All Fall Down
By: SurreptitiousFox245
Disclaimer: I don't own either Elder Scrolls or Dragon Age. I'm just playing in the sandbox so graciously provided for me.
Quick Author's Note: I'm a bit later with this than I wanted to be, but my summer has been insanely...well, insane. Yeah. Anyway, hope you enjoy!
Chapter 16
"Don't you, when strangers and friends come to call, straighten the cushions, kick the books under the bed and put away the letter you were writing? How many of us want any of us to see us as we really are? Isn't the mirror hostile enough?"
-Jeanette Winterson
~Thedas – 9:41 Dragon~
The ceiling, predictably, had been a no-go. Neither you nor Solas could reach it for various reasons, and there was also the issue of the edges not looking particularly stable. You didn't care for a repeat performance of your tumble into what turned out to be an old mine trying to get out of it, thank you very much. You'd had enough broken bones for one day. It took some scouring, but with Solas' actual sight and your uncanny hearing from having no sight, the two of you managed to find a well-concealed tunnel out into blessed open air hidden behind the gaudy dragon statue in the second chamber.
The statue was simply a two-feet tall, three-dimensional rendition of the same, upwards-rearing dragon depicted in the amulets the cultists wore, but it was encrusted in jewels, some real some not, and opulent to the tenth extreme. It was an altar, if the offerings around its three foot granite base counted for anything. However, it wasn't particularly Tevinter in design, and you voiced this opinion to Solas as the two of you labored to shove the damned thing out of the way.
At your mentioning, the mage frowned. "Perhaps it is meant to be one of the Old Gods? They are often depicted as dragons, are they not?" You shook your head absently, running a finger along a ruby inlaid as a single, fiery eye. The other was a deep, soulful sapphire. It clashed, but also seemed to fit somehow, like it belonged there. The whole thing gave you an uneasy feeling. It was piecemeal but seamless at the same time.
"Which one, though?" You rapped a nail on a fake diamond around the dragon's horns. "This isn't typical Tevinter form for a sculpture."
Solas moved to gain a better look at the statue, studying it with a scholar's practiced eye and also running his hands along the surface, trying to find any inconsistencies. "If I were to guess, I would hazard this to be Urthemiel from the decoration. But you are correct as well in saying this is not a typical portrayal. I've never seen any of the Old Gods shown in such a way, Urthemiel included."
"I'm liking the situation less and less the more I can't place it."
"The Herald should be informed of all this, as well as the Seeker," Solas sighed as he straightened his posture. You froze as his words sunk in, the breadth of them, the potential implications. Warily, you gestured to yourself.
You asked, "You mean to inform them of everything?" There would be no fighting him if he wanted to—gods, he had every right, you supposed. But that didn't mean you would stick around to face the consequences. Just as easily as the Shadow Broker joined the Inquisition, it would take just as little effort to disappear from it, lay low for a while. Maybe an age or two, just to be sure. You figured you still had a good seven hundred years on you.
Well, if the Breach didn't swallow everything up in the meantime, that was.
To his credit, the poor apostate looked dreadfully confused for a moment. He had his head tilted and everything. "What do you me—ah. I see." You could feel his eyes locked pointedly on your face. The moments where he considered his words passed by as some of the slowest you'd ever experienced.
"No," he said finally, and you let out the breath you hadn't been aware you were holding. "This is your secret to tell, lethallan. I would be pleased if you would agree to answer a few questions, however." His gaze was boring into you again, that soulful stare that tried to pry you apart by the seams and show every dirty secret you kept locked away. You winced. At times you wondered if Solas was even aware he was doing it.
"I suppose I don't see the harm. On several topics, I can't claim to be an expert. Just fair warning—there might be questions even I can't answer."
"How do you know the statue is not Tevinter?" The question was fired off rapidly. It took you aback for a moment, and you were sure the look your face contorted into all but screamed "What in Oblivion?" Was he testing your knowledge of Tevinter art forms or something? He'd agreed with you! You doubted he'd have done that if the answer wasn't as clear as you believed it to be.
Shrugging, you replied as if it was obvious, "It isn't. It's too much. Tevinter is all dark and spiky and antique. This isn't—it's flashy and I think even an Orlesian would be hard-pressed to not find it too loud."
"You misunderstand," corrected Solas with a small, wary smile in his voice. "I mean to ask how you know what it looks like at all."
Ah.
You rolled your eyes as the two of you re-commenced in sliding the granite-and-metal monstrosity off to the side. Bloody thing was heavier than it looked. "I said I'm not completely blind."
"Yet you never elaborated beyond saying so." After sending a curious glance down the darkened, uncovered tunnel, Solas apparently deemed it safe enough to begin traversing. You decided to appease some of his unspoken curiosity and casted a weak magelight. It flickered both from the rust of disuse and the severely depleted status of your magika reserves. Still, it did the trick and lit the passage quite well from where you placed it hovering steadily between the two of you, and you could only shrug helplessly at the raised eyebrow the other elf shot you.
The light bobbed as if mimicking your apprehension to answer. "It's hard to elaborate on something one doesn't entirely understand themselves. I can…sort of see through touch, but it's…blurry." You frowned at the words that wouldn't come to you. Perhaps a bit of you also was frowning at how readily you were spilling information, but you honestly didn't see the harm in it. If Solas wasn't fully aware of how easily you could vanish when you wanted to, then you had sorely overestimated him, something you not often did. Provided the elf was smart about it (something you didn't doubt in the slightest), he'd realized the futility of informing the Inquisition of information you did not wish to give.
"I see," he hummed simply in response. Solas motioned to the light. "And this? I've seen similar spells, however none quite so…"
You grinned, "Responsive? I believe this particular magelight was considered to belong to the alteration school, but in truth, it's closer to conjuration. Probably why I'm able to use it without much trouble." Allowing the light to move however it wanted, you felt the ghost of a wisp make a few circles around your and Solas' heads before willing it back to its position between the two of you.
"It feels alive."
Solas was walking now, and you quickened your pace to keep up. "In a sense, it is alive. It's…the closest I can get to explaining it is that it's the memory of a spell wisp. Not truly one, of course—that would take more magika and I wouldn't be able to direct it like this. Daedric wisps are tricky little buggers; never where you tell them to go."
Suddenly, the elf stopped and was almost glaring at you. He wasn't quite, but it was close. "You summon spirits?"
Ah, shit, you cursed mentally, trying to backtrack what you'd said and realizing just how your words could be taken as out of context as they were. You'd always been a shit teacher. Trying to explain all of this stuff that you considered second nature was going to be the death of you if this was any indication. "No. Not… Alright, this here isn't actually a wisp. It's a memory of one. Like how that vision at the Breach was a memory of what happened to the Divine." The magelight dipped and rose as if to second your statement, and you had to resist some very uncharacteristic squealing. You'd always loved this spell. It was unintentionally adorable.
"I can use conjuration magic, yes. In fact, it's my specialty." You raised a hand to cut Solas off as he prepared to speak—probably something patronizing, if you had to guess. It had completely slipped your mind just how your words might be taken in a Thedosian context to someone who considered spirits among his closest friends—spirits that could be corrupted and twisted into vile, horrific things when summoned and bound. "However, as with every other spell I can cast, my summoning is different from your summoning. I don't summon spirits or demons from the Fade. I summon Daedra, which, as far as I am aware, are completely different. Daedra can be temporarily bound to the caster with no ill effects and are harmlessly sent back to Oblivion when fatigued, dispelled, or they have expended the amount of magika used to bind them to this plane."
He was still frowning, but not near as bad. It wasn't quite as fierce, and it wasn't quite as terrified. "Oblivion? Is that perhaps what your people call the Fade?"
"No. We called the Fade the Dreamsleeve." You flushed at his pointedly tilted head. "Silly name, I know. You'd think we'd be more original. Anyway, I've…theorized due to the differences in magic that Thedas is…placed far closer to the Drea—er, the Fade than Nirn was. And Nirn, conversely, was closer to one of the Oblivion realms."
"There is more than one?"
You mindlessly tapped at a depleted ore vein as you passed it, glittering in the spell light. "Sixteen, with a Lord for each. The inhabitants of these realms are called Daedra, and my magic is drawn from Oblivion. Hence, Daedric magic. That I can access my magic at all proves that Thedas is within the same plane that Nirn was and not in another one entirely. Your magic, on the other hand, is different." Quickly, to prove a point, you charged your hand with a bit of magika and tapped the elf's shoulder. He smothered the jolt well enough, but you could tell that the suddenness of the touch combined with the lacing of magic through your fingers had startled him.
"That felt grating, didn't it?" A hesitant nod and you allowed the lazy grin to spread across your face. "Good, I'd been wondering if how your magic felt to me went both ways. That tells me now beyond a shadow of a doubt that Thedosian magic is what my people called Aedric or Aetherial, drawn from Aetherius. My people draw on Daedric magic instead because it is nearly impossible to bypass Oblivion to reach the Aetherial plane. So rare is it that there were only a handful of recorded incidences where such a thing occurred. Thedas being placed right up against or even partially inside of the Dreamsleeve, the Fade, would explain why pulling on it is so easy for you. It has long been thought that the Dreamsleeve acts as a connection between Mundus, what we call the plane of Existence, and Aetherius."
Well, more like a hole punched straight through it, but you'd save the description of Aurbis and Wheel for a later date.
A sharp dip in the path was followed by a veer to the left. There was an untapped silver vein right at the crux of the turn; you would have to remember that. "Your people appear to have had quite an understanding of how planes related to one another. I believe there was a theory among the ancient elves of something similar to your Oblivion. Banal'ras'arla, it was called. Home of shadows. As far as I am aware, however, it never had any proof, and I am unfamiliar with much else aside from name and basic concepts." Solas had a wry smirk behind his voice, begging to be loosed.
"Interesting, but I think we just had longer to figure it out…hold on," you frowned, trying to go through some calculations in your head. Gah, numbers jumbled your brain even worse than languages and metaphysics did. "Merethic was…twenty-five hundred? Then Dawn I think was six or so. First, second, third…fourth… It was over seven and a half thousand years from Convention to end. Or less depending on how you want to view the Middle Dawn fiasco."
Solas shook his head at you as light from something other than your spell could be seen spilling around the next bend. It looked natural from your blurry angle. "The city of Arlathan was founded over eight thousand years ago, according to records, and Elvhen civilization existed long before that. Middle Dawn?"
You narrowed your eyes a bit on his pronunciation of "elven", but filed it away. You'd only heard the word said that way from Merrill, but she'd received harsh backlash from Marethari for using it. To this day despite about a month of prying, you didn't know why.
"Damn. And here I was hoping to not have to suggest that we were just smarter than you." You let him peek around the corner first, grumbling all the while. "Also, nope. Leaving descriptions of the Marukhati Selective and Dragon Breaks for a much later date. They give me headaches on good days. This is not a good day." Solas actually laughed as he gave the all clear and stepped out into blessed sunlight. The sound was outwardly happy, but there was an undercurrent of melancholy surrounding Arlathan that you didn't want to ask about. You weren't particularly in the mood to have an "I saw it in the Fade" excuse thrown back at you. A lie to your face (and you knew it was a lie, or at least a half-truth) when you were going against your better judgment and being so honest just didn't appeal.
He was grinning at you, though, an amused thing that practically peeled several decades worth of stress off his face, so you supposed not prying had its merits. "Or perhaps you simply spent more of that time amassing knowledge on the subject."
"Hmm, true. We didn't have a coddling Chantry looking over our shoulders the past thousand or so years, throwing a superstitious hissy fit every time we so much as cast a fireball. I imagine that would put a bit of a damper on anyone hoping to traverse the Fade for any clues," you chortled quietly at your mild barb.
That was, however, how you ended up explaining Nirn's magic, religious, and political situation before the fall to a raptly curious apostate all the way back to where your horse had been left.
Grass, it turned out, caused quite the stain on ironbark. Solas was able to find your mask tossed carelessly into a pile of weeds once the two of you meandered your way back to Saffron. It had somehow not gotten damaged beyond a few scuffs that would easily be sanded out, but green and sticky flora certainly had mashed most spectacularly along the left side. And it refused to scrub out, so you were left sporting a mask that made you look like you'd nuzzled your face in a bush.
Solas was far too amused when he had informed you in a matter-of-fact voice of how much Varric would appreciate the addition. You supposed angrily shooting him crude gestures only helped fuel the humor he drew from the whole thing. Made you feel better, though.
He actually had a good sense of humor on him, if in a quiet manner, and his sour-and-dourness from the trip to Redcliffe was attributed to his preoccupation figuring out why the Veil had felt so strange. You had to laugh at how Alan was using the man as a battlemage, not because he was poor at fighting (actually, the strength of Solas' combat magic was mildly frightening), but because the elf was quite obviously a scholar through and through. He reminded you of Falion in that he couldn't ignore a mystery, and you could see Vienelé in his apparent fascination with history.
Actually, almost all of the things you'd told him about Nirn were facts the Breton woman had crammed into your head in the first place. She'd honest-to-goodness been insulted that you hadn't known what the Marukhati Selective was or that it had been a part of the Alessian Order. After sitting through an impromptu three-hour lesson on the Imgan Prophet-Most-Simian and his anti-mer campaign, you made the mistake of pointing out that of course the Altmer Temple you were raised in wouldn't have included the group in its curriculum. They liked censuring too much, and mentions of Marukh that you did remember painted him as more of a devil than a devout priest. He worshipped the wrong god, definitely not the living Altmer as the rest of the Imga did, and got struck from history because of it. It happened quite frequently. She'd gone on another three-hour rant about biased racism in Altmeri education (ironically in defense of a racist) and only stopped when Saeta threatened to set her on fire.
That hadn't been fun. Something Solas would do, perhaps, if provoked on the right subject. But not fun.
Anyway, once you and said lecture-happy elf had settled back in camp and Saffron was set contentedly munching on a carrot across the camp from Theneras, a bird was sent to Haven informing them of the situation. You somehow were roped into writing it, and you suspected duplicity as your elven companion had been far too fascinated with peering over your shoulder as you did so and pointing out how your handwriting was even more atrocious than you'd originally believed. He did help you a little with it, so there was some good involved in the humiliation.
Leliana's scouts arrived a week later to secure the cave with news that the Herald wasn't far behind. Alan wanted to see the mine, but the presence of Blight made it far too dangerous. No one was willing to risk the only hope there was at sealing the Breach to what amounted to a wasting sickness that's only cure in and of itself was a death sentence over half the time, so a Grey Warden was being sent instead. Gordon Blackwall, the report said. Leliana wanted to ask the man a few questions on the rather mysterious disappearance of Grey Wardens from Fereldan and sent Alan to escort him, but it appeared Blight so close to the Crossroads warranted his presence in the Hinterlands far more urgently than in Haven.
You doubted there would be much he could do aside from give advice on how to handle the infected bodies, but even you knew about all that could be done was to thoroughly burn them and to never, under any circumstances, either bury the ashes or scatter them. Infected ashes needed to be entombed somewhere that didn't run the risk of contaminating soil, wild flora, groundwater, drinking water, or irrigation water. What with the years scouting around the Anvil, this wasn't your first showdown dealing with the infection and how to dispose of what it touched. It was part of why you weren't quite so terrified at the prospect of being infected yourself—you knew what to expect, and after a day of not noticing anything, you had known you were fine even without Solas magically clearing you.
Still, Leliana didn't entirely trust what you had to say, experience in the Deep Roads be damned, so this Warden was going to be a thing whether you liked it or not. He'd be arriving with Trevelyan and Varric, along with the Tevinter mage from Redcliffe, apparently, because there was also something mentioned about a plan to deal with Alexius.
Dand was going to be receiving a letter asking him if he and his mysterious Grey Warden cousin you half suspected was actually fake knew anything about this Blackwall. And you'd asked if he could scrounge anything up through his contacts about a Dorian Pavus, too. Never could be too prepared. That the mage had followed Alan back to Haven without anyone noticing just set your teeth on edge.
After hearing about the Templars, apparently both Josephine and Cassandra had sent letters to Therinfal Redoubt all but pleading for a meeting with the Lord Seeker. One had been a formal letter and the other…strongly-worded (no bets needed on which belonged to whom), but there had, predictably, been no response. Red lyrium infection worried Alan enough that he sent a small entourage headed by the Iron Bull and his Chargers, not so much a polite knock as a stern warning with the battering ram to prove it. Or battering bull, as the case was.
The Iron Ram just didn't have the same ring to it.
Had you any contacts within the order, you would have gotten in touch with them. Alas, the Templars had been the one organization you had stalwartly refused to deal with simply out of self-preservation, and as such, any points of information you did have were second-hand through Dand or Dagna. And Dagna was incognito at the moment, so it was all a matter of whenever Dand got your letter, managed to get a hold of whatever contacts he might have, hear back, and then get back to you. It was a process that would take time the Inquisition didn't have. So it devolved into a waiting game to see what Bull would find.
You hated waiting games.
Greeting the scouts was a boring ordeal made comfortable by both Solas' insistence on doing most of the speaking and that your femur, which was stubborn about mending, had completely healed between your tumble and their arrival. That you'd also procured a new set of clothes, cowl, and gloves didn't hurt anything, either, and having the familiar heft of your mask was cathartic. Solas also seemed to notice that you were to capacity for secret-spilling and had refrained from asking about anything in-depth, thankfully.
The scouts asked about the ice marks and mashed Templar bodies. Without actually confirming or denying anything, they'd been lead to believe that the corpses were Solas' handiwork—you'd never been more thankful for the mage's partialness to frost magic than you were in that moment.
You both had to escort the four men and three women to the mine, but once there you were more than able to leave them to their own devices and wait for the Herald's arrival the next day. Alan, Varric, Dorian, and a surly warrior you could only guess was Warden-Constable Blackwall trudged into camp with absolutely no pomp, soaked to the bone from catching the torrential beginnings of a seasonal rain and looking wretchedly miserable. The first thing they did was shuffle into the large tent you'd thought to set up beforehand and try to get some feeling back into their fingers before going back out to put up their personal tents.
Solas and yourself were loitering around in said tent, carelessly playing a card game to wait out the rain when they stumbled inside in a heap. They hadn't surprised either of you as you'd heard them sloshing along before they actually got to camp, but you and the other elf nonetheless sat looking at the cursing mess of wet armor and leather and people with raised eyebrows.
"Well," you drawled, picking up a new card and deciding to frown at it instead of your companions behind your mask, "that's a fine 'how do you do?'" Solas took that moment to quietly lay down a few cards, and you scowled. Sneaky bastard…
From somewhere on the canvas-covered floor, Alan's chestnut head tilted at an awkward angle. "Oh, Lys! Solas! How are you? Have you met Blackwall? No? Meet Blackwall!" What was supposed to be a thumb-jerk was more of a half-assed hand-flop in the general direction of a slumped mound of black hair, silver armor, gray padding, and bulk. Though waterlogged, the Warden was a large man and undoubtedly formidable if the nicks on his shield and handaxe counted for anything.
Said Warden gave a grunt in reply, but didn't vocalize anything beyond that. It was Varric who spoke up from where he was curled disturbingly around Bianca. Him and that crossbow...wait, was he…? Ew, gods, he was—you were going to have more trouble than usual sleeping tonight. "Prowler, Chuckles, meet Hero." You rolled your eyes—of course Varric already gave him a nickname. Of course.
"Pleasure." The dryness in your voice belonged in a desert. "Rough trip, I take it?"
The Tevinter croaked from his quivering puddle of silk and buckles, "Vishante kaffas, woman—what do you think?!"
"Oh yeah—this is Sparkler," Varric added. You couldn't stop the snorting laugh that erupted from your throat, and you couldn't have cared less that it drew a few looks.
"How fitting. Better buck up, Pavus—it'll get worse somehow."
Solas raised a brow at you when you slapped his hand away from your cards and motioned instead to the solitary one that was the draw pile. Dorian actually lifted his head up from the ground and glared heatedly at you, not seeing or caring about the exchange. And...Morihaus' nose ring, was that eyeliner running down his face? "I'm rethinking this venture. You all can handle Alexius without me."
You rolled your eyes and set down cards of your own. "Speaking of, what's the deal with that, Trevelyan? The scouts didn't know and the letter said nothing."
"Windmill...ugh...later," was all you managed to decipher from Alan's incoherent humming. You tilted your head. The man was half asleep.
Solas smirked. "You're admitting the Shadow Broker actually does not know?" A glare was halfhearted, tempered when the elf on the receiving end of your ire was forced to fork over three of his cards. You accepted them gleefully and placed down a set of four next to two others on the small table.
"I'm good," you shrugged, "but I'm not that good."
Solas hummed, and you finally accepted that you were done for. "Is that so? Perhaps not, as I believe you owe me your sevens?" Growling, you flung the three cards left in your hands at his face. They didn't quite make it, instead fluttering to the tabletop harmlessly, one covering a portion of Solas' matching sets of cards. He had ten to your three. Bastard.
"How are you so good at 'Go Fish'? It's practically all chance!"
The elf looked smugger than you were comfortable with, and you just knew he'd done something but also knew there was no way to prove anything. He had to have—it was the only way! You narrowed your eyes. Sneaky bastard!
Varric scoffed. "Seriously? You're playing 'Go Fish'? I had you pegged as a betting kind of girl, Prowler. That game's no fun unless there's coin or stripping involved, and I see no evidence of either."
You were going to just ignore that last part. It was better on your sanity that way. "You don't understand, dwarf. I never lose. This is the sixth game, and I've lost six times. No one is that lucky with 'Go Fish'. No one."
The Warden grumbled from his corner, "Six times? Sure you're not just bad at cards and no one ever told you?"
"I'm sure," you said flatly, crossing your arms and feeling a little insulted. Solas still hadn't said a word, and you didn't think he was going to as he began to pack up the deck of cards. "The game's luck, Warden Blackwall. And in my thirty-four years, I've yet to lose at cards...until today."
"Sore loser? Or, unlucky, then?" offered Dorian. He wasn't addressing you at all, but rather Varric and Blackwall. You huffed.
Chortling, the dwarf of the group sat up and began fluffing out his hair to try and get it some semblance of dry. "She better not play Wicked Grace with him, if that's the case." Dead silence, and his face fell comically. "She didn't, right Chuckles?" True to his nickname, Solas chuckled and nodded, and you promptly wanted to hide.
"She did, I'm afraid."
"And lost?" Blackwall seemed astounded, more tuned into the conversation now. "With that mask? How?"
You grumbled, "That's what I want to know."
"Shit, how bad he clear you out?" asked Varric, voice colored with amusement as he concluded the real reason why you had devolved to playing stake-less 'Go Fish'-you were broke. You deflated further and, in lieu of answering, tossed him your quite obviously empty coin purse. There wasn't a copper to be had in the blasted thing.
"All of your coin?!"
"Yep, all of it," you groused.
He threw your coin purse back to you. The sound of empty leather flopping through the air where there so recently had been plentiful jingling was downright depressing. "What about that money I lost to you in Val Royeaux? I know you didn't spend it yet."
"That, too."
"It alone was fifty sovereigns!" The poor dwarf was absolutely agog.
"I know."
Varric gave Solas a look that was a cross between confusion, respect, awe, and maybe a little bit of fear. "Damn, Chuckles."
"My sentiments exactly." Glaring at the elf again, you barely noticed him giving a perfectly neutral look to the occupants of the room. You were far too focused trying to make daggers fly from your glower and stab him. It wasn't working, but it was probably the closest you would actually be able to get to stabbing him, so it would have to do.
All he did was shrug as he put away the cards. Your grumbling was left unacknowledged. "I suggest instead of theorizing on Lys' card skills, we wake the Herald and discuss this plan?" You eventually shrugged and conceded. After all, Alan didn't come up with it all on his own. How bad could it be?
"No."
Turns out, it was bad.
Alan gave to you a deadpan stare. "No?"
"No," you reiterated with a contradictory nod. "Find someone else."
He was flummoxed, and it was slightly funny. It was like he couldn't fathom why you would disagree with him, and you couldn't fathom his lack of fathoming. "Wha—why? Why won't you...? I don't understand."
You rolled your eyes (not that Alan could see it) and continued brushing down Varric's pony. Whoever assigned you mount duty was going to pay dearly when you got your hands on them. Alan continued to stare at you as if you'd sprouted another head, but you studiously ignored him. He didn't understand that no meant no, apparently. It seemed his inner entitled rich kid was showing.
Trevelyan's genius plan had himself and a small entourage walking into the trap that was Redcliffe Castle as a distraction while a small team of scouts plus the newest Tevinter addition snuck in through some escape tunnel. An ambush for the ambush, as it were. However, he wanted you to lead the scouts into the castle.
You. Leading. The idea was laughable, so that's exactly what you did. The last time you lead anything, a world died, your network a whole other puppy that you weren't going to equate to anything.
Not that you could exactly inform Alan of your horrible track record, so he was being particularly ornery about your unexplained refusal. "Lys, come on, if anyone can get those scouts inside undetected, it's you!"
You tilted your head mockingly. "Oh? Can I? I was under the impression that I work alone, but if you apparently know more about my limits and abilities, then please, by all means! Do enlighten me." The man pursed his lips.
"Don't make me order you."
"Don't make me ignore you," you shot back icily.
"Maker above—I give up!" Alan's hands were thrown up into the air borderline violently, and you paused your brushing to listen curiously. "Why does every conversation with you have to turn into an argument?"
Outwardly seething now, you tossed the brush into a saddle bag and flipped your mask's glower onto Alan. "Maybe because I'm here to help the Inquisition close the Breach, not get bossed around like a recruit!"
"You know what might help with that?"
Sneering, you spat, "What?"
"Leading the scouts!"
With jerky motions borne of anger was the pony's tack removed. Of all the presumptuous, preposterous, confounded preconceptions... "The answer is no, and that's final. Have Pavus do it."
"Dorian," he emphasized because your aversion to given names was another thing that apparently annoyed him, "isn't an infiltrator with a flawless record."
Snorting, you couldn't help but think of Kinloch hold, or the Thalmor Embassy back in Skyrim, or any number of thieving attempts gone wrong from your youth. You were miserable with old-fashioned stealth and advising a group how to cohesively utilize it. There was too heavy a reliance on potions and spells to keep you concealed that other people could not use. What did Alan think was the reason behind you never setting traps or ambushes like a typical rogue? In groups with the handicaps you faced in Thedas, you fought more like a warrior, albeit a rather agile one. "If you think my record is truly flawless, then you are misguided."
Alan groaned, "Flawless or flawed, you're the best I've got. You were so worried about going to the mages before, I understand that. I am, too! It's why I don't want to go in there without knowing my best has my back." You stared down at the ground for a few minutes, trying to digest the words but not quite managing to. Something in his voice, in his tone, told you he was being genuine. It wasn't…people didn't…
He was acting like he admired you. But by any name—be it Lys Ralvayn, Shadow Broker, Amaryllis, Lysana Nirith, Celria Caradriil, Vaelyswen Direnni, or whatever other alias you could concoct—you weren't someone to be admired.
"Look, I appreciate it. Really, I do." You turned to face him, hoping that somehow the stoniness of your mask could for once convey what you felt. "But trust me, I'm not the one you want leading those scouts. I'm sorry."
The Herald's responding laugh was more of a bitter yelp as he ran a hand through shaggy curls. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm sorry, too." A moment of awkward silence ensued where you refused to look away and Alan refused to look at you before he finally took a few slow, stumbling steps back to his tent. When he was out of earshot, you sighed and fiddled with Flemeth's brooch.
Trevelyan didn't understand, and you figured you'd be out of line to blame him for it. All he was doing was working with the situation handed to him, allocating trust where he felt he could spare it so as to make the most out of a shitty scenario. How could you blame him when you'd done the same thing yourself twelve years ago? You trusted Idgrod. You trusted Lurks-In-Shadows, Vienelé, Falion…
But you also trusted him, and look where that got you, that pessimistic little voice hissed in the back of your mind. One single, bad decision in the middle of a rock and a hard place, and far too many innocent people paid the price for your mistake. You barely trusted yourself to run your network without fucking up, and as far as that went, most of it was unknowingly handled by Dand anymore. All you did was check things and change flower colors.
You snorted. It was funny—changing flower colors. Did that make you some kind of over-glorified florist, then?
"If you glare at that tree any longer, I think it'll spontaneously combust," a dry voice said from behind you. You didn't jump, but it was a near thing.
Rolling your eyes, you walked over to Saffron and offered him a carrot from your pack. The rig's face practically glowed as he devoured the vegetable like he hadn't eaten in weeks. "Go away, Pavus. I'm not in the mood." You'd learned in the past five hours of sharing a soggy camp with him that the man was a ball of sarcasm and flamboyancy. He came on a lot strong and didn't seem to care that his personality—and his ego—took up enough space for three people.
"Oh, please," the mage waved away some imaginary pest as he trotted after you like a lost puppy. "Not in the mood for me and my extraordinary charm? My dear, I think you're feverish."
"Okay, first off, call me 'dear' again, and I will not be responsible for my actions. Second, go away."
Dorian shrugged offhandedly. "I think Varric will agree with me when I say you just give off a vibe begging for nicknames. And by 'give off a vibe', I mean 'you're so secretive, it's mildly frightening and we give you nicknames to make you a bit more approachable'."
"Good," you scoffed. "That just means less people ought to be bothering me." The last part was pointedly directed at the mustached Tevinter. He studiously ignored you, something you were sure he had practice at doing.
"Odd then that you'd join the Inquisition. Seems a bit cohesive for your taste, wouldn't you agree?" Pausing in the middle of loosening Saffron's saddle, you narrowed your eyes into suspicious slits. Was he…? Mara's mercy—he was interrogating you! What was it with the mages around here? Why were all of them so nosy?
You said slowly, "What does it matter?"
He rolled his eyes. "Don't act all guarded and suspicious. The whole camp could hear your little quarrel. Varric and I were betting on how long it would take you to punch him." You blanched a little, only then realizing that, no, the argument hadn't exactly been quiet.
"I didn't punch him, so who won?"
"Me, naturally," he grinned. "Nice attempt at a subject change, by the way. All joking aside, you do realize how much he looks up to you, right?"
You laughed outright, the volume and your proximity to Saffron's ear causing the horse to send you a dirty look around his mouthful of carrot. "Ha! Me? I'm a thorn in the kid's side. You're nobility, right? You should know then how diplomacy works. He's trying to cajole me into leading that squad is all."
Dorian vehemently shook his perfectly groomed head, then looked mildly irritated when a few strands of hair fell out of place. "So you think. You didn't see him pushing at Haven to have you included in the infiltration. And that letter you sent? He treated your advice like it was plated in gold."
"He values my information as the Shadow Broker," you muttered, though you felt a bit…humbled. Chastised, perhaps? "It's…understandable." Though entirely, completely unwarranted.
Sighing, the mage spread his arms in a generic gesture of "what can you do?" You had moved on to brushing your horse with steady, even strokes to avoid getting a horse head to the sternum. "Does it even matter? For whatever reason, despite your infamy or even because of it, that man trusts you implicitly."
You eyed Dorian warily; uneasy with the emotions he was unknowingly—or maybe on purpose—stirring up. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Perhaps I'm just in a giving mood. It doesn't happen often—I'd enjoy it while it lasts."
"No," you spread your arms wide. "Why point that out? What do you gain?"
He snorted. "Not everyone from Tevinter has some sort of extra-malicious angle, you know. Besides, watching you coldly brush off every one of the Herald's attempts at weaseling advice out of you was positively agonizing."
"Advice?" you asked, flabbergasted.
"Yes," he sighed like he was trying to explain something to a petulant two year-old. "Our glorified leader was trying to ask you for advice. As I said, for whatever reason, he looks up to you." You barely swallowed down a half-assed retort about him only looking up to the library of information you had tucked away inside your head and available at your fingertips.
He sounded like he admired you.
You scrambled for something, anything. "I'm not…he doesn't want my advice."
"I daresay he should be the judge of that?" asked Dorian dryly. "I don't need to be a spy or scout to tell you wear that mask for a reason. Self-deprecation doesn't become you."
"Excuse me?"
The mage raised his hands in a peace gesture. "I'm only explaining what I've seen. I don't have the foggiest idea why you're pushing people away if they so much as look at you wrong, but if you intend to continue doing so, then perhaps you need to re-think being a part of the Inquisition?" No more words were exchanged, and Dorian, seeming to have said his piece, abruptly stalked away.
It wasn't until Saffron nudged your stationary arm that you realized why his words stung so much. It was because they were true.
Final Words: I don't know why, but I felt like calling Lys out on her antisocial tendencies was something Dorian would do. I also felt like Solas would be the type to be unexpectedly amazing at cards. I mean, Dread Wolf. C'mon, now.
Also, it was established pretty early on that Lys is using a pseudonym and has been for an indiscriminate amount of time. Her real name is mentioned in here. Any guesses?
And an announcement of sorts-I've started a side-project! It's a straight Criminal Minds fanfiction, Surface and Symbol. If any of you are interested, go check it out! I'm going to still focus most of my time here with All Fall Down, but I will try to get somewhat regular-ish updates on S&S as well. Like I said-side project.
Just curious, but has anyone done any fanart for AFD? If so or if anyone's inclined to do any, I'd be interested in seeing Lys or Dand or any of the other OCs and scenes from your guys' perspective. Or, if you perfer, since I like to tack songs onto everything, what would you give Lys as a theme song?
R&R!
~SurreptitiousFox
