Disclaimer: I don't own Dragon Age or any of its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other fans like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

Rating: T

Spoilers: Takes place ten years or more after the events of Dragon Age: Origins, from the background of a female Human Noble pc who has recruited Loghain and persuaded an "altered" Alistair to marry Anora and rule as King despite his survival, and persuaded Loghain to perform the dark ritual with Morrigan. May contain spoilers for Origins, Awakening, and Dragon Age II as well as the novels The Stolen Throne and The Calling.

A/N: Kind of a short chapter, I know, really just an interlude, but I love mabaris and couldn't resist giving them their own billing. They're going to be real players as this story continues to unfold and won't be the last in the group. BTW, just in case your mind's eye is picturing something unnatural, Mustard the Mabari and her yellow siblings are not mustard-yellow as in French's "this-product-made-with-melted-crayons" yellow. Food processed to the point of looking like nothing that has ever lived is a modern development that I'm sure Ferelden doesn't have - or want.

Chapter Seventeen: A Dog of the House of Cousland

Prince Duncan was now the proud master of a fine specimen of mabari pup, one of the stable master's litter. Mustard, he'd named her. Her coat was yellow. They were inseparable, as was only right, and it gave Loghain some small comfort in troubled times to know the boy would have a stout hound to watch over him. Elilia first met the pup on a visit to the nursery accompanied by Loghain and Seanna, and she expressed due appreciation for the creature, to its young master's delight.

"You are a lucky young man, to have so fine a hound," she said to the prince, while rubbing Mustard's oversized ears. "My Kiveal was my finest and most faithful companion for many years."

"What happened to him, Lady Cousland?" Duncan asked, with interest.

"He lived to a ripe old doggy age, at least for a mabari that had tasted Darkspawn blood. He passed away some time ago, however."

The boy's arms tightened around Mustard's neck protectively. "You must miss him."

"I do. I think of him often."

The boy pondered deeply for a time, while scratching the itchy places he already knew Mustard liked best to be scratched. "The stable master's bitch had a very large litter," he said at last. "Several of the pups haven't imprinted on anyone yet. Perhaps one of them would choose you."

She smiled sadly. "It is a nice thought. I miss very much having a good hound at my side, though I could never replace my dear old Kiveal."

"He can't be replaced," Seanna pointed out, "but he can be succeeded."

"Seanna's right," Loghain, though he felt something of a hypocrite even as he said it. He'd never been able to contemplate another mabari in all the many years since Adalla died, though he'd certainly enjoyed being part of Kiveal's pack while it lasted. "You should have a look at them. Seems to me someone like you would have a better-than-average chance of being chosen."

"I would love to see the mother," Seanna said. "I'd never seen a mabari until I was with the army, and I was too afraid to get near. They're so big, they looked like they could swallow me entire. I should like to meet a full-grown hound up close, as long as I'm not alone."

"Well, I suppose we could take a peek, if you really want to see," Elilia said, trying and failing to hide her excitement at the thought of possibly having another mabari companion. "We can go down to the stables after tea."

Interested to see what would happen, Loghain went with them. He stayed well back, however, to avoid the possibility that one of the pups might accidentally imprint to him. There were four fine pups remaining from the very large litter of seven, two of them yellow like Mustard. The other two were quite unusual creatures, however. One, a male, was pure white with brilliantly blue eyes. The other, female, was black as midnight in the Deep Roads with a white blaze upon her snout and another upon her chest. All the pups clambered over each other in excitement to greet their distinguished visitor and sniff her hands and lick her face. Seanna made a valiant effort to approach the mother of the pups but an incurious glance in her direction from the great hound sent her slinking back to stand behind Loghain.

Eventually the yellow pups returned to their own amusements and the black female wandered off. The white male, however, clearly thought Elilia quite a satisfactory individual. He had chosen her. Loghain smiled despite himself. The black female was the biggest and most impressive of the pups but the white one had Elilia written all over him from the start and looked like he would grow to be quite the hound. White mabari were very rare. Elilia looked over at him, grinning, face covered in dog slobber and radiantly happy. Her gaze caught on something and she laughed. "Don't look now, but I think you've got an admirer."

He felt something heavy press against his leg. He looked down and saw the black female looking up at him, leaning hard against his shin, tongue lolling and stumpy tail wagging vigorously. "Go on, get back to your mother, now, you," he said.

The pup whined, urged forward slightly, then subsided, sat down on her haunches, and looked at him with dark amber eyes that implored.

"Does that mean she's imprinted?" Seanna asked, excitedly. "She's chosen you, hasn't she?"

"No, she just wants the wedge of cheese I've got in my pocket," Loghain growled. He took it out and tossed it in the direction of the stables and the puppy's mother. The pup paid no attention to the treat whatsoever, and the yellow pups got into a brief squabble over it.

Limpid puppy eyes waged battle with ice-blue eyes, and the blue eyes were the first to falter. Elilia laughed merrily. "Yield, Loghain, and have done with it. She's chosen you, and that's all there is to say about that. This is hardly the first time you've been defeated in single combat by a young bitch."

"Is she your chosen Champion, then?" Loghain mocked lightly, though he felt far from jocular. He knelt down and the pup put a paw on his knee. "You have atrocious taste in humans, youngling," he muttered as he scratched her ears. Ecstatic to receive attention from her chosen master, the pup closed her eyes and leaned into his hand, panting.

"What will you name him?" Seanna asked Elilia as she and her new pup joined them.

"He's white as snow, so I think I shall call him Haakon, after old Haakon Wintersbreath."

"Heathen," Loghain muttered under his breath, though with the half of a smile.

Elilia fisted her hands on her hips. "All right, Devout Andrastian, what shall your new friend's name be?"

He thought for a moment, and then realized he'd already found the proper name for such a fine dog. "Champion."

"But it's a girl!" Seanna blurted. Loghain cocked an eyebrow at her.

"Champions cannot be female?" he asked. "Elilia is Champion of Redcliffe, though of all her honors I'd call that the very merest. A few years back the city of Kirkwall declared itself a Champion that was also a woman, if I heard the news correctly."

"Right, you're right. Forget I said anything. It just sounded rather boyish to me at first. Champion - it's a good name."

Loghain stood and found the stable master. He presented him with a handful of gold coins. In Ferelden only the unscrupulous sold mabari puppies, but when one was fortunate enough to be chosen by a pup bred by another, and one could afford to pay, a kind of gratuity was only proper. It showed that you were aware of the honor you'd received in being chosen, and expressed thanks for the care the dog had been given before it imprinted.

Duncan and Mustard watched all of this with great interest from the far side of the yard. The boy's keen eyes saw that not only had the Lady been chosen, but so too had Grandfather. And by the finest pups in the litter. Excited, he raced his pup back inside, eager to share the news with mother and father.

As the trio - quintet now, with the dogs - left the stables the stable master dropped to his knees before his own mabari, took her face in both hands, and roughed her up lovingly. "Pups gone to the young Prince, the Lady Cousland, and Teyrn Loghain himself! Mirani, my lass, you've done well by your babies, you have! You're the Queen of Mabaris!"

The dog barked her complete agreement to this sentiment.

LINE BREAK HERE

He woke with a start and reached for the blade he kept on the bedside table, but in a heartbeat he registered the sound of snuffling and his memory returned. He lifted the sleeping fur and peered beneath it to see a pair of shining eyes staring back at him from somewhere near his knees. Champion had nosed her way under the covers at the foot of the bed and started burrowing her way up to the head of it.

"This will not stand, young lady," he said as severely as he could manage, "if it should happen that there is a human lady in this bed with me some night." The dog's stump of a tail wagged briskly and she whined her understanding. "Come on up, then, if such is your intention."

She bellied up and stuck her head out from under the blankets. She licked his face to show her gratitude and stretched out beside him with her head resting on his chest. He scratched her ears and that itchy spot on the side of her neck - her human had smart hands, such a blessing! - and petted her a bit before falling asleep again, his hand still at rest upon her back. Champion missed her mother, and her brothers and sisters, but the sound of her human's steady heartbeat was soothing and soon she was asleep herself. She was not homesick, for the part of her that knew this was her proper master knew also that where he was she was home.