#ficletorium

... She pushes Orsino's door open, not even bothering to knock. Knight-Commander's presumption, she's sure someone would call it, but it isn't her intention to be rude or domineering, not this time. Orsino looks up from his paperwork in surprise, then in concern when he sees the pallor in her cheeks.

"What's the matter?" he asks, setting the quill down.

"No, no, don't look at me like that," she grouses, grimacing. "Yell at me for barging in without knocking. Call me a-- what is it you call me? A hard-headed, hard-hearted harpy--"

Orsino grimaces, this time. "That... wasn't a proud moment of mine. Why would you want me to repeat it?"

"I just--" Meredith shoves her hand in her hair, exhaling in frustration. "Sorry. I just... wanted you to be you, for a moment. I--"

"And 'being me' means getting hot-headed and yelling at you because I unfairly blame you for every ill every mage has ever suffered, right," Orsino says ruefully.

Meredith waves a hand irritably. "We'll get to that later. I... listen, Orsino, I've got templars who are leaving proposals on my desk insisting that the best thing to do is Tranquilise all mages. All of them. Every single one. And I just... I don't think about Tranquillity in detail much, Elsa's a sweet girl and that's all I think about, but... I've only known Elsa the way she is. What kind of personality did she have before we branded her? I imagined how different you'd be and... I hated it. It pissed me off. Maker, I want to strangle Ser Alrik!"

Orsino is trying not to smile, his mouth twitching as he leans back in his chair and listens to her tirade. "You'd miss me if I were gone."

Meredith exhales gustily, glaring at him. "Of course that's what you'd get out of this."

"And yet, you don’t deny it," he reminds her, cheekily, but sobers. "Now imagine how many young apprentices I've had to witness lose everything they are to the brand. How many children I've adored, despite all my intentions not to, that grew up to become, not mages, but... something that most people can't even recognise as another person. I know your Ser Alrik. I've run afoul of him several times and each time it took every ounce of willpower in me not to do something horrible to him, to give him a good reason to be so hateful. I know what he does to mages. Do you hear me? I know what he does to them, and I can't do anything about it. I could tell you, but what would you do about it? Would you have him expelled from the Order? Or would you censure him and release him? Censure means nothing to a black-hearted whoreson like him. He doesn't care what you think. He doesn't care what I think. He doesn't care about anything except how much power he can have over the powerless. And being a templar will always give him a place to indulge that."

Orsino almost wishes he isn't so easily worked up, because everything becomes a speech with him. He knows it, and it embarrasses him, but passion and pain burns hot in him at all times, and all it needed was a gentle nudge to spill forth in a torrent. Meredith watches him guardedly, and he knows she's shielding herself from the emotional weight of his words -- she has to, because to feel the fullness of it would be a distraction, and her job is difficult. --Not the Knight-Commander part,  but the part where she must continue to be Knight-Commander although even her faith in the institution that she represents is being shaken to the core.

"You make this so fucking hard for me," she says quietly, and Orsino nods.

"I know."

But this was no mere skirmish, no sortie against a gaggle of darkspawn. Urthemiel rose mighty and terrible over Fort Drakon, an adversary beyond measure, beyond understanding. Not a dragon, not an abomination, an archdemon, something even the Maker, should he have existed, would not wish to behold. They fought as valiantly as they could, but soon all of them were wearier than they’d ever been, and it seemed they would lose.

In that moment Anansi Surana stood in the fray, whipped ragged by the winds that Urthemiel’s wings stirred up, but refusing to buckle. And for that moment, all was still. Later, they would all avoid the question that nagged them-- did you hear it, too?

Anansi brought his hands together in front of his chest, and he closed his eyes, and he sang but a few bars -- enough to focus, enough to touch, enough to fill him to the brim.

Urthemiel was circling, and when Anansi began to sing, the archdemon saw an opening and began to dive.

Alistair, Ali Bear-boy, was staggering to his feet when he heard the song in his mind. It was a question, and he answered. I am a Grey Warden. I give this shield, this power of mine, for Anansi. I haven’t always believed in myself, but I have always believed in Anansi Surana.

Briar Heart, Vashoth, was yanking the bladed end of eir staff out of a genlock when ey heard the song in eir mind. It was a question, and ey answered. I am a Grey Warden. I give this magic, this power of mine, for the sake of my mate, for the sake of the child ey carry, for the sake of us all.

Loghain mac Tir, newly Joined, was hastily wrapping a wound with a scrap ripped from a fallen mage’s robes when he heard the song in his mind. It was a question, and he answered. I am a Grey Warden. I give this sword, this power of mine, for the land I love and the queen who will rule it. I am not afraid to die, but maybe I will be glad to live.

So this, then, is the power of Wardens, Morrigan thought to herself as she stood on the rampart, feeding Anansi’s growing spell through the bond their Ritual had created. This magic, her last gift; her last silent expression of faith in a young Warden she’d begrudgingly nursed back to health in a ramshackle hut what seems like ages ago.

The battle is not yet done, many more soldiers in this Battle for Denerim thought to themselves as they felt Anansi’s song wash over them, lifting them to their feet, drawing their combined energy to the core of the song -- to Anansi’s loosely clasped hands, in front of his chest.

Anansi opened his eyes. The archdemon dove. Anansi raised his eyes to Urthemiel’s, raised his hands, and pushed.

“It was like... like a light, right? A giant ball of flamin’ sunlight, but all outta that one little body,” someone would marvel in a tavern later, but someone else would argue, “Nah, you’ve got it all wrong, son, it was like... like a scream, like the loudest scream you’d ever heard, like someone was just splittin’ you apart with it.” Still another would claim that Anansi’s final spell was like another dragon rising to meet Urthemiel and ripping him open, and yet another would insist that no one could have seen anything, because surely they’d gotten instantly knocked out by the force of blast just like he had, so they must all be making it up.

Preston couldn't relax. He'd only believe Noah was okay when Noah woke up and told him so. He supposed Noah would just laugh at the depth of his distrust of the Institute, but Preston couldn't understand how he trusted them so implicitly.

Sighing, Preston pulled up a seat and vowed to keep vigil until Noah opened his eyes. But biology obeyed its own prime directive, and after such an adrenaline spike and so much anxiety he could not stave off sleep for long. 

"You'll get a stiff neck like that," are the words that snap him awake, and he sits up quickly although his body groans in protest. He was right. Preston did have a stiff neck. Noah, sitting up at the edge of the bed, laughs as he surreptitiously massages it.

"You okay?" Noah asks, and Preston doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

"Me? Am I okay? Do you have any idea--"

"Yes, mother," Noah interrupts, a smile twitching at the corner of his lips. "I remember what happened. But you got me here, just like I asked. And didn't I tell you they'd fix me right up?"

"Noah, you have got to be more careful! They almost killed you!" Preston stands, closing the distance between them. "I honestly don't know how they didn't!"

"Well, the important thing is that they didn't, isn't it?" Noah peers at him, seemingly confused. "Come on, babe. Be happy. I'm okay. It's all right."

"This time it was! Because I was right there! And because... I don't know, luck, or something!"

"Preston--"

"I just got to the point where maybe I’m okay with thinking about the future, and not about how hard getting through one day is! Maybe I shouldn't hinge my entire life on you, but I did! It's done! I would never want to die and leave you alone, but you--!"

"Join me. Ascend with me. Become with me. You'll think you're disintegrating, being taken apart by a Reaper, and you'll be forgiven for thinking that. It's only scary for a short while, trust me. And you're not alone. London will think she's becoming a Reaper and taking you apart. Imagine that, right? Anyway, neither of those things is the whole truth, it's just the way it'll feel for a minute. And then the interface will be complete. And everyone, all sentient life, will be hybridised."

"What?" Adrian steps back, shaking his head. "You've got to be kidding me. How?"

"My code, your code, London's code. The Shepard Code. It's a hybrid DNA, and it'll be synthesised from all of us, and installed into the genetic memory of the galaxy. Everyone will be rewritten, but... not their minds, Adrian. Not that unique combination of memory and sentiment. They'll still be them. If that's what you're worried about."

"And I'll be dead."

"Well, by everyone’s reckoning, yeah. But you'll be with us. We'll be the Three-in-One...”

Noah Kingfisher III coughs, coughs harder, tries to force his gluey eyelids open. Vision does return to him, but not the vision of his eyes.

“Remember me?”

Noah stops trying to move his body, stops struggling against what felt like an icy shell, and sighs. Oh, he remembers. “Dark Man.”

“Good, cully. What’s the last thing you remember?”

“The bombs fell.”

“After that.”

Pushing, crowding, a loud and grinding elevator, smell of metal and machine, strangers prodding at him, inspecting him. Shaun crying in Zora’s arms, Shaun being passed into his arms, Shaun heavy and warm and familiar, smelling of powder and Zora’s perfume, and then Zora taking him again as strangers ushered them into... “The pods. What were they for again?”

“Doesn’t matter, Dead Man. And before you go telling me how you’re obviously not dead, that doesn’t matter, either. Because to the world you knew, you might as well be -- and this might as well be your drawer in the morgue. But never mind that. I’ve something to show you, old friend.”

Noah’s eyes pry open.

“Is it over?” Zora’s voice is muffled through the thick glass. Noah starts to smile, seeing her, seeing Shaun, but then his perspective widens, and he sees the men around her. He feels cold in a way that has little to do with the cryogenic pod.

“Everything’s fine. Just give us the child, and...” Their first mistake, Noah thinks pityingly. She loathed strange hands on their child.

There is a struggle. Noah raises his hands to the glass, tapping at first, then slapping, then pounding. “Hey! Hey! What’s going on out there? Don’t grab him like-- don’t grab her like that! Stop! Let me... out...”

He subsides as the coldness spreads through his veins, into his lungs, into his heart. One man, the bald one with the scar, raises a gun.

“Oh,” Noah sighs, “oh, why, god,” and Zora jerks back against her pod, blood blooming from the center of her jumpsuit. He watches without seeing as the men take Shaun and exit his line of sight. He feels in flashes-- feels lancing pain at the sunlight glancing off a mobile, at impossibly tiny fingers curling around his thumb, feels bleak emptiness at the peek of Zora’s laughing eyes under a gauzy veil, at her body tight against his. Feels nothing, eventually, as he closes his eyes and falls back into the blackness.

The Chasind dragged, as if their limbs were too heavy, as if their bodies were weighted with stones. Someone would murmur a bit of song as they prepared Malcolm’s body, the words slurred, and then they’d subside.

Leandra slept fitfully in the wailing tent, sometimes waking to weep, but the energy of the tribe pressed down upon her, too, and mostly she just lay, the tears leaking unbidden from her eyes. Bethany and Carver held each other and rocked, their eyes closed, their heartbeats slowed to the rhythm of the drums. Elijah chopped and hacked at drywood for Rurig, his jaw clenched so tightly it gave him a headache, his eyes burning because he scarce remembered to blink.

Soon it would be nightfall.

“I know you,” not-Anders said in his deep and echoing voice, leaning forward curiously, a finger pressed to Eli’s breastbone. a curious heat flared behind that bone, a questing tendril of flame, answering the voice with a will of its own.

“I know you, berserkir. you are like me. spirit of righteous fury, spirit of checks and balances. spirit of pain and punishment, of love and sacrifice, of justice.”

the primal Beast of Eli’s heart, the red rage that infused him in battle and made him berserkir -- unstoppable, blood-seeking, vengeful, exultant -- surged forward at being recognised; surged forward and painted Eli’s eyes in the colour of charcoal mixed in fresh blood, thickened his shoulders and made his hands into claws, widened his stance and hardened his jaw.

“help us, berserkir,” said Justice. “and then, when it is done... set us free.”

Anders and Elijah stare at each other as Knight-Commander Meredith shouts for the head of the apostate, as the sounds of screams and sobs and thudding footsteps and clanking templar armour rise to fever pitch, as ozone and ash clog their lungs and make their eyes water.

Anders’ hands are turned palm-out at his sides, in something like supplication, or surrender. Elijah’s hand has, almost unconsciously, curled around the hilt of the dirk shoved into his sash.

“it must be done. finish it,” Anders sighs. behind his voice, Elijah hears, “it is done. set us free.”

the Burned Man takes no more notice of him, it seems, as he would of a gnat. the sounds continue, sharp as whipcracks in the dim stillness. it occurs to Gideon that he doesn’t know what he’s doing here. he’s been pulled, by a chain around some spot right behind his navel-- pulled from place to place, from battle to battle, to here, to Zion;

he is afraid. he feels it like a hot poker twisting and twirling ‘round his guts, like ash under his tongue. the Burned Man is burning, still.

“yes,” Joshua responds, to words Gideon was certain he hadn’t spoken aloud. snap, slide, click. “there is a fire that never goes out. it is mine. and there is a darkness that never stops walking. it is yours.”

Gideon opens his mouth to question, his mind swirling in inchoate confusion.

“behind you,” Joshua answers, without being asked. click, slide, snap. “always behind you.

Courier. Messenger. it is good that you have brought one another.” slide, click, snap. “I have been waiting for you both.”