84. His Mother's Son

Someone was crying, but most of them were just silent and numb, watching the foreigners count them and sort them like cattle. Cyrion had lost track of how long he'd been in a cage now… two days, perhaps three? They'd healed his cough, certainly, but no doubt only to make him more suitable for whatever purposes they intended.

His son had been in a cage once for about this long. It made him wonder whether Finian had been forced to endure the sneering jeers, the looks of condescension, the utter lack of privacy for even the most basic functions… it was all dehumanizing on a level that even Cyrion had never quite known before. No wonder his boy had grown so restless after that whole ordeal.

The elves were lined up in cages along the walls of a broad room deep in the old warehouse. There were a good dozen elves in all, with room for more. Usually, it was just guards in here, feeding them and keeping them cowed. But something was happening now… first, a messenger ran through from the Alienage side of the warehouse. Then, guards started dashing back and forth in both directions. Then, one stumbled past from the Alienage side, an arrow in his shoulder and blood seeping from a number of puncture wounds.

"What's going on?" one of the young elves asked tentatively, only for a guard to bash a gauntleted hand against the bars of his cage. Cyrion grit his teeth, schooling himself to patience.

And then, the dock-side doors burst open and the head of the operation himself swept into the room, Tevinter mage robes flaring and a contingent of armored men at his heels. He turned to survey the elves, and then sighed. "It will have to do. Get the cages loaded… no matter how this ends, we will likely be sailing before night falls."

There were two-handed rolling carts in one corner. They'd only managed to load the first cage on it—the one with the small boy and his mother—before the door at the opposite end of the chamber burst open, and four figures stepped out onto the raised walkway.

Cyrion caught his breath, at first thinking that he'd gone mad, seeing Adaia stride into the room, all decked in leather and covered in blood. But then, the lead rescuer smiled dangerously at the Tevinter leader and said, "You must be Caladrius. We need to have a talk about your business model." Cyrion's heart started pounding even faster—that wasn't Adaia, it was Finian, and dear Maker what was the boy getting himself into now?

His son's companions didn't inspire much more confidence: they were all dressed lightly in leathers and carrying, at best, bows and a sword. That, against twice as many men much more heavily armored?

"Ah, so it is elves that are causing such a disruption. I might have guessed." The Tevinter turned his attention fully to the intruders, obviously coming to the same conclusions that Cyrion did. "I suppose we knew this little arrangement wouldn't last forever. And who might you be?"

Finian sketched a bow, as cheeky before authorities as he had ever been. "I am Finian Tabris of the Grey Wardens, and these are my companions, Meila, Zevran, and Leliana. It appears, my good man, that you've accumulated something that doesn't belong to you. Several somethings, in fact. We're here to kindly ask that you return them."

"A Grey Warden, hm?" The Tevinter didn't seem the least bit perturbed… if anything, he was even more amused. "Now that is a surprise. You know, the regent speaks the name of your order like a man cursing the greatest demons of the Fade… I suppose I shouldn't be surprised to find you interfering here."

At that, Finian arched a brow. He leaned casually on the banister separating their raised walkway from the rest of the room, but Cyrion knew both the boy and his mother well enough to recognize the dagger sheathes strapped to his forearms. Maker, he'd hoped Finian would never come to this, but the boy had always been his mother's son. "So it's our dear regent behind your little operation? And here we figured it was just one particularly ambitious arl."

"They did seem fairly close when I met them, my Warden," one of Finian's companions put in cheerfully through an Antivan accent. "Perhaps condoning slavery was something they thought to bond over, like card games or a particularly talented prostitute."

Finian chuckled. "So tell me, Caladrius… what does Loghain get out of this? Money? Tevinter support? A problem made to just go away?"

"I suppose he sees a bit of all of the above," Caladrius said with a casual shrug. "Though I can't claim to speak for the latter two, gold certainly does speak a long way even in your backwards court, and that is all that matters to us."

"I'd gathered as much." Finian stood up straight, and a dagger appeared in his hand as if by magic. He twirled it. "See, that's where I think we might run into a bit of a problem, here."

"We shan't, depending on how reasonable you are, my dear Warden." The Tevinter strode a couple steps toward them, unimpressed. Cyrion, however, was noticing how the guards were getting ready for a fight. "Truth be told, there was always a limit on how long we could operate here. We're paying for Loghain's troops now, but sooner or later, we will become inconvenient. I have heard that your order are running into a bit of trouble with your dear regent. I think we can help one another out."

"And what kind of help would we want from a Tevinter slaver?"

"Oh, you'd be surprised how well money talks… though I wouldn't expect an elf to understand." The Tevinter paced for a moment, then apparently came to a decision and turned to the Wardens with a smile. "Tell you what: one hundred sovereigns from you and allow me to leave with my remaining slaves-" Cyrion saw Finian's grip on his dagger tighten- "and I give you a letter with the seal of the Teryn of Gwaren implicating him in all of this, for you to present to any potential allies that you please. A fair trade for cutting my business here short, don't you think?"

One of the women behind Fin—a human, Cyrion realized—sidled up and whispered something in the boy's ear, only for the Antivan to furrow his brows and mutter into his other. Finian, for his part, didn't drop his smile, and the fourth member of their party stayed back, hard eyes never leaving Caladrius.

Finally, Finian shook his head and waved both his companions off. "An interesting offer, but I've got a counter. Two hundred sovereigns, and you leave without the letter or the elves."

Cyrion's eyes nearly bugged out of his head. Where had the boy gotten two hundred sovereigns? Oh, Finian.

"Oh, no that won't do." Caladrius glanced back at their cages like a fond kennelmaster surveying his hounds. "Without them, this trip simply wouldn't be profitable, would it? But I can be generous. Keep the money. I shall give you the letter for free and be on my way with my profits and my property."

Finian shook his head, looking almost apologetic. "Alas, it seems we are at an impasse. I can't let you take the elves, and you refuse to leave without them."

"Indeed," the Tevinter sighed. "And I was so hoping we could resolve this without resorting to barbarism." Caladrius raised his hand to signal his men to attack, but Antivan drew something from his pocket and hurled it in front of the walkway, obscuring the four in a shattering of glass and a waft of smoke. It cleared a moment later, and all four were gone.

"What? Find them!" Caladrius said, raising his voice for the first time. He drew the staff off his back, but an arrow appeared in his arm before he could raise it, and it tumbled to the ground. Cyrion thought he spotted a flash of red hair in the doorway.

The guards tore up the stairs to the walkway, only for a shadow to emerge from underneath it and fall in step behind them. The first guard was gutted on a sword and dagger before they even registered its presence.

Cyrion heard whispering behind his cage, and saw Finian and the human girl working their way around behind the Tevinters. "He's got two guards sticking on him like burrs," the woman whispered in an Orlesian accent. What an eclectic group of characters his son had picked up. Somehow, Cyrion did not find that fact surprising.

"I'll take left, you take right, and we'll hope Meila can keep him from casting long enough to keep me alive."

"Shall I hum a war chant while you go?"

"If you can find a way not to give away your position, go for it." Finian smirked, but then burst out of hiding, leaping into a double-thrust on one of the men guarding Caladrius. Cyrion noticed that the boy hadn't looked inside the cages at all. Was he afraid of what he would see, or of what he wouldn't? Cyrion admitted that he himself had been saddened to see how many elves had already been shipped to Tevinter, including Soris's young wife.

Finian was… dazzling. That grace and nimbleness was Adaia's, no doubt, but the flair he added to every slash and dodge was all the boy's own. When he saw Fin flip over one guard to come down on the other's shoulders, he nearly cheered.

Not so much as Caladrius, having regained his staff, shot a bolt at the archer in the doorway that threw her back into the next room, then turned a murderous look to Finian. He raised his arrow-bloodied hand, and a red aura swirled around him.

"Son, behind you!" Cyrion called.

Finian yanked his dual-daggers out of his fallen foe and finally looked up at Cyrion. Relief crashed over the boy's face at seeing him, but that second of hesitation cost him dearly. Caladrius raised his arm, and both Finian and the mage's own remaining guard threw their heads back and screamed.

The Orlesian woman shot an arrow at the mage that struck true in his back, but that only made the Tevinter laugh. "You backwards Fereldans! Making a blood mage bleed will only make him stronger!"

"Unless that blood is poisoned," a cheerful voice said from the raised walkway. There, the Antivan and the elven girl stood amidst a circle of guard corpses. The Antivan flashed the Tevinter a very sharp grin and finished applying something to an arrowhead. Then, he handed the arrow to the archer. "Try this one, my dear."

The woman nodded, never taking her hard eyes off the mage as she nocked and released. Caladrius took a couple steps back, but the arrow landed directly in the center of the man's chest.

Whatever was on that arrow, it must have been awful, because the mage started shrieking and clutching at his chest. He fell back to the ground, twitching and cursing in the Tevinter tongue.

Antivan and archer leapt over the banister, running to help pick Finian off the floor. "Are you all right, lethallin?" the woman asked.

"Fine," Finian said, shuddering. "Though for future reference, having your blood boil in your veins is not a pleasant sensation."

"Is that what he was doing?" the Antivan said, looking thoughtfully down at the still-twitching mage. "Then I suppose this must be something of a taste of his own poison, as the saying goes."

Fin moved to stand over the mage. "Was there a paralyzation agent in that poison, Zev?"

"Of course. Wouldn't want our wily mage to wiggle his fingers when we try to question him, would we?"

Finian nodded. "Mind holding him down?"

The Antivan's grin bordered on disturbing. "Do I get to be the scary one for once?"

"Yeah, Zev. You're going to be the scary one." Fin looked up at his two other companions. The human inspected the corpses, while the elven woman stood over her, watching both exits attentively. As Cyrion watched, the human produced a keyring from a guard's belt and headed for the nearest cage.

The rescue, it seemed, had been a success. Cyrion wasn't the only one to sigh in relief.

"Wakey wakey, slaver scum." Finian's voice drew Cyrion's attention back to the blood mage. The Antivan was now behind the prone mage, kneeling on his shoulders and with a dagger to his throat. Finian stood over him, slapping him lightly.

It must have been quite a sight, coming to with the sight of two blood-stained elves grinning sharply down at you.

"I've thought of a new offer," Finian said silkily, and Cyrion was appalled to hear that hard edge in his son's voice. "Would you like to hear it?"

Caladrius swallowed, eyes darting between the two elves. He seemed to have difficulty moving his lips. "I… would be open to it."

"You get out, now. Leave the letter, leave the elves. Or, I let my Crow here do whatever he wants to your slaving ass, and I eventually let him kill you out of the mercy in my heart."

Caladrius's eyes darted up to reassess the Antivan, who was now grinning in what could only be described as an I'm-going-to-enjoy-hurting-you manner. Cyrion was reeling a bit himself. His son, traveling with a Crow?

Maybe that explained the hardness in Finian's expression, but Cyrion doubted it. "That's my final offer, Caladrius. Your choice."

"I… very well. You win. The letter's in my robes… take it!"

Finian smoothly stooped down and rifled through the man's pockets. He came up with a sealed letter and a couple coins beside. He flashed the coins at the Tevinter before pocketing them. "Get him out of here."

"My pleasure." Zevran grabbed the mage by the injured arm and dragged him out the dock-side door. The Crow seemed to enjoy making the paralyzed mage bump into things.

Finian turned to the human, who had unlocked all the cages without Cyrion realizing it. Carefully, the other elves stepped out of the kennels. "Leliana, we need to go through the offices. Look for paperwork, ledgers, anything. The more we can find against Howe and Loghain, the better." The human nodded and disappeared after the Crow.

The elven woman moved to stand guard at the Alienage-side doorway, and only then did the newly released elves feel free to approach their prodigal savior. Cyrion remembered well the unrest after his boy's abrupt conscription... the madness of young elves revolting, and older elves blaming the young. The name Finian Tabris had been a curse just weeks ago, but Cyrion doubted it would be any longer.

Finian met Cyrion's eyes, and before either knew it, the elder elf had met his son in an exuberant hug. "If your mother could see you now…" he whispered proudly, and Fin hugged him tighter for a moment before letting go completely.

"Valendrian? Is he here?"

Cyrion shook his head sadly. "He was sent on an earlier ship. This is all that's left of us here."

Finian's eyes widened in horror as he looked around at their depleted numbers. "What? Then the rest of them…"

"No, lethallin," the elf in the doorway spoke up, also looking saddened by this news. "We cannot chase them down. The Blight."

"I know!" Finian shouted so suddenly that the Alienage elves jumped. The boy turned and paced a couple steps rubbing his face. "But… slavery, Meila! The hahren, my cousin's wife… Maker's striped stockings, this is a nightmare!"

"Even if you follow them, my Warden," the Antivan said, striding through the door with the Orlesian right behind him, "you will not find them easily. They'll have been scattered and sold by now." He shook his head, and the look in his eye left no doubt in Cyrion's mind that this man was a killer. "Say what you like about the Imperium; their slave trade is very efficient."

"But hard to track," the Orlesian sighed. "No paperwork, other than the letter in your hand. They must have destroyed everything when they detected us coming."

Finian's pacing was getting increasingly agitated. He had never liked the idea of anyone being trapped, after that incident with the noble boy

"No one blames you, Finian," Cyrion tried. "You did an amazing job in just freeing those of us here and putting a stop to the operation. It was more than we could have hoped for."

"But if I'd just been here," Finian said. "If I hadn't joined the Wardens…"

"Then you would have been executed for the murder of Bann Vaughan," Cyrion said calmly.

"You see?" the Antivan said with a bit more cheer. "No good for anyone." Cyrion realized this must have been a discussion they'd had before.

Cyrion turned dubiously to the Crow, surprised to be of one mind with an assassin. "I have to admit, Finian, your associations have always been dubious, but do the Wardens know you've got an Antivan Crow in your company?"

"Uh… it's not exactly something I've written to Weisshaupt about, no." And there was the Finian Cyrion remembered, smiling bashfully, with just a hint of mischief.

"Ah. As long as you know what you're doing, son."

"I don't, really. But if it helps, I'm really good at improvisation. When it doesn't get me arrested or killed."

The Antivan laughed, and Cyrion decided he wouldn't berate his son for his choice in companions: not when they'd apparently made such a good team. As the four turned to start heading out of the warehouse, Cyrion fell into step beside them.

"And who are these fine ladies, then?"

"Oh, right. Father, this is Meila Mahariel, a fellow Warden, and Leliana, a Chantry sister who's been helping us. Guys, this is my father."

Leliana giggled. "Well, we had figured that out on our own."

Cyrion whispered conspiringly, "Both quite pretty, wouldn't you say?"

To his surprise, both Leliana and Zevran burst out laughing at that. Meila, however, glanced anxiously at Finian, and Finian himself bit his lip.

"Actually, Father…" the boy reached back and pulled the Crow to his side. The other man looked surprised—but not unpleasantly so—as Fin wrapped an arm around his waist. "There's something we should probably discuss."

Cyrion took another look at the Antivan. The man was talented, obviously, and he had the sort of face that would get all the Alienage girls swooning—and many human girls at that. But there was more to it, now that he looked closer: there was a certain protective way the Crow held himself over Finian, and the guarded, analyzing expression with which he watched Cyrion spoke of intelligence and caution in equal measure.

Valendrian had never revealed much about the nature of Finian's imprisonment at a noble estate all those years ago, but Cyrion had wondered. At an age when Soris had been bumbling over every cute girl he came across, Fin had been practicing climbing the buildings around the Alienage and picking pockets in the market. When Valendrian had told him there had been an incident with a noble's son… but he'd dismissed his suspicions when Fin never came forward about it.

That his son had never felt confident enough to tell him about this made him sad, but then again, it spoke volumes about how much his boy had grown, that he was willing to broach the topic now.

Cyrion nodded and smiled, placing a hand on his son's shoulders. "And we will. But first, I think I will have to invite you and your companions to lunch. It's the least I can do." He nodded a special thanks toward the Crow, because Finian was the kind of boy who needed an eye kept on him, and he could only assume the Crow was the one to do it. The Crow smirked, seeming to come to his own conclusions about Cyrion, and nodded back.

And then, he let the Wardens lead him and the other elves along the winding route out of the warehouse, into sunlight again.