The Names We're Given

Chapter 6: Orlesian Dancing

by Dreamer In Silico

Road to North Calenhad

The acrid smell of soot and charred, rotting flesh seemed to follow them as they fared east out of Redcliffe. It was strange to Mei that after two nights of being surrounded by the corpses and the flames, only now did it make her gorge rise in horror.

Only now, when it came a whiff at a time on the otherwise fresh breeze, cutting over the green scent of forest and farmland, much as the smell of smoke had never quite seemed to leave her small clearing even a week after Giselle's ashes had been scattered.

Perhaps it was not so strange, after all.

It didn't help that they kept nearer to the city than they might have otherwise, circling around it at a half-league's distance to take the north road instead. It wasn't much to throw off pursuit, but it might buy them at least a little time if any pursuers tracked them to Redcliffe and started asking questions. When they stopped to eat, Mei took one look at the food in her pack, fought off a wave of nausea, and pulled out a map instead.

She bent over it, but barely even focused on the paper – she knew what it would show, and no amount of wishing would have the map reconfigure itself to put the Tower somewhere in the middle of the ocean.

As if on cue, Alistair spoke up, having glanced over her shoulder at the map while he ate. "With the direction we're headed, we can get to the Circle most easily, then perhaps continue north to Denerim to visit that scholar the knights had mentioned."

Mei bit her lip. She could argue – she wanted to argue – but she would lose, because it did make the most sense to go to the Circle first, and losing would undermine her authority as the de facto leader of their little band. Giving up what little control over her life she had into the hands of others was unthinkable. So she nodded, every muscle tense and screaming for her to run, run in precisely the opposite direction, away from the templars and their docile flock of sheep. "That's what I was planning on. I'm sure dear Irving will be so happy to see me."

Alistair was frowning. "We could have – should have – taken Connor with us. I still think sending him to Tevinter was daft."

Anger flared hot in her chest and rose, and if she could have spit fire at him, she would have. Hadn't she just reined herself in to avoid an argument? She was facing down the necessity to revisit a past she'd never wanted anything to do with, and now – salt in the wound – she had to listen to this ignorant shem talk about how they should have forced another mage-child into it.

The Dalish slur had been one she'd never adopted out of respect for her human lover, but now it seemed too fitting not to apply.

"Which shows precisely how little you know about the Circle," she shot back acidly. "And I'll note that Teagan didn't think it so. The boy won't grow up in a cage, and may make important political connections for his family, in time, besides." It had, in fact, been Teagan's idea to assemble a small retainer of knights and servants, along with a closely-watched Jowan, to take Connor to Tevinter. Eamon had only a scant handful of trade contacts in Minrathous, but a few were close enough that they could be trusted to assist in setting up a household. Mei knew enough about the place from her research to know that she didn't like it – mages were free, but elves were usually very explicitly not – but for a young human noble seeking to avoid the Circle, it was perfect. She had supported the plan wholeheartedly, despite her bitterness that such a haven had never truly been available to her. The boy was not any more at fault for his humanity than for his facility with magic.

What he did with that luck of station, on the other hand, might be, but if she survived the next few months, she would have influence to work with.

Meanwhile, she still had an irate, royal bastard to deal with. "That's all you ever talk about, is cages! It's as if you think mages are all harmless little bunny rabbits that want nothing more than to frolic free in the wild, and if we'd just let them go, everyone would be happy."

This was not the time to try to make him understand. She was in no shape, no mindset to say this well; she was so angry and it wouldn't help anything – "Alistair, I think they – we – are people, like any others, and we carry what can be a weapon, like any others. The hiding, the lack of control over your own life as you were growing up – did you not resent it? Did you not resent being punished for something you'd never done, a threat you'd never been, simply because you might?" she hissed.

His brow was furrowed. "Yes, but – "

Mei did not let him finish. "Now imagine that every guard, every servant in Redcliffe castle was there solely to keep you in your place. To remind you that you are a bastard, and a threat to a brother you've never met, and your very existence is shameful. They keep you from your privacy and threaten any you have the misfortune to hold dear, to keep you in that place. 'For your own good,' they say. And if you so much as put a toe out of the arbitrary lines that have been drawn around you, they're there with a sword over your neck, ready to strike. That is how I grew up, and more, and what I would never wish on anyone else. So yes, I have a problem with cages." She could feel her eyes burning with tears she would not, could not let fall, because if she did, they might not stop. Would she have to fight this battle every day of whatever life she had left as a Grey Warden?

"It's… not the same. I was – "

" – just a child?" she finished, with bitter irony, shaking her head and shivering despite the warm air.

Alistair at least had the grace to look ashamed, and stayed quiet for a long moment, tension and agitation evident in every line of his body. "Is that why you said what you did? To Isolde?"

Mei laughed, high and disbelieving, and sagged, suddenly feeling her exhaustion even more keenly than she had on the road. Why had she said that? Connor was a classic case of a wild, dangerous talent, and for all her sympathy toward him, if she could undo the results of his possession… No. That was just it, wasn't it? She wouldn't have sent him to the Circle, even knowing what could happen, because she did not want to live in a world where preemptive incarceration was acceptable, where even parents would betray and cast aside their own children for their talent.

Her voice was raw when she finally answered. "Alistair, my mother died trying to protect me, too. The difference is, she failed, and she knew she'd failed; she was bleeding out on the ground as they took me away. I said what I did to Isolde because it was what she needed to hear, as she faced her death to save him. It didn't matter what I believe, or even what was true – it changed nothing but her fear."

This earned her another studious, stormy frown, but he subsided. He opened his mouth, raising a hand as if to gesture, or to reach out, but he must have read her expression correctly for once – Don't. – for he closed it again for a long moment before replying, "You have… a strange idea of compassion."

"I have an idea of compassion that makes sense. Why no one else seems to is a mystery to me." She turned away from him to stow the map back in her bag, her eyes burning and her skin crawling with unease. "Let's get ready to set out again; I don't fancy sitting still too long this close to Redcliffe."

Mei stood impatiently while the others gathered their gear, having left even her baldric buckled during the supposed break. The tainted breeze seemed to rasp against her very skin, goading every nerve into pin-drop awareness. Why were they taking so long?

The templar was, surprisingly, the first to join her at the road, fully kitted and ready to move. Alistair had previously established a tendency to linger over meals with mild reluctance to move on – understandable thanks to his gear being far heavier than the others' – but now he seemed nearly as anxious to be moving as she was. Another wave of unease swept through her, leaving adrenaline in its wake.

"Mei…" Alistair began, his gaze careening frenetically around them –

"Do you feel - ?" she'd said at the same time.

Shit.

Swords drawn, they edged back toward the others, scanning the trees for signs of movement. Leliana was the first to notice something was wrong, having just shouldered her bow and moved to join the two Wardens. She did not call out, instead knocking an arrow and hissing quietly to Morrigan and Sten.

Suddenly and smoothly, the woman swung her bow up and fired into the thicket, the arrow passing less than two armspans past Mei. Its faint zing was followed almost immediately by a guttural bellow of rage, and everyone started moving at once. Mei had only a heartbeat to register the fleeting thought, Not again, before answering arrows began whizzing out of the trees.

Alistair brought his shield to bear while Mei dodged for cover, Leliana and Morrigan already attacking the other archers from their more protected position. Knowing she lacked the focus necessary to maintain her own projectile shield, Mei ducked behind a hummock to help with the archers as best she could. She should wait for an open skirmish to begin before engaging with her blades, which she hastily sheathed. Instead, she brought her scant reserves to bear casting a weak disorientation field that she hoped would at least throw off the darkspawn's aim.

It was only luck that allowed her to hear the pair of skulking darkspawn rogues in the underbrush behind them, one creeping toward her and the other heading for Leliana. "Leliana, behind us!" she shouted.

Leliana whipped around, assessing the distance in an instant and dropping her bow in favor of the small, agile daggers she kept at her belt. Mei saw her leap for the nearest spawn before her own was upon her. There was something unusually satisfying about the sound her swords made as she pulled them from their scabbards to engage – they sounded like action, like purpose, as she met a foe she could face without complications.

She was a Grey Warden, and there was a darkspawn before her. Everything narrowed to the magic that limned her blades with frost, the movement of the creature she feinted and sliced at, and the caustic spray of its tainted blood as one blade found an artery.

Mei could not have said how long the rest of the skirmish lasted – the fact that she did not quite collapse at the end suggested it had been short, but the memory was nothing but a swift-moving blur. The ground was still trying to move around her when she stopped at last, the clamor of darkspawn presence receding to a whisper in her mind.

"Is everyone okay? All in one piece?" Alistair's voice reached her ears.

"Your mouth is clearly intact, more the pity," came Morrigan's automatic rejoinder, as if from a long way away.

Mei dropped her head, suddenly dizzy as even the witch's sharp words came blurred and indistinct. "Morrigan, she's bleeding." The lilting, accented voice was nearby, and a slim hand took hold of her shoulder as if to steady her.

Was she bleeding? She supposed she was. That would explain the dull pain at her shoulder… but why was it tingling?

"Poison. I don't think it's bad," Mei managed to grind out. Another pair of hands appeared and pressed her down onto a log, provoking a startled, unpleasant shiver at the touch. But neither was gauntleted, nor sang with the lyrium the templars were all addicted to, and she subsided and allowed it.

Morrigan confirmed Mei's own hazy assessment a moment later. " 'Tis causing the wound to continue bleeding, but little else, it seems." Mei smelled the sharp bite of elfroot as the other mage uncorked a bottle of what must have been a strong tincture, and gritted her teeth through the cleansing and subsequent mending. Healing magic had never been her strong point, and having it used on her never failed to feel strange.

So now she knew what darkspawn presence felt like. She hadn't been able to sense them at Ostagar, as apparently the taint was too new to her, then. Detachedly, she wondered whether that strange, hyper-focused attention she'd had while fighting was another Grey Warden thing… or was she simply that tired? It reminded her of the way she felt when she'd been in the library all night without any sleep, and the whole world contracted to a few lines of text at a time – as if she only had a finite amount of attention, and her field of vision shrank to conserve it. Would it always be like this? That could be inconvenient, what with –

"Mei, did you hear me? Are you well?" Leliana sounded urgent and concerned, and Mei surfaced from the mire of her thoughts slowly. She had not heard anything said since Morrigan had spoken.

"Ahh… yes. I'm fine. Just tired. Let's get away from here, shall we?"

They made camp at sunset, shortly after Bodahn and Sandal rejoined their party from the road. Mei set up her tent and then prowled their clearing while Morrigan cooked, unable to settle. The smell of stew made her stomach roil, though by all rights she should have been ravenous, and the close darkness of her tent was anything but welcoming. Fatigue buzzed just behind her eyes, and she was vaguely aware that she needed rest and food and to relax, but none of those things seemed even remotely possible.

That diamond-bright clarity that had carried her through one crisis after another was like a distant dream – she could see it, remember it, and reach out to it, but it always danced just away from her sluggish grasp. Somehow, she found the presence of mind to volunteer for first watch, at once certain she would not be able to sleep if she tried and afraid that she might. If she slept, it felt as if she could wander the Fade forever, aimless and unable to return.

She was afraid, also, that she wouldn't want to return.

"Mei." Her watch partner's voice came from behind her, radiating warmth like the banked embers of the cookfire that Mei kept her back toward to save her night vision.

The mage sighed quietly. "Yes?"

Leliana alighted on a flat rock next to her like a bird settles on a branch. "I noticed you did not even get near the stew, earlier. I've, well… I bought some dried fruit and nuts in the village, before we left. Would you care to share them with me?"

Mei looked up, surprised and uncertain whether to be grateful or disturbed that the woman was looking out for her in that way. She blinked blankly at Leliana for a long moment, trying to summon an expressible reaction, a polite refusal… However, now that the smell of meat had mostly dissipated, she was hungry, and starving herself accomplished nothing but making her an easier target, much as she had once admonished Alistair about his refusal to rest. That settled things.

"Ahh… yes. Thank you. That is kind of you," she managed.

Leliana offered the pouch with a friendly smile, and the pair munched in silence for several minutes. It was good – roasted walnuts, and berries, and peaches – and the gnawing hunger eased fractionally. Mei was relieved to realize she could probably handle some journey bread or cheese, later, now that her stomach's threat of total rebellion had quieted.

At length, Leliana spoke again. "It was fascinating to watch you fight, this afternoon."

Was that a compliment? Did it matter? What was she supposed to say (because clearly some response was expected)? What sort of conversation was the human –

Stop. Mei took a breath like a swimmer surfacing and answered with as little extra thought as possible. "What does that mean?" A light chuckle, not entirely forced. There. She sounded almost alive.

Leliana laughed at that, and the sound was bells to Mei's falling stones. "It means I had never seen, nor thought to see a mage who had any skill with blades, before I joined your party, and I got a better view than usual today. May I ask how you learned?"

It was an easy enough topic, and might let her ask questions of her own – and quite besides that, the thread of spoken words was something to focus on and cling to, to keep her mind from trying to run away from her. "Piecemeal, really," she answered. "A few of the older mages in the Circle had picked up a motley bunch of combat skills – don't ask me where they got them, for I do not know – and they taught a handful of us what they knew, in secret. It never went very far, just the most basic and universal concepts – how to guard, how to move, how to look for openings."

"I can't imagine the templars liked that much," Leliana interjected, and Mei stiffened. But the human was smiling with wicked amusement, and she consciously made herself relax and continue.

"They didn't know, and never found out. We were good at hiding. Then when I lived among the Dalish, I stumbled upon a record of how to use magic to augment one's strength and agility, and trained intensively with some of their warriors after that. It has been… useful," she finished.

Leliana nodded, still smiling. "So I've seen."

"So… what of yourself?" Mei asked. "You said you learned to fight when you lived in Orlais – what did you do, there, that warranted such training? You don't have the look of a soldier or a guard any more than you do a cloistered sister." And precious few soldiers prefer knives to swords.

"I did a lot of things," came the amused reply. "Danced, sang, made pretty small-talk at parties, went shopping…" She paused at Mei's raised eyebrow. "Ah, but of course you mean professionally, don't you? I was a lady's maid for Lady Cecile, the woman my mother had worked for, and later a minstrel."

It was very apparently closer to the truth than she'd skirted before, but Mei had read far too much about Orlais after meeting Adrian to miss the nuances. "Minstrel? Je pense que ce n'est pas le mot juste. Vous était une barde, non?"

Leliana stared at her in shock, though whether her expression had more to do with Mei's use of Orlesian, or the guess it had included, the mage was not sure. "Quelle surprise… Oui. J'étais une barde." She paused, a far-away look in her eyes, and then seemed to re-orient herself before speaking again in Fereldan. "But I left that life behind me, some time ago."

From courts and intrigue to a scruffy little backwater, masquerading as a Chantry sister. That's not a casual decision, by any means. "Why did you leave it?"

Something hardened in her expression, ever so briefly. "Because I was forced to. You are familiar with that sort of problem, yes?"

Mei elected not to prod further, for the present. She would not demand answers she was not yet prepared to give, herself.

The bard had already moved on to a safer question. "Did you learn my language in your Circle tower as well? Your accent is barbaric, but I am impressed. So few Fereldans will have even that much to do with Orlais, in these times."

Mei smiled at last, feeling the barest hint of pleasure at having surprised her, if only slightly. "Yes. I had… a little tutelage from a visiting mage, as well, but it wasn't enough to iron out the accent." She made a face. "Books only go so far, as I'm sure you know."

"Oh yes." Again, that trilling, bell-like laugh. "I know that quite well. I could learn history from them, but everything else… not so much. Books are patient; they do not require subtlety or impeccable timing, and are not apt to snub you when you make an ungraceful mistake. They are also not much good at dancing, I'm afraid."

Stretching her legs out in front of her and lifting her eyes to the shadowed stars above, Mei surprised herself with a giggle. She might actually like Leliana, misplaced religious devotion nonwithstanding. "You… are quite right on that account. Do you know what's funny? I told you I learned the rudiments of combat from other mages in the Tower, but not a one of them could dance. I didn't have anyone who could help me with that until I left it."

"Ahh, that's terrible!" Leliana exclaimed with dismay. "Everyone should learn how to dance. It is good for the spirit, I think."

"I tried to teach myself," Mei said, nostalgic amusement crinkling her eyes and loosening something in her chest. "There weren't many real storybooks in the Circle library, but there was one that I found not long after I learned how to read, which was my favorite. I hid it behind other books in its section so no one else would find it and move it or take it away, and I'd go back to it again and again. My favorite part was the celebration at the end, and there was a lovely painted illustration of all the characters dancing in a circle. Not much help, of course, but I understood that the idea was to move, and there was supposed to be music and it would look pretty."

"And did it look pretty?" Leliana grinned.

Mei snorted. "How should I know? I never saw it. You'd have to ask – well, you'd have to ask someone else," she amended, biting her lip.

"Well, you shall just have to show me sometime, then, since I have no one else to ask."

"Maybe I will. Though I'm sure compared to your court dancing, it's nothing special," Mei mused.

"I'll tell you a secret," the bard said, conspiratorially. "Orlesian court dancing is, more often than not, dreadfully dull. Too many impossible shoes and stiff skirts, you see. It's the common folk who really know how to have fun with it."

Mei heaved a sigh, her dark mood once more lapping at her ankles as if vexed to have been ignored. "I'll have to go see what kind of fun you mean, then, someday… assuming we manage to save the world and I don't get myself burned as a heretic or a maleficar in the process."

Leliana was silent for a long stretch of time, clearly wanting to express sympathy, but uncertain what form of it might actually be accepted. At length, she said very quietly, "We do what we can with the hands we're dealt, and it will be enough. It has to be enough." It almost sounded like she was trying to reassure herself as well as the mage. "I… didn't mean to eavesdrop, but I overheard what you said to Alistair, earlier, about Isolde. For what it's worth, I – I think it was a good thing that you did."

Masquerading as a Chantry sister, indeed.

"It was the only thing I could do." With a wry twist of her lips, Mei echoed the other woman's own words from moments earlier. "It had to be enough."

A/N: While I'm reasonably confident in my "Orlesian" grammar, if any native speakers happen to notice issues, please let me know!