Title: Campfire Conversations

Author: Divine Dark Angel

Summary: A Dragon Age Origins-based series of one-shots and short-chaptered stories based around the original character Arya, a warrior of the Dalish who was chosen to become a Grey Warden and, eventually, the Hero of Fereldan. It is a mish-mash of prequel-story-sequel to the events of the game, since I could not quite get over some of the plot bunnies that have plagued me since I completed the play-through. This is my first foray into the DA genre, so please forgive any minor issues with Codex. I will do my best to keep all of the facts as straight as I can. I am writing this mostly for my own pleasure, and if you enjoy it as well please review and tell me so!

Rating: Anywhere from K-M, rating will be posted on the top of the story.

Pairing: Arya x Alistair (I can't help it, he's so damn perfect!)

Disclaimer: All characters that you recognize belong to and are copywrite of BioWare. The recognizable plot items and other such things are also copyrighted to BioWare. I am simply playing in the rich world they have created for us.

Title: Arya Interrupted

Rating: T, for depressing thoughts (really, it's DA. There's always some kind of depressing thought going on)

Arya Mahariel, one of the Dalish who roamed the lands un-fettered to a specific location, looked up at her Keeper with confusion in the dark forest green of her large eyes. Only seven summers old, she did not understand what her Keeper meant when she had pulled the youngling from the circle to explain that her parents would not be returning from the hunt they had embarked on three days prior. To her young mind this simply meant that her parents would be late, perhaps delayed until the winter snows. The Keeper had sighed deeply and placed a hand on the young female's shoulder, telling her that she would be sharing a landship with Merrill for the foreseeable future.

Young Arya had been ecstatic when this news was spoken, for she and Merrill were as close as sisters. With a short bow to the Keeper she had sprinted back to the fireside to plonk down next to Merrill to share the news with her and received the joyful hug the other young female gifted her. They planned all of the fun things that they would do with their free time, when young Merrill was not learning her place as First and Arya her skills as a future Hunter for the Sabrae clan.

This time passed in blissful ignorance of the true reason Arya shared young Merrill's landship until the first snows of the winter of Arya's eighth year fell to the ground. The young female approached the Keeper shyly and tugged her skirt to get her attention.

"Keeper?" Her soft voice queried from near the taller female's hip.

"Yes child?"

"When are my parents going to return? I miss them and our Halla is pulling someone else's landship. Why have they not returned yet?" Arya looked up at her Keeper and was surprised when the dignified female knelt to look into her eyes. She brushed the deep auburn hair behind the child's ear and a look of deep sadness crossed her face.

"Oh child, I knew you were too young to understand the first time I told you of this. Your parents are gone to the after and you will not see them again until you are taken into the arms of the gods as well. It will be many years yet for you, and so you must grow and learn with Merrill and with your teachers. Your parents gave their lives for the safety of this clan and there is great honor in that. Do you understand?" The Keeper's voice was soft as she explained again to the child who had thought her parents simply missing that she would not see them again in this life.

Arya stood still as a deer that has scented the hunter. Her large green eyes widened and tears began to form in the corners. She tried vainly to hold them in, but as she bade the Keeper farewell and made for the cover of the trees a silver trail began that she was helpless to stop. Making it safely to the shelter of one of the sylvan oaks, she curled in the cradle of its roots and let the tears fall. She finally understood that her dear parents would not return to her, would not see her receive her vallaslin or take her place in the clan. She cried for the lost time she should have had with the two people who should have been there to teach and train her in the craft of her clan, and when she had reached the end of her tears she said a prayer to the gods to watch over them safely until she could return to their side to do so for them.

When no more tears would come, she stood from her nest among the roots of the sylvan tree and wiped her face off on the soft leather tunic she wore over her breeches. She had lessons with her craft-brother Tamlen soon and it would not do to let him see her cry. With a determined stride she returned to the camp, nodding to the Keeper's inquisitive look and retrieving her practice bow from the landship she and Merrill shared. At her sib's look she smiled and waved her off before turning to cross the clearing to the practice yard.

Tamlen waited there with the old Hunter who trained them, impatient as always to get started. Arya strung her bow under her tutor's watchful eye and stepped to her designated practice target. With the practice arrows head first in the soft ground before her, she took ten shots. Five of which hit the target and the rest dropped harmlessly to the side. A scowling look crossed her face as she waited for Tamlen to take his shots before she went to retrieve her arrows. A through tongue lashing from her Hunt Master the last time she went out without regard to her fellow pupils' aim had trained her well to ensure the practice yard clear of any shots going amiss.

Tamlen made all of his shots hit the target and laughed when he saw her face, "Awe cheer up da'lin! I've been at this a good deal longer than you have!"

"You're only two summers older than I am Tamlen, you are not a grey beard yet!" Arya responded, trudging out to retrieve her arrows. She knew the Hunt Master would not allow her to return to the landship until her shots were hitting the target every time. A poorly placed shot could result in quarry that suffered or got away, and their clan needed all the prey that their hunter's could bring in.

Arya's favorite part of the Hunt training was not the archery, however. No, Arya shined when it came to the martial combat lessons taught to those who would someday be called upon to defend the clan should the need arise. As wanderers, it was up to the clan to provide both law and protection to its people, and the Hunters too provided this. Arya had shown at a young age that she was nimble and quick, and had taken to the study of the sword as a duck takes to water. The fact that she was small and slight of build was not a deterrent to her, and the dogged determination she put into extra training and arm strengthening exercises showed.

Her Hunt Master had even started pairing her off with some of the older pupils, since she had beaten Tamlen so resoundingly that he refused to step onto the training ground when she held a sword in her hand. The older pupils had mocked her at first, taking in the delicate feature she had inherited from her mother and assuming that this made her weak. Within a month she won more than she lost and the older pupils had developed a grudging respect for her.

When the time came for her to make her first solo Hunt, she tracked an elk for three days before bringing it down with a clean heart shot. Her Hunt Master was very proud of her, and was there to support her when she underwent her vallaslin. The marking chosen for her was that of Mythal, the great protector. While one of the more elaborate markings, she did not flinch or cry out when the ink was applied to her face. When it was completed, the clan cheered for her and carried her off to partake of the feast prepared in her honor.

She spent two years as a Hunter for the clan, and more than once served as its protector. It was she that the Keeper tasked with guarding the great landships as they moved from camp to camp, and it was to her that the other members of the Hunt looked for guidance. Though she did not know it, she had grown into the same beauty that her mother once claimed with the humor of her father. The Keeper often smiled upon her as she carried out her duties, though she was often scolded for her sharp tongue. Her Hunt-mate Tamlen grew to infatuation with her, and often requested to be paired with her on patrols. This is why the two of them were together when they discovered the trio of quicklings that would lead them to the upheaval of their entire world upon the discovery of an ancient artifact that should have remained lost to time.

One of them would survive the encounter, changed forever. The other was lost to the madness of the Blight, a thing that had been only a legend until now. Arya's life, already marked by upheaval, would again change drastically as she was taken from her clan and the life she knew and thrust into a battle to save what was left of her world from the ravishes of the Darkspawn. Fate was to be kind to her in one thing only, the Warden Alistair. He would provide the companionship that would be her solace through the storm of the Blight and give her the hope that there would be a happier end to their tale. These are the stories of Arya and Alistair, the two young Wardens who stood as the only two beacons of hope in the darkness of the Fifth Blight. These are the stories that have not made it into the history books, of those quiet times that filled the spaces in between the heroics and proved that even heroes are human….or Dalish as the case may be.

Notes:

Vallaslin-"blood writing." A coming of age rite in which a Dalish Elf acquires the facial markings of their clan.

Landship - a kind of cart pulled by the white deer-like Halla

Quicklings - also shemlen, also shem. Slang term for humans

Dalish - the last of the Elvhenan. They consider themselves different from the city elves.