Dreamwalking
Alistair
The light is strange here.
It's the first thing he notices, and he is just about to ask about it, when his sister walks up to him, humming fragments of a tune he used to hear in the stables at Redcliffe, trying not to let the straw scratch too much and eavesdropping on the stable hands. He always found it... comforting, somehow.
Now he remembers - the light is always odd here, Goldanna is always forgetting to buy more candles, he should really remind her...
Something nags at him, as if he has forgotten something, but he brushes it away. He's probably just forgotten the cheese.
She is smiling at him, and there is pie, and life is perfect. His family is here, his niece running around his feet - a little ball of barely-compressed energy, just like he was at that age.
He wonders if Morgana ever had a family, before she was taken to the Tower - wait, who is Morgana, what Tower?
There is an odd noise, and then she is striding towards him, the glowing aura of defensive magic around her, a familiar splintmailed figure, and he remembers. That's Morgana. He almost remembers other things; they're at the edge of his memory, and they're slipping further and further away, and why is Goldanna's smile suddenly so tight, and he is grabbing onto what little memory he has, because he is sure, though he doesn't know why, that it's important, and he has that sensation of it slipping away again, and he is sure he'll forget Morgana's name, but he can't forget her name, he can't -
Goldanna smiles at him and asks if Morgana would like to stay for dinner, her daughter, his niece, clapping and jumping with a "Yes, yes please!" and he suddenly wonders if Morgana likes pie, asks her.
An expression flickers over Morgana's face for a moment as she takes in the scene - pity? Why pity? Goldanna's house is lovely, there aren't even cockroaches like so many in Denerim - but then it is gone, and, face blank almost like she is making it that way, she ignores Goldanna - rather rudely - and takes hold of his arm. Gentle though the touch is, bringing back memories of healing - healing, what's healing? - something of the haze clears, and his fellow Grey Warden - wait, what's a Grey Warden, why are the words provoking an odd warm feeling in his chest, like when he sees his family? - says quietly to him, "Alistair, this isn't real. Any of it."
He shakes his head. What an odd thing to say. Maybe she's not real...
"This is the Fade. They are demons. Please..."
He still doesn't understand, and is beginning to take offense at the way she keeps referring to his family.
She shakes her head, as if in exasperation, but what is there to be exasperated about here? There's pie... She's talking again."I'll try reasoning, but I doubt I'll get anywhere. If I can't reason..." She looks back to his sister and the child playing on the floor with a doll he got her when she was a baby. (He remembers that. Can't remember where he got it, though...) She swallows. "If I can't reason, I'll try and make it quick."
She is shouting at Goldanna, something about demons...
He feels the mana spark, flare into life into her veins, because she is about to put it to use and he can sense it because every templar-trained bone in his body is humming with the build-up and what's a templar anyway?
It all comes back as she sends a fireball towards his sister - wait! His sister! - and summons up lightning when Goldanna gets back up again, wincing as it hits the woman, taking a deep breath.
It's like seeing her for the first time - he remembers her nervously fumbling with the sword - but she's getting better, so much better, because he's been teaching her, he remembers - and contrasts it to the woman throwing spells ten to the dozen, anger in her eyes, glowing with mana, focus never wavering; she is a mage. The Fade is her place, he realises abruptly, admiration for her talent and fear of it fighting each other for dominance, and then panics because he's not dreaming - he thinks - so why is he in the Fade?
He searches for the barrier, the fortress, to pull around his mind, he can't find it, because you can't use templar skills here even if you still have the senses, and there's no Veil for protection, and demons and spirits -
The little girl - what he'd thought was his niece - has disappeared. Was it part of the demon also pretending to be Goldanna?
She turns to him, and says calmly, almost kindly, "They weren't your family, Alistair. See your family outside the Fade - it's where they truly are."
He is about to say something, but everything is fading and where is she - ?