Champion,

I require your presence in my office at Templar Hall as soon as possible. An urgent matter has arisen and given your recent actions, I believe you are the best one to deal with it.

Sincerely,

Knight-Commander Meredith

"Do you trust her?" Sebastian asked, handing the letter back to Hawke.

Hawke shrugged. "Do you? Does anyone? I would rather not go see her, especially after Cullen said she's becoming more and more dangerous. But if I don't, I'll wonder what she's up to, or why she wanted to speak to me in the first place."

Sebastian nodded. "The decision is yours. If you go, I will accompany you."

"Of that, I had no doubt," Hawke said, leaning upward to give him a kiss.

Dearest Father,

I think I am the only one that still responds to Meredith's summons. She seemed very appreciative that I had come to see her, and got straight to the point upon our arrival. She stated there was a conspiracy within the gallows, and that the mages were responsible. When she went so far as to say even the Grand Cleric was blind to what was happening within the city, of course Sebastian became defensive. He told her that Elthina sees everything all too clearly, but Meredith ignored him.

I asked her to explain what was going on. She said mages were sneaking out of the Gallows at night. No templars were reporting their absence, which she attributed to the mages using blood magic on them to mask their disappearance. Meredith told Orsino to keep a tighter watch on his charges, but he refused. I asked her how it is he can refuse if the two of them are supposed to be working together for the good of all in the Gallows. According to her, Orsino thinks her unreasonable, and will not assist her. Without his help or Elthina's assistance, and being unable to trust her templars, I was her only remaining option.

I dared to ask Meredith why she hated mages so much. I had to know if there was a reason, and I found out there was. Her sister was a mage, a kind gentle soul she said, unprepared for what being a mage truly meant. The family hid her, concerned that her soft nature wouldn't be able to survive in a Circle. They thought they were doing the right thing, until a demon possessed her. After killing their entire family save Meredith, who barely escaped, her sister went on to kill seventy more people within their village before the local templars finally took her down. It was for that reason Meredith joined the templars. She doesn't hate us, she said, but she is personally aware of the curse bestowed upon us, and how easily we can lose ourselves.

I can't fault her for that, Father, as I have thought on this time and time again.

So I agreed to help her. I told her if I found evidence of her claims, I would immediately bring it to her attention. But I also warned her that I wouldn't lie for her, and if I found nothing, she'd have to drop this vendetta once and for all. She agreed, to my surprise, and told me of a meeting being held in Hightown by the mages she suspected of escaping. I don't know how she found out about the meeting, but we followed up on her lead.

Varric met us at Fenris', and we went to the courtyard outside the De Launcet mansion where the meeting was supposed to be taking place. To our surprise, there were also templars there. The moment they saw us they attacked, even after I begged them to stop and listen to me. So Meredith was partially correct; mages were leaving the Gallows. But the templars weren't under their thrall, they were assisting them willingly, enough to die with them.

A note found on one of their bodies lead us to Gardibali's warehouse. Another meeting interrupted, another dozen mages and templars dead before listening to reason. All except one templar, a man I had saved several years ago.

"I begged them not to," Keran said as the group approached him. "I swear to you Hawke, if I knew you were the one they had been speaking of, I would have warned you immediately. You saved my life from those blood mages, I owe you everything. And kidnapping was never supposed to be part of the deal!"

Hawke raised her brow. "Kidnapping? What are you going on about Keran?"

"They said someone was spying, and that we needed leverage, a hostage, to make them see reason," Keran explained. "We just got word they took one of their own, a templar named Carver."

"You bastards kidnapped my brother?" Hawke asked in anger.

"He wasn't going to be hurt," Keran told her, taking a step back. "We just wanted to be left alone to plan our next move. Thrask says Meredith will cause a war between the mages and the templars unless we work together to remove her from her position."

"Thrask is in charge of this?" Sebastian asked. "He hardly seems the sort to resort to kidnapping."

Keran nodded. "As I said, it was just meant to keep you from stopping us before we could act. It's no secret you support Meredith, so Thrask must have thought this was the best way to do that."

"Of course I support Meredith," Hawke said through gritted teeth. "I have seen first hand what blood mages are capable of. My own mother…" she trailed off, unable to complete the sentence, and turned to walk away from him so he couldn't see the tears in her eyes.

Sebastian continued to deal with Keran so Hawke wouldn't have to. "All of this is an elaborate plot to overthrow Meredith?"

"She needs to go," Keran said. "We need a new viscount, and templars who serve to protect the mages, not harm them. What Thrask has managed to accomplish is the first step to a better way. For six years he has brought mages and templars together. Taught us that we didn't have to hate each other out of fear, and that we could work together. Meredith wishes to undo all of that, keep the mages in check with fear from those under her command. We no longer wish to follow her."

"The only other person willing to help your cause is Hawke," Sebastian told him. "But kidnapping her brother was not the way to gain that support."

Keran sighed. "I know. Like I said, if I had known it was her brother I would've said something sooner. We have a base out on the Wounded Coast, the southernmost region. That's where he's being held. I assure you, he is unharmed."

Hawke turned and glared at him. "For your sake, he better not be."

We immediately left for the coast. All I could think about was Carver; I didn't care for the mages or the templars or Meredith. I needed to know my brother was safe, and would deal with the rest of them once I was certain he was out of harms way.

We ran into Samson along the way, the crazy ex-templar who usually hung out in Lowtown begging for lyrium. He still seemed a bit crazed, but he assisted us when a group of shades attacked us. That made me nervous; if there were shades, that meant blood mages. To think the templars were condoning this? Samson agreed; a mage templar alliance was an honorable idea, but if the templars turned a blind eye to it for the sake of a truce, what kind of future did that mean for Kirkwall? They were ignoring their duties in stopping blood mages by joining them, and Samson wanted no part of it.

Neither did I.

I told him to hurry back to Kirkwall and get Cullen, and any other templar that Cullen knew was still loyal to Meredith. I needed templars that were thinking clearly, not Thrask's group of blood mage supporters and kidnappers.

We found the base further south, right where Keran said they would be. I saw Thrask, and Grace and Alain from the Starkhaven Circle, and Carver. He was unconscious but alive, and I thanked the Maker for that. Thrask begged me to see reason, explained his stance on what he was trying to do. An honorable goal I told him, but this was not the way.

He agreed, and told Grace to free Carver, but she had other ideas. She admitted she was waiting to have her revenge on me for killing her lover, Decimus, and so she refused to release Carver. Thrask told her to stand down, but instead she killed him before rallying the other mages to attack us. Alain tried to stand up to Grace, but she knocked him to the ground before focusing her attacks on us. The templars attempted to assist, but they were overwhelmed. It was a long, exhausting fight, and if Cullen and his men hadn't arrived when they did, I'm not so certain we would have survived.

Alain released Carver before being escorted back to the Gallows by Cullen, who also allowed Carver a pass for the night to return with us to Kirkwall. It was nice having Carver home. We were able to have dinner together, and then we sat by the fire and just talked, catching up on each other's lives. I have missed him so much Father. To think I almost lost him as well? His being in danger on account of my actions within the city have only strengthened my resolve to end this final conflict in Kirkwall and then leave with Sebastian immediately for Starkhaven.

Of course I'm not entirely certain where Sebastian is on his plane to retake the throne. We haven't talked about it in a while, but I'm hopeful that some of the connections he made at Chateau Haine are finally coming together with a solution. The sooner we get out of here the better.