Disclaimer: I own absolutely and completely nothing. Bioware has that particular pleasure.
Summary: A City-Elf/Bann Teagan collection of drabbles and one-shots based on a prompt table from an LJ-community. These will be more or less in chronological order with the faintest traces of added plot here and there. Will vary from drabble length to one-shot.
Author's note: Hm, don't know why it's so hard to write these two characters together. It's like it never fits just right. How weird.
In this chapter: A word can hurt more than a thousand blades.
027.
"Why are they just staring at each other?"
Wynne shakes her head silently but, otherwise, does not respond to the former Templar. She could have. With a little effort, she could explain what is happening in simple terms, something that he would understand. But that is just it, nothing here is simple and any attempt would destroy the importance of this moment. The two women stare at each other, cautiously, measuring each other as if they'll start fighting just a moment after - entirely possible. The older mage has no idea of what they're thinking but somehow she is aware they're off in their own world.
It is not up to her to intervene, even if she wished it. And it's hardly needed, as the Commander takes her large sword, placing it by her side, huge and threatening.
"You got out."
Tasha shrugs, lightly while her hands tense around her blades. "I told you I would."
"I wasn't there," Cauthrien continues. "I'm here now."
Another shrug, dearest Maker. It worsens the atmosphere, transforms it, fills it with so much tension that Wynne almost feels difficulty in breathing. This will end in battle, it cannot end in any other way but battle. The one that wasn't finished in the Arl's Palace nor done in Fort Drakon.
"You don't want to stop me."
"Why?" The Commander hesitates for but a second. Wynne hesitates with her. Sometimes, just sometimes Tasha makes little sense to no sense. Presumes too much, the silly girl. "Because you're stronger? Because you're right? Because you'll kill me?"
"Because of all those. And because I can do what you can't."
"That is?"
"I can stop him."
"No one can."
"I can."
Silence, they all fall in silence. Wynne finds that she cannot help but believe in the Warden. Ostagar and Brecilian forest, the Dead Trenches where the Broodmother awaited, Redcliffe where dead walked, the Tower, the lakes, miles and miles of dry earth. She believes Loghain can be defeated. So does Cauthrien, for that matter.
"I can," the Warden repeats rather uselessly. "For a price."
More silence, the whispers of the Landsmeet barely making a dent.
"Leave him. Betray him. Walk away."
It would be easier to ask for the sun and yet, Tasha asks it. Foolish girl. This is the Commander, his second, the one who was at Ostagar and still stays. Someone who has seen Howe's treachery and said nothing. This is foolishness.
"You will stop him?"
Behind her, Wynne can swear Zevran is appreciating the verbal duel. This hardly happens. At this point, blades and swords would be involved and any words would involve pain and insults. He seems to enjoy it though, moving from side to side like a captive audience. Another kind of violence. Wynne focuses on him. The conversation seems to flow in a direction she does not wish.
"Yes." Simple, simple reply.
"You will kill him?"
"I don't know."
Wrong. Terribly wrong answer. At this point, Tasha should know better. Or even better, the elf should ask her. Wynne can tell her everything, all the crimes, all the wrongdoings, all the things that keep her awake at night while her Tower burns in her thoughts and children die in her dreams. All because of this man. He deserves death, just as all murderers do, like her children cried out during the nights that they spent closed in that smallest space while only her magic kept danger out. He deserves to die.
Cauthrien has no right to ask for this.
"Do you know mercy, elf?"
Hesitation and Tasha's words are like a lesson long forgotten."She wields the broken sword and separates true kings from tyrants."
"But you are neither."
"No, I am not."
That sentence sticks in Wynne's mind. It's not unnatural. After all, her memory is quite fine for her age, quite flexible. It sticks and turns, moves around, sounds exactly the younger woman – the mage, the qunari, the bard, the other mage. Yes. The trip to the mountain taught her a great deal of things. The trip to the south taught her more.
Tasha nods to her fellow Warden and both walk through the great doors, leaving the other woman behind. Confident. She is probably confident that the other's honor will be strong enough to spare the one she follows. That is not acceptable. Not now, not ever. It is not fair and her children lay dead.
"Her sword is not broken," she speaks for the first time, like a cold blade through skin, loud and clear before walking away.
Zevran looks curious as they walk towards the doors and keep to the back. The mage can see his confusion but really, why bother to address it? There are more important details. Like Loghain who is already speaking and Tasha, that one simply states why she's there, all facts and none of her usual emotional outbursts. Maker bless her with small miracles.
"My dear, have you just baited the Commander?"
Wynne is the wise one. Wynne never raises her voice. Wynne hates just as everyone does, dislikes the Chantry but says nothing, does not agree with Alistair as king but understands, is a mage and hates her shackles but accepts.
And yet, "I am an instructor." Who has been in battle, who has been in Ostagar, who has lost friends to betrayal. "I was merely instructing her."