She was no mage, and arguably knew nothing of Circle politics. And yet, knowing nothing of them, she'd been willing to throw her own life aside to save theirs.
The Dalish were not known for intervening in the affairs of those outside their own — often even shirking all but those in their own clans. He had seen much of that indifference in his travels amongst the clans — both in the dreaming under the mantle of Fen'Harel as well as in the waking world as himself — before he gave up his fruitless attempts at connecting with them. They wanted nothing of the Dread Wolf nor the wandering apostate without a clan.
Yet, what she'd offered to perfect strangers had been the exact opposite.
She'd hid well behind her mask of indifference, even to those who offered her power — well enough that it had fooled even him in the beginning. Had she not declared otherwise, he would have believed her entirely unaffected nor interested in the business of saving this world she belonged to. Flashes of compassion had bled through their conversations, enough to reconsider his position on her, but it was not until the cabin that he truly saw the Herald's mettle.
She'd declared her intention to protect him from the Inquisition, should ever it be needed, and it was only now that he truly believed that she would.
It was a terrible incident, and a terrible choice, but she had reacted without hesitation, as though that level of empathy was purely instinct.
She had acted like a spirit of compassion.
"It was the only thing to do."
She had challenged him to denounce the act, to tell her she'd been wrong. But how could he tell her otherwise, when he'd been so staggered by the level of empathy she had shown in preserving life — in protecting the innocent? He would have praised her for it, had it not been the world itself that hovered on the brink.
Her life was not hers to gamble away, not anymore, not even for such heroic acts. He'd told her as much, as gently as he could.
And her anger — she had been consumed by her rage as she fell upon the templar prisoner, as though gripped by a spirit of vengeance. Even in that, had she asked, he would not been able to condemn her. He could only despair in that she'd been driven to it in the first place.
He had watched her bury them, watched as she gave Dalish funeral rites to those who weren't even elvhen, let alone her people. He'd even shared in the words with her.
And in her grief, she'd reached out to him and clasped his arm to steady herself.
It was beyond denying that he felt admiration for her, at this point, for her actions and for how she responded to the fate unfairly placed upon her. With each transgression against her, each freedom stripped from her, with each new horror she was confronted with, she held tight to a quiet dignity to make it right when it could have too easily twisted her from her sense of self, from her sense of purpose. And whatever the myriad motivations that brought people to the Inquisition, they worked as one to bring stability, to bring aid to the dispossessed, to the refugees. It was still a small force, and yet the potential was there to become something more.
As she could be.
The notion came unbidden, and startled him.
The world, as it was now, was far diminished from the world he knew in his time. It was an aberration, made unnatural by the presence of the Veil. The absence of magic, of the Fade, made everything less — as though all of the color and light and life had been drawn out of the world. It was like walking through a nightmare from which he could not wake. His only solace came in the dreaming, in the memories of the time before, in the company of the few who remained untainted by this world.
Very little in this world caught his attention beyond passing curiosity, beyond what was useful to further his plans. And yet—
Walking far ahead of him at the head of their procession, silent and burdened by the horror of war, she was a beacon. She was bright — brighter than all the rest. Yet surely that was a trick, a side-effect of bearing the Anchor. The magic made her more, gave her the illusion of almost being real.
But that was certainly false, certainly just the lonely hope of a fool, and it would bring nothing but trouble to think any further upon it. And yet, he could not shake the nagging feeling that he could possibly be wrong.
There was a part of him, however small, that hoped that he was.
How else could she be what she was in such a terrible world? How else could she increasingly make him feel as if he walked beside one of his own?
Solas could not help but wonder what she had been before she received the mark. Had she always been like this? Driven by such caring, by such furious conviction?
Or was the Anchor actively changing her?
It troubled him, either way. It cast doubt where he could not afford to keep it. His mission had no room for it, not even for the smallest shadow of a doubt.
It was nearing nightfall by the time they neared the Crossroads. Varric was singing a ridiculous song to distract the children from their grief; it worked insofar that they were no longer crying. The children and the two women had been seated on the horses, given their injuries. It had made the trek to the Crossroads more tedious than it should have been, but they still managed to reach the town in relatively good time.
As they neared the outskirts, it became immediately clear that the town was under siege.
Tephra moved ahead, bow in hand, but the Seeker caught hold of her.
"You are too injured—"
The Herald rounded on the woman, and insisted, "I'm fine. I've got this. I can fight"
Cassandra's hold on the elf's arm tightened; despite the layers of her coat and the bandaging, the pressure was sure enough to stir the pain of her burns. Yet the Herald did not cry out, stubbornly fighting the look of pain that crossed her face.
"I can fight," Tephra repeated through clenched teeth.
She would not be swayed.
Cassandra held her gaze steadily for a long moment, before releasing her. "Very well. Stay with Solas and Varric, and keep your distance from the melee. As Solas has said before, the cost of your death is a price we cannot afford to pay."
"There's a war on, and you've made me your banner," the Herald replied, her tone edged with dark humor. "Of course they're going to target me. But I'll certainly make them work for it."
The Seeker was hardly amused. She turned back to the apostates on horseback, "Take the children back down the road, and wait for us to return when it is safe. Can you protect your own?"
The woman sitting on Varric's horse gave a stiff nod, "We'll manage."
With that, Cassandra started down the road into the town. Tephra followed quickly behind her, bow drawn and ready.
"They're gonna get her killed," Varric mused, suddenly at his side.
Solas turned to regard the dwarf, whose face was deeply lined with concern.
"I've seen it too many times," Varric continued. He shook his head as he huffed, "Humans and their martyrs."
Solas unlatched his staff, as he replied, "Then let us endeavor to ensure that it does not happen to her, Master Tethras."
"Agreed," the dwarf quipped, as he started down the road towards the town.
He had no intention in letting this world make a martyr of the Herald, not if he had a hand in it.
Solas followed after the dwarf, and prepared himself for combat by pooling what remained of his mana in anticipation of fraught spellwork.
The Seeker shouted back over her shoulder as she ran, "Inquisition forces! They're trying to protect the refugees!"
Solas could see them now, as they neared the center of the township. They were few in numbers, but were holding out admirably against the rebel mages.
"Looks like they could use a hand!" Varric called after her, as he pulled his crossbow free and readied it with quick, practiced movements.
The central section of the Crossroads was a frenzy of templars and mages combating one another, with little disregard of who was caught in the crossfire. Residents assisted the Inquisition soldiers, armed with gardening tools and crude weapons.
It was, at best, utter chaos.
Cassandra barreled into the midst of it all, nothing short of a righteous force of nature.
Thankfully, the Herald did not follow after the Seeker. She kept her word and stayed closed to him, as she loosed a furious hail of arrows on the rebel forces. Varric flanked her, matching her pace and exceeding it with ease due to his superior weapon.
Solas turned his attention to the mages. If he could perhaps turn them against the templars, appeal to them as an apostate—
"We are not templars," Solas called through the chaos, hoping to assure them. "We mean you no harm!"
His plea was swiftly answered with a sudden burst of crackling magic barreling against his barrier.
Fenedhis.
"Doesn't look like they're listening," Varric griped, before he leapt and rolled out of the way of a burning spell flung his way.
Very well, then.
Solas loosed a burning torrent upon the mages nearest him. Their barriers held out briefly, almost admirably, before cracking and dissipating. Their screams were brief, as the fire consumed them. He did his best to ensure it was quick, as they were nothing more than hedge wizards — their inexperience was startlingly clear, and their deaths were pointless.
If only they would have listened.
He pushed the thought aside, and resumed his onslaught, targeting the templars rushing toward Cassandra. His staff spun in his hands as he struck at the air, sending brutal spells toward his targets.
Solas did not see the templar in his peripheral, until an armored fist slammed into the side of his head.
The blow sent him staggering, as he lost grip of his staff. It fell uselessly to the ground at his feet. Dizziness and pain swelled over him as he bent to recover it, but the templar hoisted him back up by his jerkin, holding him hostage by the collar.
Solas struggled to break free, as he turned to jerk himself free, but the man swiftly secured him. One arm locked around his throat, jerking Solas back against the man's armor, while another twisted his arm back and up in a painful armlock.
How long had it been since he was last in a scuffle like this?
Far too long, he realized dimly, as the man was quickly overpowering him with sheer, brute strength. The arm around his throat had begun to tighten and cut off his air supply.
And then all at once, a sudden force propelled him out of the templar's grip and sent him stumbling free.
Coughing and choking for air, Solas turned to find that the Herald had crashed her body into the much larger man and knocked him off balance. She did not wait for the man to recover his senses. It seemed almost a dance the way she slipped from one movement to another — turning out of the moment of impact to brace a foot as she slipped a dagger free from her belt, turned it between deft fingers, and smashed the handle into the templar's face. What remained of the ruin of his nose had quickly become a fountain of blood.
She is fond of that move, he noted, with some measure of amusement despite the pain pulsing in his head.
Tephra pulled back just enough to shift the dagger once again, before driving it up into the soft underside of the man's throat. The templar gurgled in an obscene red spray, reaching uselessly for his throat as she shoved him away from her. The man stumbled back on legs that quickly gave out on him, before falling to the ground in a dying heap.
She turned to face Solas as her eyes swept over him, checking for wounds. Her gaze snapped up to his, feral and bright with battle-fever, "You good?"
Solas gave a stiff nod, feeling at his temple with trembling fingers. They came back wet with blood. "I'll live," he assured.
"If I have any say in it, you will," she insisted.
Solas felt an odd thrill shiver through him, as he remembered her previous declaration. He could not help but smile, despite the taste of blood trickling into his mouth, as he asked, "However you have to?"
She flashed him a sharp grin, "However I have to."
With that, she was spinning away again and back into the clamor of the battle. Whatever promise she'd made to stay out of the melee had been long abandoned at this point.
Dagger or bow, it mattered little, as she was the weapon. Darting between their opponents in a constant motion of mortal strikes.
In the end, the battle ceased almost as quickly as they joined it. What remained of the templars fled outright, as more of the Inquisition's forces spilled into the town from the north, likely alerted by the outlying scouts.
Cassandra heaved a sigh of relief, as she lowered her shield and sword, "That's the end of it, then."
Her concern turned immediately to the Herald, as she moved to look the elf over.
"I'm fine," Tephra informed, with some annoyance.
The Seeker nodded, and did not mask her relief. "Come, let us find Mother Giselle."
Solas let out a slow breath, reaching again for his temple. His head was pounding. How long had it been since he'd been physically struck? He could not recall.
"You alright there, Chuckles?"
He turned to find the dwarf offering a scrap of relatively clean cloth. Solas took it and pressed it to his bleeding temple, and said, "Quite. It is only a minor wound."
Varric gave a bark of laughter, "Always check your peripheral, elf. Templars fight dirty."
"Indeed," he agreed, annoyed with his own carelessness.
"Good thing the Herald had your six, eh?" Varric mused, as he watched their companions depart.
They were to meet with the chantry woman who'd stationed herself in the midst of civil war to aid the wounded, regardless of which side of the fight they were on. She treated them all, even as they attacked the very town she'd taken up residence in to work.
"They'll be a while," Varric sighed, turning his gaze to back to Solas as he flashed a grin. "Let's hit the pub."
The prospect of alcohol was arguably inviting after such an eventful day, but he was drawn more to the sight of the wounded — civilians and Inquisition soldiers alike. Medics and chantry sisters moved among them, tending to the most dire first, while calming the rest who waited to be seen to.
There was still work to be done here.
"I will join you shortly, Master Tethras. I believe my skills are needed presently," he replied.
"Of course." The dwarf gave him an approving smile, before departing for the tavern, with his crossbow slung over one shoulder.
As Solas moved toward a woman slumped down against a signpost, hands sparking with pale blue magic, his thoughts were drawn to the Herald. As he worked healing spells over the woman's wounds, he could not rid his mind of her words.
"However I have to."
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Tephra found Mother Giselle tending to the wounded in a makeshift infirmary. Whatever the building had been before, it was now crowded with cots filled with the wounded and the dying. Cassandra excused herself, and left her to speak with the woman alone.
If the chantry mother was at all bothered by the skirmish that'd taken place just outside, she did not show it as she was the very picture of patience and compassion as she worked amongst the wounded. Tephra wasn't sure what to expect of the woman, given what little she knew of the Chantry beyond their condemnation of her as the so-called Herald of Andraste. But when the woman rose to meet her, she was met with a kind smile. Tephra felt herself relax, if only marginally.
"You must be the one they are calling "The Herald of Andraste"," she mused.
"I do wish they'd stop," Tephra replied. She could not help the discomfort it gave her, and she was certain she would never grow accustomed to it, not at all. "Is that why you asked for me? The Chantry has already—"
"I know what they've done," Mother Giselle interjected.
Tephra frowned, "Then why am I here?"
"I know of the Chantry's denouncement, and I am familiar with those behind it," the woman replied. "I won't lie to you; some of them are grandstanding, hoping to increase their chances of becoming the new Divine."
That didn't surprise her. She was largely unfamiliar with human politics, but that particular motivation seemed a common theme among them. Power for power's sake, each clamoring for the highest peak of it, without a care for those who suffered for it in the process.
It turned her stomach.
"Some are simply terrified," the woman continued. "So many good people were senselessly taken from us."
The memory of the burning bodies at the Temple of Sacred Ashes flashed through her mind, twisted and frozen in their final moments of agony. Her stomach gave a brief, sick lurch. Her frown softened, as she said, "What happened was horrible."
The woman continued, in a soothingly sure tone, "Fear makes us desperate, but hopefully not beyond reason. Go to them — convince the remaining clerics you are no demon to be feared. They have only heard frightful tales of you. Give them something else to believe."
"That won't just make it worse?"
The woman's dark eyes searched hers, "Because you are not human?"
That had been the obvious reason, of course.
"That too," Tephra admitted.
"Let me put it this way: You needn't convince them all. You just need some of them to doubt. Their power is their unified voice. Take that from them and you'll receive the time you need."
Frustration flared in her. If they were anything like the one in Haven — Chancellor Roderick — then it would be a wasted effort. "So I show up, say hello, show them the mark on my hand? You honestly think that will be enough?"
The woman fixed her with a measured gaze, "I honestly don't know if you've been touched by fate or sent to help us, but, I hope. Hope is what we need now. The people will listen to your rallying call as they will listen to no other. You could build the Inquisition into a force that will deliver us — or, destroy us."
Herald.
The title meant nothing to her, and yet with each passing day its noose tightened further. It strangled out any hope of ever returning to her old life — any hope of ever being what she'd been before. Of ever being just herself — just Tephra.
All she was now was the mark on her hand, and how it could be used to further the purpose of other people's plans. And yet, she knew with a startling clarity that any and all failure would be hers alone, as would the consequences.
Her stomach rolled and heaved at the prospect.
"I will go to Haven and provide Sister Leliana the names of those in the Chantry who will be amenable to a gathering. It is not much, but I will do whatever I can," Mother Giselle continued on, despite her silence.
"The Inquisition thanks you for your support," she replied, awkwardly parroting what she'd heard the Commander saying to those who came to join the organization.
The woman regarded her with a measured look, before reaching out to her. It took everything in her to not flinch away. Sister Giselle gently touched at her hair where it had been burnt short and blunt, just above her ear.
"I heard several of your wounded soldiers passing on word of what you did for those apostates and their children," she said, quietly. "Stories of you throwing yourself into the fire for their sake."
Tephra swallowed hard at the sudden lump in her throat, and thought only of the small boy she couldn't save.
The woman's hand retreated as she said, "Fire can be destructive, it can devour us so thoroughly and reduce us to nothing but ash and charred remains — but it can also be sacred, it can be a means of rebirth. There are times when we must light signal fires to let others know that we are here — that we need help, to keep ourselves from being consumed alone in the dark. And there are times when we must become that fire, to guide the rest forward. You must become that for us, Herald. There is no other who can."
There was nothing but the sick roll of her stomach, and the fluttering, anxious beat of her heart straining against the confines of her ribs. "I don't know if I can do that, if I can be that — for anyone," she confessed.
"All you can do, is to try. And you must," Mother Giselle urged, in a gentle tone. The woman heaved a sigh, as though some weight she'd been carrying had been lifted. She regarded Tephra with a warm smile, "We will speak more later. You should rest. You have much to heal from."
When she left the infirmary, Cassandra was waiting for her. The Seeker said nothing as they walked side by side.
"She agreed to help," Tephra said, finally.
The Seeker relaxed, visibly. "Good."
She considered her words for a moment, before she said, "I would like some time — alone. If I might."
Her words came out tentatively, and unsure, as she was not at all certain the Seeker would grant her even the smallest of freedoms.
Cassandra put a hand to her shoulder, stopping them both and turning Tephra to face her. Her sharp features worked through a range of emotions, before she said, "What you did today — I am not angry. I am—" The woman gave a sharp exhale through her nose, as her words failed her.
Tephra shifted awkwardly, taken aback by the Seeker's sudden change in demeanor.
The woman regained her composure, as she continued, "Take all the time that you need. We must speak later, but for now — your time is your own."
She felt a sudden, intense appreciation for the woman. "Thank you, Cassandra."
As Tephra turned to go, Cassandra pulled her back to say, "Do not ever hesitate to ask for what you need, Herald. You may be our "banner", as you said, but we are the many hands holding you up."
The Seeker's words elicited a strange mesh of emotions that knotted deep in her stomach. Tephra could do nothing but give a stiff nod. Cassandra patted her shoulder roughly, before she sent her off with an almost gentle push.
She did not know where to go.
It would be unwise to leave the town, though she feared the rebels far less than the Seeker's wrath, should she be fool enough to betray her sudden goodwill by leaving. And the town was crowded with refugees and residents who'd spilled out from hiding after the fighting had ended — there was no place to go where she might be alone.
She opted for the next best thing, and headed for the tavern.
If solitude was off the table, well, inebriation was the next best thing.
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Unlike in Haven, she had no say in the clearing out of the Crossroads tavern. It had been done well before she came into it, and despite her protests it remained closed to all but her and her companions for the night. Food supplies were low, but still they offered meals and alcohol without charge to them. The kitchen still funneled food out the back for refugees in need, but the establishment had insisted on hosting them for coming to the aid of the town.
Tephra supposed it was fair payment for saving them from the rebels, yet still she felt some measure of guilt about it. People died, and now she was being plied with free mead. She turned the food away; the smell of it only further upset her stomach, which continued to churn with anxiety and grief.
Her companions had claimed a table, and sat talking in low voices over their meals. She'd opted for an oversized armchair by the fireplace, which sat with its back turned to the rest of the tavern, which afford some measure of solitude. It was the best she would be able to find in this crowded little town.
It practically engulfed her, and she'd sat for a long time with her knees drawn up and her hood pulled down low, nursing the large bottle of mead she'd been given. It warmed her, loosened the grip of her grief, but she knew that was only temporary. The others left her alone to her thoughts, and she'd spent the time letting her mind turn over the events at the burning cabin as she stared into the fire, until it was too much to wallow in it any longer.
Tephra bent down to rummage in her pack that she'd left on the floor by the chair, and pulled out the small leather-bound book she kept in it along with an inkwell and pen. She settled back in the chair, as she turned past the most recent pages she'd written in, back just before the events at the Conclave. She had been documenting Ferelden plantlife that she'd been unfamiliar with during her journey through the unfamiliar country, jotting down notations and making botanical sketches.
Tephra balanced the inkwell on a knee, and carefully dipped the nib of her pen. She hadn't touched it since the start of all of this and it felt comforting to hold it in her hand again, as her hand hesitated over the blank page.
Tephra did not know what to do, only that she needed to do something.
Should she write of her grief? Put it to paper and then tear it away, throw it in the fire? It seemed futile — pointless. What would it serve to continue to wallow in such grief?
She turned her mind toward something good — something beautiful.
The nib of her pen scratched restlessly at the paper, swiftly putting to page the images in her mind.
Time ticked by as she focused on each line as she drew it, as she let her ragged emotions drain away through each measured mark on the page.
When she finished, she gently blew her breath over the paper to aid the drying ink. When she was certain it wouldn't smudge, she tore the page free and rolled it tightly before tucking it away into her coat pocket. She put her belongings away, and left the chair to join her companions at the table.
Tephra was pleased to find that The Seeker had been at the mead, as well. She was in the middle self-deprecating soliloquy.
"Did I do the right thing? What I have set in motion here could destroy everything I have revered all my life. One day they might write about me as a traitor, a mad woman," she ranted, before falling silent a moment. Her face was tight with doubt. "And they may be right," she mused.
Tephra claimed the chair beside her, and asked, "What does your faith tell you?"
The dwarf and apostate were silent as the Seeker regarded Tephra, as though she were trying to gauge if she was being mocked or not. Finally, she said, "I believe you are innocent. I believe more is going on here than we can see. And I believe no one else cares to do anything about it."
"Ain't that the truth," Varric muttered, shaking his head and taking another drink from his bottle of mead. A large book sat open before him, as he wrote in a furious, tight scrawl. It was as if he were taking notes of the conversation at hand.
Cassandra continued on as if she hadn't heard his interruption, "They will stand in the fire and complain that it is hot. But is this the Maker's will? I can only guess."
"Mother Giselle agreed to help us," Tephra replied, not wishing to speak of so-called divine interventions and machinations. She leaned across the table to claim an untouched bottle of mead. She ignored the sway in her movements as she sat back down in the chair heavily, and popped the wax seal. "So what happens now?"
"Now," Cassandra started, and then promptly stopped to heave a sigh. "Now we deal with the Chantry's panic over you before they do even more harm. Then we close the Breach. We are the only ones who can. After that, we find out who is responsible for this chaos, and we end them."
The Seeker toyed with her glass of mead, turning it between her hands with measured silence. "And if there are consequences to be paid for what I have done, I will pay them. I only pray the price is not too high," she said, finally.
Tephra turned in her seat to regard the woman with a tight frown. The guilt in her voice pulled at her, forced her to consider how these events must have been for the Seeker — it sank heavy into the pit of Tephra's stomach, as she said, "You didn't have a choice."
"Didn't I?" The Seeker smiled at that; it was a small, bitter thing. "My trainers always said: Cassandra, you are too brash. You must think before you act. I see what must be done, and I do it. I see no point in running around in circles like a dog chasing its tail. I misjudged you in the beginning, did I not? I thought the answer was before me, clear as day." The woman held her gaze a moment, brows furrowed together, before looking back down to the glass she held between her hands. "I can't afford to be so careless again."
Tephra felt the sudden odd urge to comfort the woman, yet knew any kind words would be met with harsh rebuttal. The Seeker was no less difficult when it came to softness than she herself was. Instead, she opted for appealing to the woman's sense of justice, of practicality. "It wasn't like you had no reason to suspect me," she ventured, hoping the woman would not rebuke her small attempt at reassurance.
Cassandra met her gaze. Her face remained still, yet tight with an emotion that Tephra couldn't put a name to. "I was determined to have someone answer for what happened — anyone."
The Seeker shifted in her seat, sitting straighter. It was as though something had been settled and put at ease in her. "It is clear that you do not believe you are chosen — by yours gods, or mine — but I suppose that no longer matters. I have to believe we were put on this path for a reason, even if you do not. Now it simply remains to see where it leads us."
"Preferably somewhere a little less end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it," Varric joked.
Cassandra gave a sharp huff, but there was amusement there which she quickly concealed by taking a long drink from her glass.
"Seeker," Solas said, speaking up suddenly from where he sat beside Varric. "You initially believed our Herald was involved in the attack on the Conclave, yes?"
"I did," the Seeker conceded. "The evidence seemed damning, given the lack of an alternative cause or suspect."
"Yet, you changed your mind," he observed.
Tephra knew what he was doing, and he was doing it with far more skill than she had.
Cassandra gestured at him, "You also heard the voices at the temple — is it so surprising I listened to them?"
The apostate sighed, "Sadly, yes. Too few invested with authority possess the courage to alter their course. They fear the appearance of weakness."
The Seeker drew up rigidly, chin raised as she declared, "The truth is more important than my reputation, and anyone willing to accuse me of weakness is welcome to try."
"Well said," Solas replied, with an approving smile. As he filled his glass again, he said, "It is a comfort to have you present on our journey, Seeker."
Cassandra frowned, as she stated, "You so rarely call me by my name, Solas. Why is that?"
That was true enough. He rarely called any of their companions or the advisers by name, opting instead for titles or even racial distinctions over given names.
He'd never called her by name, not even once.
Perhaps it was his way of keeping his distance, given his status as an apostate. Or perhaps it was something deeper than that, something far more complicated, that compelled him to keep them all at arm's length.
Casting a brief, sidelong glance at Solas, she was certain it was the latter.
Nothing about him ever proved less than complicated.
"Manners, perhaps?" Solas quipped.
"Manners have not held you back on other occasions," Cassandra replied.
An amused snort left her before she could stop it.
Tephra quickly busied herself with taking a long drink from the bottle of mead she'd claimed and avoided Solas's disapproving gaze. Varric flashed her a conspiratorial grin, tipping his mead at her in salute.
"I say what I believe to be true, even if it gives offense to those who prefer the lie," Solas replied, sharply. His tone softened, slightly, as he said, "But there is no lie in what you are. Your position is an honorable one, and well-earned."
The Seeker was clearly taken aback by his statement. Flustered, she cleared her throat, "Thank you, Solas." After a moment, she hurried on from the subject of herself, and noted, "As it stands, we need to decide our next course of action. It would be wise to move on to Val Royeux, as we cannot put off dealing with the Chantry. And we must also decide on whether to approach the templars or the mages about sealing the Breach."
"Not the templars," Tephra interjected with sudden, wrenching certainty.
Though the chaos in the Hinterlands hardly offered any insight on the morality of the conflict between the templars and mages — had only offered the brutality of miles littered with bodies left to rot in the hills, in the waysides of the roads, half-submerged in brooks and streams — she was certain that of the two, that the templars were more at fault, if not wholly, for the situation.
Any sane person would seek to free themselves from a prison. She could hardly fault the mages for wanting their freedom, when it was all she wanted for herself.
Cassandra fixed her with a measured gaze, as she asked, "Is that what you wish, Herald? Do you believe the mages will be cooperative, that their power will be what's needed to close the Breach?"
"Why do you all ask me these things as though you expect I know what I'm doing? I know nothing of your Chantries and your templars and your wars, except that it is terrible for everyone else who finds themselves caught up in the middle of it." Tephra sat for a moment, frowning sharply, as the grief crept back in and soured to anger. "All I know is what I've experienced. The templars have done nothing to prove that they'd be a better choice in this matter."
The Seeker frowned, "And what of the mages? Do you believe they are justified in their rebellion?"
"Solas would have a better opinion on that. I am no mage," Tephra looked to Solas, but he said nothing.
As though taking a page from her book, he simply busied himself with a particularly deep drink from his glass of water. He seemed quite pleased with himself, as her frown deepened.
Damn him.
She was forced to consider her own position, with perilously little to go on.
What did she know of mages, except how they were taken by the Chantry, and forced to live in the Circles? She didn't even know what a "Circle" was. She'd heard the passing tales of maltreatment, of what they did the possessed and the uncooperative. It was the primary reason why the clans perpetuated a myth of casting off surplus mages, when in truth they were too few and too coveted. Still, nothing she'd ever heard of the Circles had ever been kind, or just. But what could she truly say of it, having only heard hearsay?
Tephra fumed silently, before she simply stated, "No one should have to live like that. They should be free."
Cassandra snorted, and then downed the rest of her mead. She cast a sharp smile at Varric, and prompted, "What about you Varric? You knew a mage who wanted to be free. How did that go?"
The dark look that crossed his face startled her. The Seeker remained unfazed.
"Not well," Varric replied carefully, after a tense moment. He stood, gathering up his book and his bottle of mead, and forced a cheery smile, "If you all will excuse me, there's a clean bed upstairs with my name on it. I'll see you all at breakfast. Hopefully the subjects of conversation will have improved by then."
With that, he left the table without a further word.
"That was perhaps—" Cassandra started to say as she watched the dwarf depart, but then dropped the subject entirely.
What a curious, complicated relationship the two of them had. Tephra knew nothing of it, only that it reached far back, and was full of things she would probably never know of.
The Seeker stood, and turned to Tephra, "This establishment doubles as an inn. They have graciously provided us with boarding for the night. You should retire soon — you need your rest. As do I."
With that, Seeker took her leave, and briefly Tephra wondered if the woman meant to catch up to Varric to apologize. She assumed not, considering the woman in question.
When she turned back to the table, Tephra found that Solas had moved so that he was now sitting directly across from her.
Clearly he'd meant to engage her in conversation, or perhaps another rousing argument.
Flustered, she said, "Many thanks for the help on the subject of mages. I doubt I made a convincing argument."
His eyebrow lifted, as he quipped, "Should I hold your hand and lead you through all of your discussions?"
Tephra flushed. He was clearly teasing her, yet it somehow made it worse.
"I meant it. I know nothing of mages and what they face in this world, only what I've heard," she griped.
"Then ask," he said, simply. When she opened her mouth, he cut her off, as he continued, "Not of me, but of them. You saved two, today. Speak with them, and listen to their stories. Ask others whose paths we cross."
He was right — all mages might be apostates now, but many had lived in the Circles. Solas had not. His opinion would have been as subjective as her own. Still, she couldn't help but snark back, "Perhaps when they're not blasting me in the face with magic."
Solas laughed, low in his throat, "Fair enough."
As she took another swig of mead, he said, "You should eat something."
She gestured at him with the bottle, "Does this not count?"
"Hardly."
As far as she knew, he hadn't had anything to drink at all tonight. Come to think of it, she wasn't sure she'd seen him drink at all in the entirety of the time she'd known him. She quirked an eyebrow, as she asked, "Do you not drink, Solas?"
"When it suits me," he replied, with amusement. He reached over the table and took the bottle from her hand. He proceeded to take a long, slow swig from it as if to prove his point, before he set it back down in front of her.
There was an odd, tight pull in the pit of her stomach, but she ignored it as she promptly turned to gesture at the waitress who stood idling across the tavern.
The woman hustled over, and Tephra said to her, "Another bottle of mead for my companion, if you would."
"Of course, your Worship."
That was new — and unsurprisingly worse than "Herald".
As the waitress departed, Tephra gave a sharp huff, "For fuck's sake. It never ends."
"And it never will."
Was that agreement?
From Solas?
She turned to stare at him, and was met by his heavy gaze. There was something there that she couldn't begin to decipher.
"You will always be this to them — you will always be known as the Herald," he said, in an almost apologetic tone.
The waitress returned with a bottle of mead and set it down in front of Solas. He thanked her quietly, as she ducked away and left them to their conversation, which had stalled into silence. Solas averted his gaze and busied himself with popping the cork off his bottle of mead.
Whatever his opinions of her were, her Dalish heritage or otherwise, there was empathy in his words. The smallest act of reaching out.
Cassandra's earlier statement echoed in her mind, as she said, "My name is Tephra."
She knew that he knew it already — Varric used it when he wasn't amusing himself with the ridiculous nickname he'd given her. He'd certainly heard it. Before, she wouldn't have cared much for what any of them called her, least of all the elf who shunned her at every turn.
But something had shifted — something had changed — was changing.
And yet, she couldn't begin to quantify it, let alone place certainty in it, as a part of her still expected the sudden jab of his criticisms, of his disapproval, or another disavowal of her entirely.
Solas offered her a small smile, "You would do well to remember that. As we all should."
Still, he did not say it.
In a way, it was its own form of rejection.
She idly wondered why she cared that he hadn't — that he wouldn't. He was so often short with her, nearly insufferable to engage in conversation without great care to avoid the pitfalls.
Why should she care at all?
And yet, he had been the first to stand up for her. He offered his knowledge freely, and encouraged her questions. And when her nightmares plagued her, he'd spent half the night spinning wondrous tales until she fell asleep.
It had been the first time she had slept so peacefully in a long time.
He'd kept her from certain death, and brought her back from the brink of it several times now. He chided her for her recklessness, and would not let her forget the gravity of her position. He made her look at the hard truths, when it was easier to look away, or to dismiss them entirely.
Was it any wonder that she was so often drawn to and equally repelled by the man? There was no predicting which side of him would greet her at any turn.
It was as thrilling as it was vexing.
And yet still, there was something about him that drew her out, that made her feel as though she could tell him anything and that she would be met with his enthusiasm. Or—
She recalled his scathing tone when it came to the Dalish.
Each time the subject had come up, his criticisms had sent her hurtling back into the center of herself, retreating back to safety.
As she remained lapsed in her thoughts and considering him with a measured gaze, Solas busied himself with catching up to her. The ease with which he downed the mead was rather surprising. He seemed hardly affected by it at all, while she was certain if she tried to stand that she would be immediately met with the floor.
There was only one way of knowing if things had truly changed between them — if something in the tension had eased.
And if he scorned her again, then she never need come to him again with it, nor anything that truly mattered to her.
She studied his face a long moment, before taking a deep drink of the mead. Almost too much — she coughed, the briefly covered her mouth as it burned her throat. She steeled herself for the inevitable, and said, "I wanted to ask you something before. Back in Haven."
Solas straightened in his chair, and leaned forward as he rested his elbows on the table. He locked his fingers, as he regarded he with sudden interest, "Of course." He hesitated a moment, before he said, "I was, perhaps—"
"No matter," she replied, quickly. She would not risk ruining this small chance by having him think he needed to apologize. He could do it later, if he wished. For now, she had one singular, burning interest — the truth. She swallowed hard, and asked, earnestly, "You walk the Fade — there must be so much you've seen." She stopped herself from continuing that useless preamble. She cut to what mattered, having meant to ask in a careful manner, and yet it all came out in a rush, "Do you know what happens to us, when we die? Is that where go? To the Fade? Or do we go somewhere else?"
His eyebrows lifted, ever so slightly, in surprise. He recovered quickly, and said, "It is natural to be preoccupied with such questions after loss, such as today."
Her gaze shifted, as she huffed in frustration at his non-answer. She wanted to chide him for it, for diverting, but she would not risk spurning him.
She was certain that this — whatever this was — was a door that shut once, would be shut forever.
She needed to switch gears.
Tephra met his gaze again, as she mused, "It's just that I always wondered if that's what the spirits were. If they were us — just in another form. If they were what we become after we pass."
Solas looked — startled? Awed? Disapproving?
Whatever it was, it was gone quickly behind his well-schooled features, as he regarded her without speaking.
She hoped that his silence wasn't what she'd feared — that she'd offended him in some way. She pressed onward, and asked, definitively, "Is that what we become, when we die?"
He spoke, finally, as he asked, "Is that what you fear?"
Tephra drew back in surprise, and frowned. Had she given that impression? "No, it's not that at all. It's just — it would give me hope."
Her hand went to her sternum, to the shell that hung there, as she idly turned it between her fingers.
The gesture didn't escape his attention. His frown softened, as he observed, "You've lost someone dear."
"The dearest," she replied softly, unable to stop the shaking sigh that left her. She turned her face away and shut her eyes, features drawn tight as she struggled to push the emotions away. When her face finally calmed, she tucked the necklace beneath her shirt.
"I apologize," Solas said, in an equally soft tone. "I should have known that such pertinent questions were rooted in—" he hesitated, "—a delicate matter." He let the apology stand a moment, before he continued, "Nearly every culture in Thedas, in some manner, believe that the souls of the deceased pass on into the Fade, at least for a time. After that, the opinions on the precise destination tends to vary."
She turned back to him, "I'm not interested in opinions. Have you seen souls of the dead in the Fade, in your wanderings? Do you know for sure?"
Her preoccupation with the subject — her insistence on the truth — seemed to please him. "I have seen many things in the Fade; memories and echoes beyond counting. I have also seen the brief crossings of souls through the Fade."
"Through?" To where? What could be beyond the Beyond? The Void? It was a horrible thought. And how long did they stay in the Fade? Could they linger without ever leaving? The questions clamored in her, as she stumbled through them, "How long do they linger there?"
"Some wink through like candle flame snuffed between two fingers. Others endure, for a time. I presume the younger ones pass through the quickest, as they tend to have less regrets to let go of. Though they all pass on, eventually. I have not seen where it is that they go." Almost delicately, he added, "If I were to hazard a guess, I would say that we all return to the ether — to the primordial essence of the Fade."
Her face fell. She knew that it did by the way his seemed to mirror it — as though he was disheartened to give her such a hard truth.
Tephra ignored the grief that swelled in her chest, and rambled, "I read somewhere that a researcher in Orlais made a hypothesis that all magic is energy, and so are we. That everything is made of energy, that it all comes from the same source. Perhaps that is the ether — the Fade itself. Energy. And that when we die, it returns to it. So in a way, we always return to those we—" she swallowed at the hard lump building in the back of her throat, and diverted, "Well, it was always a comforting notion, to me. It's that, or, there is just... nothingness."
"The Void," he stated.
"Here lies the abyss, the well of all souls," she parroted, remembering what little she knew of the human religion.
Solas smirked, and mused, "You did not strike me as an Andrastian, Herald."
It was a teasing jibe, and curiously, it did not sting.
Tephra felt an odd warmth, and returned the smile, "My interest in the nature of souls spurred me to research beyond my own people's beliefs. Truth is truth, no matter where it comes from."
The feeling did not last, as the weight of truth settled over her. Even if he did not know for sure, Solas knew reasonably more than most — and that meant that her brother was well and truly lost to her, as they all were.
There was nothing for it, but to let go of a child's hope of one day reuniting with a family long gone.
She took another long drink, finishing the bottle of mead. Her head was swimming, and her stomach rolled with grief.
"It was stupid of me to ask," Tephra said, quietly.
That elicited a disapproving frown from him.
"It is a decidedly natural and mortal concern to have," he assured.
"I suppose nothingness isn't so terrible. You can't miss anything when you're nothing, right?" She gave a sudden, amused smile, "Besides, it would be a far kinder fate than the old stories, the ones of how the Dread Wolf feasts on the souls of the dead."
Solas stood, suddenly. The legs of his chair scraped noisily on the wooden floor. He looked as though she'd struck him.
Shit.
She had been trying to toe the line of his patience, to keep her Dalishness squirreled away to keep from offending him, but now—
"Sathan," she pleaded, earnestly. She reached for him, briefly, before letting her hand fall back to the table, fisting against the wood at her own incompetence. "Please, I was just joking. I don't really believe that."
A shadow seemed to ripple across his face, before it grew still and calm. He sat slowly, almost stiffly, as he said, "There is much that the Dalish get wrong about such matters, especially as they cannot be bothered to free themselves of such ignorant folklore."
"On that, we can agree," she replied, hoping to placate him. "I'd rather find the truth of things than to accept what is simply told to me. It was a poor joke."
She did not share in the religion of her fellow Dalish — certainly not the more absurd aspects of it. She believed in what could be touched, in what could be measured, in what could be quantified.
Besides, if the Elvhen gods had ever truly existed, why would they have let their people fall so low?
"For that, you are wiser than your people. Hold on to that, and nurture it," he advised. "It would be a terribly sad day for all of Thedas if you were to ever lose it."
The sweeping nature of his statement flustered her; she could not tell if he was complimenting her, or mocking her. She ignored the feeling, as she said, "Thank you."
"For?" His tone had all the caution and distrust that she felt.
It was as though they were on differing sides of a war zone, long gone quiet with an uneasy truce, though liable to skirmish again should either provoke the other.
"For telling me the truth," she replied. She hoped that he would believe her sincerity. "You could have spun a story to coddle me, or parroted what the others say. Even if the truth is that you don't really know. I appreciate your honesty."
The warmth returned to his face, and she felt the tension in her body slip away. He eased forward, leaning on the table as he had before, and asked, "What other truths would you have of me?"
Oh, Creators.
She needed more alcohol.
.
.
.
.
.
.
The Herald of Andraste was well on her way through a second bottle of mead. Or was that her third? He wasn't quite certain.
"So are they like us? Do they have souls, or are they souls themselves — only without bodies? Is that we were before we were born, or did we come into being at birth?"
There were truths here that could not be elaborated on by any measure, lest he tread into dangerous territory regarding the Veil, or himself.
Still, Solas could not help but delight in her rambling questions. There was a decided lack of stigma attached to her point of view, a lack of fear and superstition. It left her open, afforded her the willingness to ask such things. It was not a subject of casual conversation, save for eccentrics tucked away in universities or in Circles, and even then posed only in private — lest they be punished for heresy.
That she'd thought to ask at all had bowled him over, and he was still trying to get his footing back.
And, to be honest, he was delighting in the freely offered mead a bit too much as well. He'd already surpassed her pace. It left him a bit too uneven, a bit too open.
"Spirits are... spirits," he managed, and laughed when she laughed at his response.
"That is decidedly not an answer at all," she chided.
He decided that he rather enjoyed her laughing far more than her aloofness or her frowns. He would have to endeavor to elicit them more often, if he could.
Solas gestured vaguely, "They often defy such simple explanation. Though mortals might perceive them as simple, their existence and nature has always been vastly more complicated and inscrutable. Few theorists or historians have ever done them justice in their explanations."
She was ponderous again, leaning closer to a frown.
There was a knot of grief there, and he was certain that nothing he could ever tell her would give her closure for what she sought.
Solas's hand twitched and tightened around the bottle of mead, and he very much wished to divert her attention to something other than the old pain she carried from her childhood. "You have not complained about your burns," he ventured. "If they still trouble you, you need not keep it to yourself. It is no trouble to me to apply what healing magic that I may."
Tephra turned her her palms up and eyed the bandage-work. Her gloves had been taken, so that the fresh dressings could be applied from the tips of her fingers well up to her elbows. "Do you know what's strange?"
"Many things?" he offered.
She flashed him a brief look of exasperation, before musing, "I didn't feel the fire at all, except at first. It just... disappeared. It was like being in an oven, but somehow I got through it because I couldn't feel it. It burned me, and I felt nothing. That's strange, isn't it?"
It was, indeed, strange — yet even as he began to consider it, his thoughts were dragged back to that burning cottage, back to the sight of her disappearing inside of it and once again throwing his plans into utter chaos.
He remembered having a hold of her, the first time she returned to the window, after she'd pushed the children out. He'd been afraid to pull too hard because of the burns on her arms, but then she'd wrenched herself free of him and disappeared back inside. If he could have wedged himself through the small opening in the boarded-up window, he would have. And he couldn't risk magic again; his first attempt had brought half the cabin down on her.
He was reasonably certain that at least some of her burns were because of his hastiness to get her out of there.
When she reappeared again, he let go of whatever breath he'd been holding and pulled her free. Burning fabric had clung to her armor and a portion of her hair had been on fire. The Seeker threw her own coat over her, and they worked in unison to beat away the flames. He could do nothing but let her as she pushed herself free, with the dead child in her arms. He do nothing but watch her futile attempts to breathe life back into him, and then after, as she killed the templar.
She'd nearly died. She had been willing to throw her life away for a handful of children, on the small hope of their survival, and it staggered him.
Helping those who needed it was not something he was averse to. In truth, he was compelled to ease suffering where he could, especially now as he worked as part of the Inquisition, but even so, he would not consider even for a moment throwing aside his mission for the life of one over the many.
She, however, seemed perfectly content to trade her one precious life as though it were nothing more than something trivial and easily replaced.
Solas was suddenly aware of his own silence, and its extended duration. He cleared his throat, and replied, "People are capable of remarkable things in times of extreme duress, with or without magic. Even ordinary people."
"Are you saying that I'm ordinary?" A small smile played at the corners of her mouth.
"Not at all. Not even if you tried, I fear," he replied.
It was a swift declaration, and the vehemence in his tone concerned him, but there was no walking back the compliment.
Blessedly, she seemed not to perceive it.
The Herald lapsed back into seriousness, as she said, "When I was inside the cabin, there was—" She struggled to put whatever she meant to say to words. Confusion and grief warred across her face, as her gaze dropped to where her hands curled around the glass bottle between them.
He was struck by the sudden, acute need to comfort her, to assuage her guilt.
"You saved six people today. And more here, as well," he stated, firmly. "You should take comfort in that."
"I didn't save him, though. Or his mother." She turned those horribly real eyes on him — dark and drowning in the tides of her grief. Old pain and new pain, miring together in those depths.
"He was right there, and I left him. I told them to hold onto each other and I was so sure they had him, but I couldn't save him any more than I could have saved—" Tephra stopped herself, mouth twisting into a hard line as she lapsed into an aching silence. Her eyebrows knitted together as she struggled to keep the grief from her face.
He knew then, that her brother had certainly died.
She did not dream of her parents, or of her clan, she only dreamt of him.
Only loss could root like that in the dream of another.
Impulsiveness seized him, as he asked, "Is that why you asked, before?"
The look she gave him was answer enough.
Solas reached across the table, reached for her hand, to take it into his own, to — what? To comfort her?
He hesitated, hand hovering awkwardly as she stared at it with an unfathomable expression.
Whether she welcomed it or saw it as an intrusion, he could not say.
Solas withdrew stiffly, as he aborted his useless gesture of empathy.
She could have saved all of Thedas itself, and that one little boy would still haunt her.
That truth clutched curiously at him, and compelled him to say, "You cannot save them all. You must remember that."
She frowned, sharply, as she insisted, "I won't lose anyone else."
Still so defiant.
"You will," he said, but not unkindly. "But you must not let it break you. The work that must be done is too important to be lost to grief."
It clearly troubled her to know that she would, that she couldn't save everyone, but he knew it better than anyone that there was never saving everyone.
There was always a cost to be paid, no matter one's intentions.
She sighed. "Have you seen much of war? Of death?"
"More than I care to admit," he replied.
"I haven't," she confessed, as if it were some terrible crime. As though living in relative peace, tucked away in some quiet corner of the world, was somehow something to regret. "I've never seen anything like this before."
Of all the things in the world to be ignorant of — to be ignorant of war was perhaps one of the kinder ones. He despaired that she had to be thrust so violently into it, with no warning, and with no preparation.
"And now you've been thrown headfirst into it," he mused, darkly.
She fixed him with a haunted expression, and asked, "Does it get any easier?"
"No."
She lapsed into silence again, and reached for Cassandra's bottle of mead that had been left half-drunk. She drank from it deeply, and he could only wonder at how she'd remained so well-spoken despite her obvious inebriation.
Tephra met his gaze again, as she said, "I keep trying to hold on to some vision of a world where I can see myself existing after all of this. A world where this—" she held up her marked hand, to punctuate her point, "—didn't end with death, or martyrdom."
Guilt twisted sharply in his gut, as Solas shifted back in his chair to retreat from the truth of her words.
"Do you know what this feels like?" She flexed the hand until it crackled and sparked, and the magic danced between her fingers in flickering bursts. "It feels like time running out. I can feel it in my bones, and I don't want to find out what happens to me after the last grain of sand falls in the hourglass."
He could do nothing, say nothing, but accept the terrible weight of her words — of her fears. There was nothing he could say that wouldn't have been a lie, and any words of comfort or reassurance would have been entirely hollow.
Solas drank deeply, letting the burn of alcohol in his throat distract him from the guilt burning in his gut.
"I'm so angry, all the time, that I have to be this for them — for these people, for the Chantry, for all who ever had a hand in destroying us," she confided, as she let her marked hand close in a fist. The magic snuffed out in a sputter. "They erased us. Whole generations of us — eaten up, and spat out. Our history — all that we were, or could have ever been — stolen, and erased. All the way back to Elvhenan."
A part of him wanted to flee, to retreat from the truth laid bare before him.
Truth could be liberating, something to cherish above all, but it could also be a graveyard with all of the bodies dug up and laid out side-by-side.
Truth never came without accountability, and it was too much to face the ugly whole of it, to have to hear it spilling from the mouth of one so mortal and fleeting, of one so robbed of all that she could have ever been.
"There are legacies and histories inside of me, carried in my blood, in yours — ours. Beating out a eulogy in us even as we struggle to live in this world, just to survive."
Her need to claim him as one of her own burned through him. His hand fisted on his thigh, and he continued to drink as she spoke — not once taking his eyes from hers. His head was heavy with grief and inebriation, but she was owed this.
It was the very least he could give her. The smallest act of penance.
"Our people were cast to the margins, and we struggle and fight just to stay there. Whatever measure of freedom the Dalish have is just an illusion. I see that so clearly now," she continued, in quiet anger. "But what is there to do for it, but more war? More death? And all while the Breach stares down at us, while time whittles away. How much time do we even have left, even if we close it?"
Not enough, not by far.
That elicited more guilt, twisting deep.
How could she be so attuned to the vast suffering of this world? She was too small, not even whole, and yet—
"Time," she mused, with a sharp, bitter laugh. She took another deep draught of mead, and continued, "Isn't it all terrible? We long for what was, but the ancients were no better than we are. They had the gift of time — of endless life — and still they did horrible things to each other, still killed each other over petty things. And now we have so little time in this world to do anything good, anything that matters."
Her face twisted, briefly, with an old sadness.
"You'd think it would make us kinder to each other," she remarked, as she pushed away her grief.
Still, its remnants remained, despite her efforts. The depths of her emotions suffused her, softened her features to something that simply ached in him. He nearly choked on mead for the sore lump that was forming in his throat — a knot of all the things he could not say.
"Not all of the ancients were terrible, surely." The words left him half-choked, and raw. "Some may yet remain."
She regarded him with skepticism. "If there are, they are very good at hiding. And they do not care at all for us."
He said nothing further, as she spoke the truth he could not.
Had he not turned his back on her people? There was nothing he could say to justify it, even if he'd spent centuries of trying to reach out only to be shunned, even if that turning his back had not been in scorn, but in defeat.
It did not matter.
"It's so hard to imagine that, sometimes. That we were once immortal."
Her face softened with thoughtfulness, and he knew that whatever she imagined did not hold a spark to the true flames of the old world. A part of him ached to show it to her — to give her what she deserved.
"And now we're like everyone else — terribly mortal, and born into a world of constant change," she said, her tone falling softly to that quiet grief that dwelled in her. "Everything around us and inside us decays, and dies. And now there's a hole in the sky. If ever there was a time to appreciate the beauty and urgency of a mortal life, I'd say it was now."
She raised the reclaimed bottle in a mock salute, and downed the last of Cassandra's mead. She set it down again with an audible clank, and sank back into her chair. She sighed, deeply, and said, "Apologies. I've drunk far too much, and rambled on far more than that, and I do believe the spin is rooming a bit."
She frowned at her verbal fumble, and then gave sudden laugh as she realized what she'd said, and he could have—
Could have what?
A dangerous thought.
He shoved it aside, and banished it from his mind.
He wanted her to stop talking, and he wanted her to never stop.
There was such a startling clarity in her words, a wisdom that surely did not belong to her — how could it possibly belong to her? — and it was a torment to him to hear it. A liberating, renewing, startling torment. For all he disdained the Dalish for, it was his fault that they were what they were. That she was what she was, but her words held him accountable. They made him face what he swore to not forget, as he watched helplessly from uthenera as the world he knew burn in the aftermath of the Veil.
The scattered glimpses and memories in the dreaming had only been a fragment of the stark, catastrophic whole.
Solas regarded the woman, locked in stunned silence.
If this is what she was diminished, as a shadow of what she should have been — what terrible wonder would she have been whole?
It stole his breath to consider it, and anchored him with a guilt that threatened to drown him.
He looked at her — truly looked.
She stared back at him quietly, as she frowned at his continued silence.
Seeing him as he saw her.
It all felt far too real.
The urge to flee intensified, as though she could unmask him at any moment, to see him for what he was. It thrilled and terrified him at once, in equal measure.
"You know, sometimes when you look at me, Solas, it's like you're looking through me," she said, her tone ponderous but not accusing. "It's the same with the others, too. As though we're not quite real to you."
Her words tore through him, and shook him to his core. Anxiety flared and raced through his body, chased by an almost euphoric rightness.
She spoke like a prophet, if there ever truly was such a thing. For a moment, he could believe it, as she spoke his terrible truths with absolute conviction.
Even if she couldn't begin to comprehend the full truth of it, she saw him.
Tephra reached across the table and took hold of his chin, tipping his face up just so, so that his eyes met hers directly.
His skin burned where her fingers pressed against him.
"See? I'm right here. I'm a person. I'm not just a thing. Not just—" her hand retreated just enough so that she could flash her palm at him as the Anchor glimmered softly, as his own magic sang back to him, "—this."
She retreated back into her chair, lapsing into measured silence as she watched him for however he meant to respond.
His pulse pounded in his ears.
He considered, briefly, running. Yet he could only remain there where he sat, stiff and cornered, and consider, and reconsider, and doubt.
Had he been wrong? About her, about all of them? Had he—
"Why didn't you heal yourself?"
Some time had passed, he was certain of it, though Solas wasn't sure how much. She'd waited until her patience gave out, and her perplexed question pulled him out of the spinning torrent of questions in his head.
Solas cleared his throat, as he stumbled over his tongue to answer her, "My energies were better spent on your wounds, and those of the ones you saved." He gestured at his face, "This will heal well enough on its own, and in the meantime serve as a reminder to not act so impulsively."
"Yes, in the future, if I happen to be inside of something burning, I would appreciate if you would not bring the roof down on me," she teased.
The amused quirk of her mouth and the lilting tone of her taunt did a terrible thing to him, and set his stomach rolling.
Tephra shifted where she sat and bent to pick up her traveling pack from the floor. She placed it on the table and began to rummage through it, before finally producing a small jar. She stood suddenly and made her way around the table towards him.
His pulse spiked again, and began to race furiously at her approach. It felt as though every nerve in his body were suddenly awakened and aware, because he knew without a doubt that she was going to touch him again. His jaw tightened as he watched her open the jar and run her forefinger over the healing balm contained within. She set the jar down, before moving to stand beside him.
When she reached for his face, she hesitated, and asked, "May I?"
His stomach rolled and heaved, tight with apprehension. He nodded stiffly, and braced himself.
Tephra cupped his jaw with one hand, and applied the balm with the other. She leaned over him as she worked it into his cheekbone — the area was tender where the Seeker had struck him, but it was nothing compared to the sensations elicited by her touch.
The shock of it thundered across his nerves, fast and without warning, and he found himself holding his breath and braced for impact. He wasn't quite certain if he had flinched or not, until she spoke a quiet apology. The tickle of her breath at his brow caused him to shut his eyes, and his hands fisted uselessly on his thighs.
It was all he could do, but to simply endure it.
It had been, perhaps, far too long since someone had touched him, let alone touched him in such a gentle manner. He could not help the way his body relaxed beneath her touch, under the careful ministrations of her fingers as she applied the healing balm, her fingertips working slow, steady circles into his flesh.
He had gone, perhaps, far too long without physical contact.
It had been especially prudent to avoid such complications when the mantle of Dread Wolf had been placed upon him. More so, when most began to regard him as a god. No matter his attempts to dissuade his people from such myth-making, he could not deny the imbalance of power it placed between him and everyone else.
After that, he had never been seen for who he was, not truly. Not as Solas; not as simply just himself. When prospective lovers presented themselves after that, there was never truly any way of knowing their intent, let alone if their consent came entirely without coercion from his position of power.
Even the casual touches of his comrades — friends he'd known through many skirmishes and conflicts through the ages — came to a stop as fear and reverence set in. Even they had not been exempt from the sudden shift in perspective.
He had never disliked solitude, until then. When it became no longer a choice, but an exile.
How long had it been, then? He could not remember the last time someone touched him, so simply and willingly and without ulterior motive. It was because of that, that he found himself so utterly and absolutely unprepared for it — for the implications of touching, and being touched.
Solas forced himself to push his focus elsewhere, to settle his attention on something unremarkable — anything — to slow his pulse and still the clamor in his chest. It quickly resulted in failure, as his gaze simply shifted to watch her small hands at work as she let go of him briefly to get more of the balm. As he watched her lift jar and claim more of the balm on her fingertips, he couldn't help but notice that they were curiously stained with ink.
Had she been writing?
That was a curious notion, given that most Dalish were illiterate. And yet her rambling, drunken soliloquy belied any notion of an uneducated mind. It only spurred more questions that crowded about inside of him — Who taught you? Who did you lose? What are you? — questions that ached to be asked.
She returned to take hold of him, and began to apply the balm to his temple.
That elicited a hiss of pain from him.
"You really should heal this before it scars," she chided, as her fingers began to circle his temple gently.
The repetitive gesture was infinitely soothing, and in that moment, he couldn't care less whether it scarred or not.
His focus wavered and shifted to her eyes, as her face was unnervingly close to his as she worked. He could not help but be drawn in by them. Her eyes were so dark that the pupils spilled disconcertingly into the irises, which often made her expressions unfathomable.
Dark waters hiding a riptide.
Even now, he could feel that pull.
Especially now.
This close, though, he could see the subtle shift in shade between the pupils and irides. They were not truly black — their hue more nuanced, dark ribbons that caught hints of steel and obsidian in the right light.
"That should do for now," she said, pulling back to survey her work. She nodded to herself, seeming satisfied, and went to pack away her balm.
Solas's eyes fluttered shut, briefly, and he swallowed the knot building in his throat again.
It was possible — likely, even — that he was drunk. Perhaps it had put him at a disadvantage, thrown him off guard. Made him susceptible to being fooled by a very lifelike construct. Fooled by words and hands that felt far, far too real. Fooled to think that perhaps she wasn't just a shadow, that perhaps—
Foolish old man.
When he opened them again, he saw that Tephra was hoisting her pack on her back. It was clear that she was leaving, and she would take her wonderful mind with her, alongside all of her fascinating questions and terrible truths.
He wanted to protest, to entreat her to stay and to continue shattering his previous convictions of her, and possibly his convictions of the world itself.
Any regard for the danger of what that could bring had gone out the window the moment she'd spoken those unavoidable truths — and the moment she'd touched his face.
Something had inevitably, irrevocably changed.
He would never be able to regard her as the same — as less. With each new declaration, with each stolen moment of discussion, she would become more, and there was nothing he could do to stop it, nor deny it.
She worried at her coat, checking the pockets with the fumbling grace of one who'd had far too much alcohol for her own good, and suddenly produced a bit of rolled-up parchment from her pocket.
"I have something for you," she said. That impish smile returned to her face, as if she held a secret.
Clearly, it was whatever that bit of paper bore.
Still, he indulged her. "Oh?"
Tephra held it out to him almost tentatively, and did not quite meet his gaze. "It's my gratitude. For the stories, the other night."
Impulsively, he made a point of letting his fingers brush hers as he took it. It would seem entirely accidental, of course, yet he couldn't help himself.
It was as though he'd been starving for centuries without hardly knowing it, only for it to become startlingly apparent the moment she offered the smallest scrap of attention. The touch of her skin burned against his as he retreated and unfurled the paper.
His eyes were met with precise strokes and hatchwork in fine, minuscule detail which depicted two white trees made stark against a wash of black ink, with a flurry of white moths fluttering between them.
"I've probably got it all wrong," she said quickly, as though suddenly unsure of herself. "But I thought perhaps you might like it."
Solas felt a curious swell of emotion in his gut, and a deep longing for the world that was.
For what she could have been, and for what she would never see.
He lifted his gaze to meet hers with a tight smile, "It is wonderfully done, Tephra. Thank you."
Her eyebrows knitted together in a sudden, sharp expression, before her face lit up with a smile. She averted her gaze quickly, as though she were overcome, and fumbled to distract herself from it as she said, "Well, I should go and do that whole rest thing that Cassandra has been on about. I would hate to provoke her, when we're finally getting on so well."
"You do need your rest," he agreed.
It would be selfish of him to keep her there, talking with him all night. She had an obligation that was far bigger than what ever this was, no matter how much he would have liked to keep provoking her into rambling declarations and startling truths.
"Goodnight, Solas."
"Rest well, Herald," he replied, forcing himself to step back inwardly. To let go of the crashing swell of his emotions — at least for the moment.
His eyes dropped to the parchment in his hands, to the moths she'd managed to capture in striking detail. She had recalled the dreams he'd conjured for her with perfect clarity.
He did not watch her go; it would have been too easy to call her back. And yet after a long, stalled moment, he inevitably looked back up after her.
Tephra was nearing the top of the stairs when she cast another look back to him, and stopped briefly.
Her gaze burned right through him.
It was too canny, too perceptive — too aware. And there was something there that he could not begin to fathom, or put words. It elicited something small and dangerous in him, something a bit like hope.
And then she ducked out of sight onto the second floor of the building, leaving Solas where he sat at the table with an odd feeling budding sharply inside of him.
In a world full of sleeping Tranquil, she was wide awake — and he had her full attention.
And he couldn't deny that his attention, in turn, had been awakened.
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Author's Notes: I should learn how to write shorter chapters, but I really can't. Any chapter (like this) titled as "Pt. II" pretty much means the previous chapter ran on way too freaking long and resulted in being split in two. It is, perhaps, possible that I write too much. Also, apologies for the scenes that use sizable chunks of game dialogue, but I'm trying to at least keep in the most important bits. I am quite pleased with this chapter, and I hope you all are too. I hastily edited this to finish it before I leave on a work trip, so apologies if I missed any glaring typos. I'll double check when I get back in a few days.
Also, thank you to all those who have left reviews/kudos. I am pleased to know someone's enjoying reading this as much as I am in writing it, and it really motivates me to keep up a good pace.
Specific Elvhen used and credited to the work of FenxShiral:
Sathan. — Please.