Chapter 2: Beneath Denerim

Underneath the bustling streets of Denerim lay an immense network of tunnels and caverns, some man-made and some natural, that composed the city's extremely complex sewage and irrigation system. Water runoff trickled down grates and manholes into the catacombs and collected into large pools to be pumped back out into the fields of the city's many surrounding farms. The tunnel system had been a perpetual work in progress for hundreds of years, each generation adding new passageways and aqueducts as older ones fell into disrepair, disuse, or were simply forgotten. It was amidst these older passageways and secluded caves that the Black Wardens of Denerim made their home. One wrong turn and a man could get lost down there forever, but Feanor and Zevran had begun mapping the underground labyrinth nearly ten years ago, and now every Black Warden knew each twist and turn by heart.

I know what you're thinking. Really, I do. "If you all are doing so well, why are you living in a sewer?" Well, come sit under my learning tree. You're a smug idiot if you think people in our line of work are too good to hold up in sewers and, like you, most people are smug idiots. These passages run for literally hundreds of miles in every direction, and if you know them, which we do, you have literally hundreds of spots throughout the city you can pop in and out of completely unexpected. And vice versa, if you don't know them, which you don't, and recall here that most people are exactly like you, you will get lost down here. And you will die, but probably not before the rats start eating you. But what really makes it bearable is the fact that we're rich. Really rich. Rich enough to make even a cistern in a sewer look like an arl's palace. Trust me, I've been in several in my day. And the smell? Well you get used to that quicker than you'd think. It's mostly just water run-off down here anyway. Mostly. Now close your eyes, because we've reached the point where if you see which way I turn next, I'll have to kill you. Wouldn't want that, would we?

The three elves emerged from the tunnels into a massive natural cavern as big as any noble's great hall and furnished with just as many amenities. Alcoves carved into the walls served as quarters for each of the cell's members, and the cavern proper was lit by clusters of luminescent crystals and provided ample space for training and lounging about. Feanor let down his hood and tossed his rain-soaked cloak aside, collapsing gratefully into one of many padded chairs at the communal table after what had been several long days hunting the Crow hit squad. He looked so innocent lounging in that chair, slight of build even by elven standards with a meticulously clean-shaven head, his dark hair never growing longer than a fine stubble. His face was truly beautiful, with full lips and a perfect nose that had miraculously never been broken, and features that might have been considered delicate if not for the perpetually hardened expression he had mastered over the years. His alabaster skin was crisscrossed with intricate facial tattoos in the Dalish style. Feanor was not Dalish, but his family had taken up the practice of the Vallaslin generations ago. They thickened considerably around his eyes, accentuating what was by far his most stunning feature: Eyes the color of polished emeralds that seemed to glow when the light hit them just right.

But looking at those eyes long enough, a perceptive person would notice how cold, distant, and haunted they seemed. Once they noticed that, maybe they would notice that when those full lips curled into a smile, it was usually either sinister or devoid of mirth. Perhaps they would notice that the tattoos on his face extended down his neck under his collar, but they would not know that on his arms those tattoos wound into thorn-covered vines, or that each of those thorns represented a life Feanor had taken. They would not know why he religiously shaved his head; that he had begun the practice years ago after seeing an Ogre grab a man by his long hair and rip his head clean off his shoulders. But maybe, just maybe, upon recognizing a few unsettling details about Feanor, a perceptive person would also recognize that his lithe frame was all muscle and sinew wound tight as a spring. That his hands were calloused and hard as stones. That under his cloak he always wore strange drakeskin armor, light as leather and hard as steel. Maybe they would spy the handles of one or more of the dozen daggers and knives he kept on his person at all times. Maybe, just maybe they would recognize the kind of person Feanor was. But only if they looked at his brilliant green eyes long enough.

If you haven't figured it out already, let's get clear on one thing: We're not the 'good guys.' We kill people for money, the absolute antithesis of 'good guys.' That doesn't mean we don't have some sense of morality though, we're not the Crows. We don't go around offing children and Chantry Sisters for bloated landlords and spoiled princelings. In fact, all of our targets in some way fall into the same category as 'bloated landlords and spoiled princelings.' Which is to say, they deserve what they get. Granted, our employers sometimes deserve the same or worse, but name me one business in which associating with unsavory characters doesn't come with the territory and I'll eat a live Nug. Besides, the beauty of it all is that given time, our unsavory employers eventually end up as targets themselves. It's a beautiful system, it's why we do what we do, because someone has to do it.

As Feanor reclined in his chair, a large human male walked over with two mugs of steaming spiced wine in his hands, sat across from Feanor and slid one of the mugs over to him. Feanor nodded his thanks and took a sip, savoring the warmth that immediately spread to his limbs. The human was Quinn, and at fifty years old he was still as spry as a man half his age and the strongest human Feanor had ever met. He was built like a bear with broad shoulders, a barrel chest, and limbs as thick as tree branches. Feanor had once seen him snap a man's spine just by squeezing him. Quinn had salt and pepper hair pulled back into a tight ponytail and a perpetual five o'clock shadow. What was most intimidating about him though was not his size, but his one empty eye socket covered by a patch of seared scar tissue that even Feanor found hard to look at, and he had seen some ugly shite in his day. Quinn knew the effect it had on people, which was why he chose not to wear an eyepatch and made a show of leering at whoever he was talking to out of his one still functioning eye.

Quinn's story is pretty well representative of all Black Wardens. You see whereas the Crows buy or steal kids to shape into weapons, we take recruits who have been sharpened into weapons by life. And they have a way of finding us. Take Quinn for example, I actually met him years ago. He was born in the Free Marches and was a huntsman for some minor noble. The noble had several daughters, one of whom took a liking to Quinn, and he to her. One day they weren't being quite careful enough and got caught tumbling in the hay. The kind-hearted noble made Quinn watch as he had his daughter flogged, and then he shipped off to some remote Chantry to live out her days in penance for loving a mere commoner. Then he put Quinn's eye out with a hot poker and sentenced him to ten years in a penal silverite mine. After he got out, he moved to Ferelden and bounced around from one band of mercenaries to another for a few years. During the Blight, the people of Redcliffe hired the crew he was riding with at the time to protect the town when things started going all weird there. After one night of the dead coming after them, the whole merc band ran away. All except for Quinn, he stayed and fought, and that was where we met. After that I'm not sure what he did, but a few years ago when the Black was just starting to gain a real reputation, we were contracted to off a merchant smuggling lyrium-infused drugs. We ambushed the merchant's caravan on the road, and once the arrows started flying and a few of the hired guards dropped, the rest ran off. All except for one: big old Quinn. He remembered Zev and me from Redcliffe, and we remembered him. We offered him a chance to join us, he agreed. The merchant smuggler was Quinn's first kill as a Black Warden. The second was the noble that put out his eye nearly twenty years prior.

Feanor nodded toward one of the alcoves where a dwarf was bent over a large table covered in bottles and parchment, mumbling to himself as he jotted down notes on a scroll. While still stocky by most standards, he was rather thin for his race and eschewed the usual elaborate beard sported by most dwarven men for a clean shaven face. His ashy-blonde, cropped hair looked to be in need of a good washing. His grey eyes were bloodshot and had dark circles under them, and the small tattoo identifying him as casteless stood out in stark contrast to the dwarf's too-pale skin.

"How many days straight has he been awake this time?" Feanor asked Quinn.

The big man looked over at Brecca the dwarf and shrugged, "Three I think."

Feanor sighed and shook his head. Brecca had a bad habit of losing track of time when he got caught up in his work, which was often. "What's he working on now?" he asked.

"Who knows," Quinn said. "The same scary stuff he's always working on. Probably some new way to make dying quicker, slower, or more painful than needed."

"You need to get better at dragging him away from that table from time to time when Zev and I aren't around," Feanor said, "Maker knows what the fumes from all that junk are doing to him."

Quinn harrumphed and spat. "Not like I don't try, you know how he gets though. If I even manage to pry his fingers off those bottles and tubes, he's right back at em five minutes later. You need to take him out more. Give him something to do other than skulk around here obsessing over potions."

Feanor sighed and nodded. He knew Quinn was right, but really didn't like the thought of giving Brecca anything dangerous to do. The dwarf just wasn't cut out for field work. Feanor called to Brecca and waved him over to the table. Brecca looked up, blinked, and smiled when he recognized Feanor. He stood up and swayed for a moment, stretched his back and blinked again, as if surprised by how stiff his muscles were. He walked around the pool in the center of the cavern and pulled a chair up to the table. He looked at Quinn as if just noticing the big man was there and smiled meekly at him. Quinn chuckled and got up from the table, returning a moment later with another mug of wine and a bottle. Brecca cupped the mug in both hands, his tiny smile turning into a broad grin.

"Thanks Quinn," he said. Quinn nodded and patted Brecca's shoulder.

"Whatchya been up to these past few days, Brecca?" Feanor asked. The dwarf's pallid face visibly brightened at the question.

"Oh! You'll like it!" Brecca said excitedly, "It's a construct of Deep Mushroom extract and the venom from a certain breed of sea snake, with a few other minor ingredients. One drop is enough to paralyze a full grown horse for hours!" Brecca took a sip of his drink and frowned thoughtfully, "If I can just get the damn measurements right," he muttered.

"Well maybe you'd be able to think straighter if you slept for a couple hours," Feanor said like a parent chiding a child.

Brecca shot Quinn an accusing glare before looking back at Feanor with a penitent expression. "But you'll really like this one Feanor! It'll be so useful when it's done!"

"I know it will, Brecca," Feanor said sympathetically, "But it won't be worth it if you drop dead from exhaustion while you're making it. Get some sleep tonight, that's an order."

Brecca looked so absolutely crestfallen it actually panged Feanor a little bit. "I hate sleeping," Brecca mumbled into his mug. Feanor had to stifle a sigh, Brecca really did hate sleeping. Dwarves didn't dream, and something about the blackness of sleep frightened Brecca. It was undoubtedly a symptom of neuroses, but Feanor wasn't one to judge. None of them were entirely straight in the head, after all.

Brecca is the most physically unimposing individual I've ever met, but he's a genius alchemist. Not just poisons - although he has a fascination with them that is frankly a bit disturbing - but poultices, stamina draughts, aphrodisiacs, you name it. We found him a couple years back just kind of wandering around Denerim, selling vials out of his coat pockets. I didn't give him a second glance, but Zev felt bad for the little bugger and bought a few silvers worth of his product. I won't tell you what it was, but it worked really, really well. Mind you, Brecca was a pauper at this point, so he didn't even have access to quality ingredients. He just made this stuff from whatever he could scrounge up. We kept going back to him and eventually offered him a spot as the Black Wardens' resident alchemist. At first it was a bit of a charity case I'll admit, but over time he became a genuine Brother as we learned more of his story. Brecca was born casteless in Orzamar, which is just about the crappiest circumstance a person can be born into. And I say that having grown up in an alienage, so I know crappy when I see it. He had it better than most casteless though. He had a loving family who didn't have to resort to crime or worse because his father was a brilliant alchemist himself, that's where Brecca gets it. His old man's reputation was so amazing he actually attracted the patronage of a noble, which ended up being a curse, not a blessing. The noble family which patronized Brecca's father's alchemy shop was in the middle of a feud with another noble house, so when these rivals found out that Brecca's dad was "supplying" their enemies, they burned their shop and house to the ground. Killed Brecca's father, mother, and two siblings. The only reason Brecca survived was because he was out running errands. He came back to find his home destroyed and his whole family dead in the street. People walked right on by them as if nothing was amiss, just another day in Dust Town. After a few years of begging in Orzamar, Brecca made his way to the surface. How he survived as long as he did is a mystery to me, but fate brought him to us and even though he can't fight worth a damn, he's an integral member of our brotherhood. Death doesn't always come by a blade or an arrow, sometimes it comes from a clear, tasteless liquid mixed in with your mead. That's how death came to the noble that ordered Brecca's family killed.

Zevran and Alderas returned from their respective quarters and joined their other comrades. Three elves, a dwarf, and a human sat chatting amiably for a while before talk turned to business.

"So I take it you found that Crow hit squad?" Quinn asked as he poured himself a fresh mug. Feanor nodded.

"They did not make themselves too difficult to find, or too difficult to kill. I imagine that will change in the very near future," said Zevran.

Brecca shook his head in amazement, "That's what now, three in the past two months? Why do they have such a hard on for us? It's not like we ever did anything to them."

"Yeah, except kill all twelve of the guys they sent after us," Alderas said with a maniacal chuckle.

"That's my point," Brecca said, "Guys that they sent after us. They started it!"

"They started it? This isn't Chantry school rough housing, little man," Quinn scowled. "They know we're better than them and they don't like it."

"We should take the fight to them," Alderas said with enthusiasm, "Call all of our cells together and hit them where they live! Right in the bits!"

Feanor and Zevran looked at each other and chuckled. "What did we tell you about the bits? Stop it," said Zevran with a small grin.

Quinn raised the eyebrow of his one good eye and made a disgusted sound, "Still shooting dead guys below the belt, huh?"

"Not anymore apparently," Alderas said with obvious frustration.

"Good, it's weird," said Quinn, "Besides, everyone knows that kind of junk just isn't done, kid,"

"That's what we told him," Feanor said.

"Even I know that," Brecca chuckled.

Alderas frowned and rested his chin on his folded arms as the other four men laughed at his expense. "Honestly," said Zevran, "It really is bizarre. I shudder to think what about it…does it for you."

I have a theory about that. Alderas was born a slave – sorry, a "servant" - in Orlais. When he was maybe seven he walked in on his master's son taking liberties with his mother. Forcibly. Alderas jumped on this prick's back and started beating on him. Well, young master didn't take too kindly to that, so he started kicking the living crack out of Alderas. His mother grabbed a millet grinder and brained him, knocked him out cold. Then they made a run for it because she knew what this meant if they stuck around. They got a mile, maybe two into the woods before the hounds were sent after them. They didn't make it much farther. Alderas' mom got him up into a tree before the hounds got to her. He watched as they ripped her to shreds. The hunting party circled the tree Alderas was in for a couple hours, lobbing arrows and spears at him before they left. Apparently the life of a kid wasn't worth missing dinner over, probably figured he'd die in the woods anyway. He stayed up there a full day before climbing down and burying what was left of his mom. Some Dalish found him lying on the shallow grave half starved to death a few days later and took him in. He lived with them for a few years, but this was one of those passive clans, and as Alderas got older it became clear that he had a thing for fighting and killing humans. Can't really blame him, can you? So when he was old enough the clan just kind of asked him to leave, and he obliged. That was a little over two years ago. The clan had trained him as a hunter, so stealth and skill with a bow came as naturally to him as breathing. And he never forgot where he came from. The nobleman's son was by now the nobleman, and Alderas made his way back to the hold, climbed into the bed chamber, and avenged his mother. Zev and I just happened to come through the same window a few minutes later to find Chevalier frack-face with one arrow between his eyes and one in his dangles. Alderas was hiding in a cabinet. Good work is good work, and he was obviously a kindred spirit, so we asked him on. Since he said yes, we still got to collect the bounty. We gave it to Alderas, and he used it to build a proper cairn over his mom's grave. It took a while for Alderas to warm up to Quinn. Not believing all humans are inherently evil is a relatively new development for him, and one I empathize with.

Are you sensing a pattern here? Because there is one. Quinn, Alderas, and Brecca, they all have similar stories. Zev and I…well, our stories kind of share aspects with all three. Most of it's a well well-known tale of which we play minor roles, so I'll spare you the intricate details. Mostly because I don't feel like talking about it right now. .

We aren't really assassins, the Crows are assassins, and we're executioners. If you think there's no difference you'd be in the majority, but you'd still be wrong. We execute people who have committed crimes and believe they are above justice, and we take money for what we do so we can keep doing it. We have enough coin in our coffers for every one of us to retire and live like arls, but we don't. Know why? Because some people need to die. If you are one of those people, I promise that sooner or later we will come for you, and we will send you to whatever Maker you wish. There are hundreds of us in a dozen cities, and every single one of us has a story like Quinn's, Brecca's, Zevran's, Alderas', and mine.

But I'm sure none of them have a story like hers.

"Has she said anything today?" Alderas asked.

"Not a word," Brecca replied in a hushed voice.

The five men at the table collectively looked to the far wall of the cavern at the copper-skinned qunari woman sitting cross legged, staring expressionless into the pool. The scars of the removed stitches were still fresh around her lips and stood out red and raw even from a distance. They were all in awe of her, even Feanor. How could they not be? Feanor had encountered all kinds of things in his life that were unbelievable. None came close to the Saarebas sitting across the cavern: A mage of the Qun, one that had escaped her own people. Feanor regarded her for a moment longer before returning his attention to the others.

"Give her time," he said, "She will speak when she is ready."