Varric watched the spectacle, and the longer he watched, the more it reminded him of the blasted Proving Grounds. Not that he had seen one, personally; then again, he didn't need to. If Varric had anything in spades, it was his imagination.

But this? I can't believe I'm not imagining this!

The day promised to be eventful when he woke up: giant swirling butthole in the sky, nervous humans in armors all shifty like lyrium addicts in Lowtown, and no other dwarf save him in sight. Only the elves seemed normal, going about their day like it was any other normal fucking day in Haven.

But even the elves were spooked when they saw a bald elf walking behind the Seeker, holding a gnarly staff and parading with an air of confidence and a posture no elf had any right having.

Varric picked up his lunch of roast and mashed potato, and followed the crowd that followed the elven mage that followed the Seeker. The following stopped at the training grounds, just outside the big archway gate, in the jut of land overlooking the frozen lake of Haven.

Varric squeezed his way through the thin crowd and found himself at the front row of what looked like a training match. Soldiers demarcated the sparring space by standing, with two arms-lengths between them, on the perimeter of a semi-circle.

On one side, the elf wore light mercenary armor with no helmet and boots. He twirled his staff like a pike and stabbed it in the air like a halberd. Varric knew the guy was warming up but he also had this determined expression on his face that Varric could only describe as Fenris facing slavers.

On the other side, Cassandra was coaching a Templar who was being fitted in full armor.

Varric dipped the roast chicken leg in the mash and took a bite. The chicken was good, the mash could be better.

The match was over before he finished chewing his second bite.

The thin crowd applauded as Hairy (nickname pending) returned to a relaxed starting stance. Meanwhile, his sparring partner stood helpless, a pillar of frozen ice.

Cassandra pushed another templar to spar next.

Hairy spun his staff and conjured a barrier. The templar struck sword to shield to antagonize the mage. Hairy started spinning gracefully with his staff; ice projectiles flew from his staff to the templar who was now charging forward, shield braced for impact. Some ice projectiles punched the Templar's armor and shield, most of it glanced off or broke apart like snowballs, and still the Templar's path was set.

Just when Varric expected the shield to make impact, Hairy spun away in two steps and hit the ground with the butt-end of his staff. A circle, luminous and white-blue, appeared on the spot between templar and mage.

"Cancel!" Cassandra shouted from the perimeter.

The Templar didn't take the bait, but then he didn't need to; he was a big man with a long arm and an even longer sword that he sent in a slashing arc toward the mage. Only the barrier protected the mage, who then blinked away from where he stood and reappeared a few meters behind the Templar. Without waiting he again launched projectiles, spinning like a ripple of water.

Cassandra nodded to a third soldier, who carried a maul.

And that's when Varric started having flashbacks of arena fighting that he had never personally witnessed. It made the chicken in his mouth taste like nug. He spat it out.

Some spectators reacted to this, pointing at the fourth party to the spectacle. The elf cast a fresh barrier as the sword and shield templar prepared to charge again. The soldier with the maul marched towards the elf. The elf cast another ice mine in front of him before switching back to projectiles, concentrated at the templar who was closing the space faster.

The templar stopped midway and raised his shield up and brought it crashing down with a flash of light that erupted from the ground in a circle larger than the ice mine and covered the ground where the mage stood.

The maul-wielding two-hander stopped at the edge of the ice mine and slammed the maul on the ground, exploding the ice mine and sending ice shards flying. The explosion was indiscriminate but that didn't seem to matter—the shards hit the elf, whose barrier decayed from the templar's magic-eating ward, and fell to the ground from the impact of the maul.

The maul went up and down again, the impact shaking Varric's feet. The mash fell but at this point who cared about the mash anymore?

The elf managed to roll away from the maul, but he seemed woozy from the tremor, holding on to his staff for balance.

Unfortunately, he was within striking distance of the templar again, who now raised his sword to strike the elf still kneeling on the ground.

Steel clashed on steel as Cassandra blocked the templar's blow with her sword in one hand, and bashed the bastard away with her shield on the other. The templar hit the ground hard.

"Stop!" she ordered.

But behind her, the elf blinked away and reappeared behind the two-hander. He stabbed the soldier with his staff, the business end of it hitting the helmet before blasting it off with an ice attack that froze the mauler mid-turn.

Cassandra shouted another order to stop but the elf's stance looked like he was readying to send another volley of projectiles. She closed the distance between her and the elf in two steps, but her sword didn't swing for the elf. It stabbed the ground.

A ward burst from the ground, larger than the cleansing ward the templar set earlier, and it exploded in a controlled way, sending the elf flying off the ground and slamming back down, pierced by pure energy that shone like blinding sunbeams.

And then Cassandra hit the elf one time with a thwack that made the crowd gasp.

The staff clattered noisily when it hit the frozen ground.

Varric dropped the roast and the mash. Lunch ruined, he thought back to the Proving Grounds. Provings were more brutal and bloody. This wasn't. But at least Provings, the real honorable ones, rewarded the strongest.

But this? There was no way the elf would win. And Varric was disappointed with himself for forgetting that.

There's no way humans would let the elves win.