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: So. Yes. Last update for a while. Thank you to roxfox for betaing this whole thing for me, thank everyone else for the lovely ideas and for brainstorming with me. I hope this chapter is liked. It took a while to make it work. If anyone's interested, I placed some screencaps of both PCs on my profile. Sometimes graphics help.
In this chapter: They end say goodbye together, mortal and immortal.
046.
The Archdemon is amazing. Maker knows she has seen enough dragons in the last year to make any seem slightly familiar, but this creature, this God, is breathtaking. Scary. Frightening enough to make her knees buckle under the weight of her armor. To make her wish to flee and leave her swords behind. Forget she ever tried something as foolish as to take a place in a battlefield. Scary, yes, it definitely is, but Maker help her, it is beautiful. Dark scales, dark skin, dark eyes, dark, dark, dark everything and its roar conquers everything above the madness occurring around her small, very very small form. Beautiful. She can't think of anything else as she crosses the flurry of commotion, between elves and mages, dwarves and dogs and Sten right behind her. It is beautiful, the kind of beauty she'd use to describe a blade.
She knows it – he? She? – is going to kill her. She knows she is going to kill it – him. Her – and still, it doesn't stop her from admiring the God. Both will end in horror, might as well love the beauty while they can. It makes her a little disappointed that she cannot give something as beautiful to the creature. Give and take – her father taught her – until they take everything from each other.
"Loghain! Distract it!"
There's a shadow moving in front of her for the barest second before it vanishes, following the other Warden into the fray. She pays it little attention – Zevran, foolish man, he should be more careful – because the Archdemon is more important. Everything is common and normal while among genlocks and hurlocks, all of them dying almost easily after so long fighting them. But the Archdemon, that one is her challenge, her fate and end. She heard stories of heroes in her life – she battles next to heroes every day of her life, amazingly enough – and even now that she doesn't consider herself even close to one, she finds herself remembering how one's life is made for one single amazing moment. Then we can depart.
The elf is almost proud of Loghain. Stupid, she knows, but she is. Hated, disliked, unwelcomed while still pushing forward, pushing everyone forward, truly. He is amazing, she thinks to herself, almost detachedly as the creatures fall around her and she's vaguely aware of how broken her two arms feel and everything that she is will soon follow. It's why he has to live. The Wardens will need someone who can face hatred and persevere nevertheless. No. No, that's a lie. He has to live because she wants him to live. She is not strong enough to see others die in front of her. It only takes near death for Tasha to realize she is a selfish coward.
It is easy to be proud of Sten, the elf continues as she catches up to the Qunari, especially when he's running towards the giant dragon without prompt necessary. He might be scared but none can see, not even her who prides herself in knowing him a little. Perhaps to seem afraid in front of the God would seem cowardly, Asala sings to her, coming up and down, like a violin, again and again cutting the air in bloodied symphony. They are not dancers, they are farmers, red grain falling all around them as they despair about keeping the dragon still. Trying to buy time as Zevran manages to fix the ballistae and it is good that he does and everything but really, better aim.
Tasha should be scared only she's not. The morning is coming right above the horizon and she'll get to see the sun. Then, who knows? She has been in the Fade and not everything about it is awful. Maybe the Maker does live there. Maybe He is watching right now, laughing at the philosophic thoughts she never had and chose to dwell on during a battle. Maybe He will say she did good. Be proud but a little.
That's not important right then though. It's going to be over in just a few moments – her blades move a little quicker at that, she wishes it so much – and everyone will be saved and safe. Including her, safe and sound and asleep. She's not scared because Asala croons to another's music, one she can swear to hear if she comes closer, just a little more, just like so. No wonder the darkspawn search for it. Their world is tinged in black and red, anything more beautiful they crave. Poor creatures, she thinks to herself, killing one more, a dozen more. They have nothing else but the song. It is a very sad, hauntingly beautiful song.
She's not scared. She's terrified. She's frightened until her bones shake and she wants to run off. Wants to go back to the Alienage, to leave towards other lands, to live in the Keep that she helped save. Perhaps complain to Alistair about their duties, talk to Leliana about clothes she will never wear, hear Wynne scold her every day, Morrigan, can you believe we did all those things? And Zevran right by her side, his head over her shoulder in a lewd comment while Sten stares and Oghren sleeps. Assan by her feet, his head on her knees and between her fingers. A tree and a waterfall, a shadow and an arm around her.
But Tasha wants this to be over more than everything. Otherwise, her strength will break, her resolve will shatter and she will collapse in tears. Run and never return. If it is soon, she will be a hero and not a coward.
"Kadan!" Sten will be able to go home. That is why he needs to walk away from this, alive and well.
Behind, get behind me, she is about to command him – after all, the final blow is hers – when someone moves in front of her. Tasha finds hitting it is instinctive, his body crumpling in front of her feet, groaning hidden by the battle's sounds and black hair all over her boots. Idiot. A year trampling around the world is more than enough and she learned, she even defeated him once. He's needed, she's not and he's not taking this away from her. Not when her resolve is still steady – damned the Orlesian, damn him for telling her, damn him for damning her, damn him for dying on her, a thousand times damned she is not sorry, she is just afraid – but not broken yet.
The elf needs nothing else to jump forward, Starfang lost somewhere behind while leaving her with the old veridium sword. It never failed her, she never doubted it. And it might fall down and shatter, blade crying as it meets the strongest bone since the elf took it in her hands, but it is all right. Sten taught her, a blade is a soul, this blade is her soul and her soul has saved her life so many times already. This seems fitting, ending in the exact same moment, the unimportant elf that she is and the beautiful ancient God, ancient but never forgotten.
Light is all they can see and, bathed in it, Tasha cannot be sure of who she is anymore. She becomes part of the dragon, part of the God, and is nothing more that little speck in the corner, amazed with everything, scared and marveled beyond her wildest dreams while tears fight their way out and slide down.
They are saying goodbye together, the elf realizes. Staring at the world around them, raising their head, searching for something, anything and Tasha doesn't understand what until they find it. As one, they both look at the rising sun, finally touching the city. There is nostalgia which both understand, both feel, both both both and they aren't individuals anymore but one being who loves the world more than anything and doesn't wish to leave it. It is not their fault, they tried so hard and yet the world changes and they aren't needed anymore. This regret is theirs, this fear is theirs, these tears are theirs. They don't want to leave but it is time to say goodbye.
Blessed are those who stand before the corrupt and do not falter. Blessed are the peacekeepers, the champions of the just.
Another moment and they are not they anymore but a God and an elf, mortal, so mortal and he is being taken away, slipping through her fingers and leaving her behind and all she wants to say is no and beg to be taken too because it is unfair and he shouldn't have to die. But he does. Abandons her to see his final moments, to notice just when the song dies and, with it, the most beautiful being she has ever laid eyes on.
Let mine be the last sacrifice, like a parent whispering in her ear.
It is the holiest, saddest moment of her entire life.