Shock was starting to finally kick in as I almost tumbled down the broken cobbled steps towards the temple. My feet felt numb, my ears hummed and all I could feel was the thudding of my heart in my chest. I barely registered running forward down the hill until I rounded the face of rock that opened into what should have been the temple.

What was left of it... Stopped me in my tracks. There was barely anything standing to even resemble the Temple of Sacred Ashes. Everything was crumbled and ruined, rock and stone and wreckage. Then there were the corpses, charred and burned and frozen in their final petrified moments. Their hands clawing at the sky for The Maker, Andraste, Mythal any deity that would save them... But it had been futile. They were burned in fire, their once human bodies turned to grotesque statues of decay and death. No. There were no Gods here. How could any God allow such a monstrosity to happen? How could they simply stand by and watch as their people, their good and innocent people, be burned to nothing more than a pile of bones in the dust. I don't know how long I stood there for. Long enough it seemed as I soon heard hurried footsteps and from around the corner rushed Leliana and two of her scouts.

"Lavellan!" She called and my head slowly turned to her. Her eyes were as keen and focussed as ever, undeterred by the destruction around her.

"You did well, I will find a way to repay this." She explained, but her voice drifted off and her face grew blurry as my eyes filled with tears.

"How can you be immune to such carnage...?" I whispered and her eyes widened in surprise. There was a long moment of hesitation. Her lips fluttered for an answer, but none of them honest. She finally lowered her head and uttered lowly,

"I am not." Her head lifted again, her green eyes clear and open, "I do not believe any one is. Those who are are monsters. But in order to save those who survived we must harden ourselves. Who will act for them if not us? No, I am not immune, but I must push myself forward if I am to aid anyone at all." Her eyes tightened again, her mask firmly back in place. "Does that answer your question?"

I stared back at her in awe. She had the power to suddenly make me feel horribly inadequate and I couldn't help but force my resolve to strengthen. There was truth in what she said. I must harden myself to this chaos, if I don't... Surely it will destroy me. And it would surely destroy those I cared about if I did nothing to help.

"Come on," She called to me as she turned around and headed back to the breach, "The others are waiting and we could use your skill in this fight."

As she disappeared around the corner, I took a long and steadying breath, willing myself to be strong, to pull myself together. Weeping for them will not help them. With one final breath and a roll of my shoulders, I followed Leliana to the Breach and just in time, it seemed. Trevelyan had her hand outstretched towards the breach, green strands of lightning emanated all around her and I felt it. The hum of the air, the rumble of the ground beneath me and the most unholy shriek I'd ever heard. It sent a chill down my spine as Trevelyan continued to tear at the breach, like the yell of a tortured soul begging for some sort of release, some sort of mercy! And then it stopped. Stopped only to be replaced my a blood thirsty roar as a creature, spiked and towering over us all sprang from the breach. I saw everyone gawk in awe at the large demon that had appeared from nowhere and if we weren't all fighting for out lives it would be been quite comical. However as soon as it swung its great log of an arm, I was torn from my daze along with everyone else who now looked with rage at the creature. The only one who didn't seem to fight the lumbering spiked horror with such tenacity, was Solas. Yes, he fired his repetitive practised and precise spells as usual, but there was a heavy look of regret on his face that seemed to tighten with each swing of his staff. It made me curious to say the least. But he was indeed quite strange, maybe it was a quirk of his, a rather suspicious quirk but nonetheless at that precise moment in time I was not entirely focussed on analysing aspects of Solas' character. Rather I was trying to help Varric who had been somehow caught between two shades. A (luckily) well placed arrow (what with my horrid human bow) and and flash, bang and fizzle of magic the two beasts were felled and Varric stared at me in almost disbelief.

"That's a hell of a lot of crazy magic you got there Trixy." He said, patting down his hair that had gone frizzy after my rather frazzled display of lighting strikes. I laughed slightly as his tone suggested a compliment but as we turned back to the fight, there was a look in the corner if his eyes. Fear... I'd frightened him. Was my magic really so hectic as to warrant fear from this supposedly impassable dwarf. The thought in itself was unnerving. I was not a monster... I was not like this thing that roared and devoured and killed in front of me. I would never become like it. As if seeing my thoughts it charged towards me, clawed fists balled and ready to strike with the most sharp and piercing bolts of lighting. For a moment I stood petrified, but just a moment. I was Dalish. Natural born hunter, ancestor of magical beings beyond comprehension and I was powerful.
That dark voice in the back of my head whispered this over and over, the pull of the fade rushing over me in orgastic waves that tempted me to release it all, release it now and show them all your power. Fire spread from my feet, burned hot in my eyes, winter ice and snow entwined in my hair and fingernails and sparks irradiated around me as I aimed my final arrow at the beasts galloping form. The power in me almost welled over and it would've been so utterly delicious to let it go but I couldn't. It was dangerous, I couldn't control it I could end up hurting someone. Conceal it, put it away-

"Dhalen your powers are not for this world, they reign ruin and anarchy, control them." Keeper Deshanna's words echoed in my mind and her stern face stared directly into mine. Her wise voice now tinged with fear but I understood. I understood why they gave me a bow instead of a staff. I understood why I had been held back from first to second and second to third. I was dangerous, uncontrollable... But I had to think clearly now. With a flinch I shut the magic away, let it stay hidden, my heart was with arrow and bow, like a true Dalish hunter. My heart beat in a riotous thumping rhythm that threatened to give out but my breath and hand was steady. This is was I lived for. My fingers itched to fire but I had to wait for the opportune moment, wait for its eyes to be almost level with mine and- yes!
In a whistle and a piercing of tough flesh the creature stumbled to a halt, my arrow proudly protruding from its left eye.

"Now! Seal the breach!" Cassandra cried out, breathlessly after the hard fight and after recovering from her shock, Trevelyan shot out her hand and within moments the breach final sealed shut. But not before I heard and felt that horrible shriek again. It pained me in my chest and head and everywhere. Like a distant agony, the memory of pain. It made me flinch slightly but then there was a bright white light, a boom, a bang and a crash and suddenly we were carrying an unconscious Tevelyan back to Haven. Somehow news of her miraculous deed had spread and instead of scorn she was now looked upon with reverence. Herald, some of the shems called her. Bollocks is what I thought. Not that I voiced this to anyone, they all seemed so enraptured by her I'm sure they'd have me strung up for blasphemy if I even so much as said her hair was out of place.
But I digress, a physician was sent to the lady heralds meagre shack to look after her while she recovered. The little town seemed more hopeful, the sun had even come out but that was all secondary when I saw Cassandra storming towards me, Cullen and a few other guards in tow.

"Chain her." She commanded and the cuffs came out. I hopped down from the wall on which I was perched and swallowed down the piece of toast I had managed to pinch. Was that what this was about?

"Creators, if I thought you'd be this harsh for stealing toast I would've just went for the carrot." I said, half joking. Judging her her reaction, Cassandra was not amused.

"This isn't about toast." Cullen said viciously, grabbing my wrists and cuffing them before I had time to struggle, not that I didn't try afterwards.

"I thought we were passed this." I growled as they began to haul me away. Again.

"As did I, until you showed signs of possession." Cassandra said bitterly, dragging me up the steps to the Chantry. At this I panicked. I wouldn't go back in that cell. I wouldn't...

"What? What are you talking about possession? You think I'm possessed?" My words came out in a disbelieving jumble of indignity and it seemed to draw attention. Leliana looked up from her maps and frowned when she saw the spectacle.

"Cassandra!" She called, hastily making her way towards us. "What is the meaning of this? She helped seal the breach did she not? Surely you can forgive her escape attempt now?" She said, and I would've mistaken it for lightheartedness had her voice not been edged with threat. Cassandra's frown could've broken a mirror.

"You saw what she is Leliana. At the temple, flame, ice and lightening engulfed her and she felt nothing. Almost as if it was a part of her. She has clearly been possessed." She said dismissively and continued to haul me onward and through the great creaking doors of the Chantry.

"I'm not bloody possessed!" I shouted through gritted teeth. Leliana again came to my aid as she followed.

"Cassandra, be reasonable. That is not enough evidence to suggest that she-"

"It is evidence enough, we cannot take the chance of having a demon amongst our own." Cullen interrupted and I nearly booted him in his stupid arrogant face.

I struggled against them viciously as I was lead back down into the dungeons. Leliana had fallen back... I hoped to the gods that she had not just given me up for an abomination.

"Let me go!" I cried, kicking out my legs so as to try and free myself but I was thrust down and tied to a chair in one of the cells. I struggled against the iron clasps as fear and panic welled up inside me. What were they going to do? Smite me? No. They couldn't just do that on the suspicion that I was a demon...

"Fetch the mother of this chantry." Cassandra said lowly to one of the guards and did as he was told. It was when Cullen and Cassandra began praying that I really began to shit a brick.

"What are you doing?" I asked them, trying to hide the quiver in my voice. They didn't answer, only continued muttering their prayers. I rattled against the chains again and struggled with all my might but they wouldn't budge. Then the a shemlen woman came down softly in here preposterous looking garb and talked quietly to Cassandra. Eventually they nodded to each other and began to make... What, a circle around me?

"Before we resort to the rite, we must first attempt to draw out the demon. If we can save nothing else, at least we'll have saved her soul." The mother said softly and the other two nodded.

"The rite? What rite?" I asked frantically, still trying to escape my confines. None of them answered, perhaps they didn't have to. I'd heard of the shemlen ritual for possessed mages. They take away their magic, but in doing so they take the person. The very fabric of who they were. They become tranquil. A shell. A corpse. Alive but not living, not feeling joy or sadness ever again... No, Please no. Not that.

"Mythal's mercy I'm not possessed! Stop this!" I cried out in fear but I was suddenly shushed by the mother as she stepped forward and placed a clammy hand on my head.

"You will come out of this child." She said harshly and all I could do was raise an eyebrow and how foolish she looked.

"You will come out of this child." She repeated again, but only this time she stepped back and I saw Cullen and Cassandra raise their swords vertically and then smash them down into the stone floor. Everything from that point on went razor sharp. The clang of the metal was deafening, and the rawness of my wrists was agony.

"You will come out of this child." I heard the mother shout, somewhere over the chaos and pain that was this moment. Then another deafening clang and I felt my soul shriek out, like the fade had when it was manipulated by the Herald. Only that distant pain was very much on me. I almost tasted blood from the scream of pain that erupted from my throat. I felt my magic flare off, I wasn't controlling it anymore... It was untethered. Creators know what it would do. I could barely even think over the pain never mind see, I didn't want to. Death would be a mercy from this agony.

Then suddenly it stopped. A raised voice, a wash of peace and then kind blue grey eyes.