#inquisibitches

“No,” Contessa said in as even a manner as she could manage, desperately trying to keep her teeth from chattering. “You’re right, we could’ve stayed on the boat until you finished your business. I’m sure the accommodations would’ve been far superior.”

It had clearly been meant as a slight against his vessel, but it seemed (for the time being) that Stormbreaker wasn’t going to rise to the bait. He simply kept walking, occasionally lifting a hand to greet the other Avvar they passed on the path. “Aye. The ship would’ve been a better place for the lot of you. It’s not often the hold opens itself to lowlanders—”

“How honored we are,” Napoleon hissed.

Stormbreaker favored him with a sharp glance from over his shoulder. “You’ll not find any of your painted faces here. No masked balls or fancy finger-cakes in Shark Maw. Only the sea and the gods.”

Bringing up the rear of their group, Damien’s voice—naturally low, always quiet—was all but swallowed up by the wind. “Comforting,” he might’ve said. Or perhaps he said nothing at all; it amounted to the same.

They stopped abruptly in front of a thatched hut, the wood of its walls crusted with the white scale of salt or ice or both at once. There were no windows, but even so, in the dim light of evening it seemed to possess a peculiar blue cast. It was then that the three of them, strangers in this frigid land, seemed to finally grasp the gravity of what Stormbreaker had been saying all along. Damien, most of all, grew noticeably tense under the thick layers of furs wrapped around him.

Something about that light was unnatural. Arcane.

That would not do.

“What I tell you now,” Stormbreaker began, eyeing them all with a seriousness that made his already grim face somehow even more menacing, “Is not to be taken lightly. I do not expect you to understand what you see, and I do not expect you to agree with what you hear, but you will—” at that, he pointed his gaze directly at Damien, “You will, lowlander, say nothing. You will do nothing. You will behave in the manner befitting this place. I’ve seen you in your Chantry. I know you are capable of silence and respect. You will show that here, or you will face the consequences of the hold. And I will not champion your cause. Are we in accord?”

Damien bristled, his face remaining unmoving.

Napoleon sucked his teeth loudly and rolled his eyes like a child, folding his arms across his chest as best he could, considering the multitude of layers he was wrapped in.

It was Contessa (as always) who took the initiative. “You’ve told us very little about your religious practices,” she said as airily as she could with her breath forming such thick clouds in front of her face. “This speech feels less like a warning about our behavior…and more like a warning about what’s about to happen to us.”

He turned his gaze to her, his exasperation evident. “Keep your mouths shut, and it won’t much matter what I warned about, now, will it?” With that, he opened the door to the hut and disappeared inside.

After exchanging one last apprehensive glance they followed suit, Damien holding the door ajar for the other two, more out of habit than anything else.

The interior of the hut was heavy with the smell of ozone and burning herbs. It was dark as the door swung shut again—so very, very dark—save for the ephemeral blue light flickering from the wicks of strange candle clusters. Combined, the effect was unnerving: Shadows stretched and writhed along the walls as gasps of smoke swirled into rippling air currents, giving the distinct impression that there were a great many people lurking in the darkness.

Unaware of it, they turned to Stormbreaker in unison, searching for some sort of answer…or at the very least, reassurance. But he offered none, as was his wont, and simply strode forward towards the largest group of candles.

“Torsten Stormbreaker.” The voice came from everywhere and nowhere all at once, smoky as the incense filling the air. One of the long, spindly shadows seemed to slither its way out of the wall, forming into something made of blood and bone. “I thought I heard whispers of your name on the breeze…”

In response, Stormbreaker spoke only one word, his voice full of the clipped reverence with which the others might’ve addressed a Grand Cleric. “Augur.”

All at once around them, the pale blue candlelight surged, growing brighter until the hut was fully—if dimly—illuminated. The contents of the room were thrown into brilliant contrast, revealing stacks of moldering books, vials of unnamable things, and five human skulls in varying states of decay featured prominently around an open brazier. The shadow that had crept and crawled became more solid, stepped into the eerie blue light, and stared back at them with white eyes as unseeing as the skulls laid out behind her. “You come with guests,” she stated plainly, each movement of her head causing the faintest tinkling from the shells and bones woven into the thick, matted plaits framing her face. “Lowlanders.”

“Lowlanders,” he agreed with a dour nod. “But I do not come with them. They come with me.”

She seemed to consider this for the better part of a minute, her hazy eyes narrowing to slits as she stared through Stormbreaker’s chest. The light of the candles flashed, growing brighter and brighter before slowly dimming once more. A quiet, contemplative hum, and then she was walking, her bare feet making no sound on the floor. Angling her head towards each of them in turn, the augur made a wide, slow circle around the hut, her shadow never quite precisely where it should’ve been. “That they do…and why, I wonder?” Through the cottony fog of smoke and candlelight, her features seemed to twist and change; strangely, had anyone asked, each of the three would’ve sworn they’d recognized her nose or chin or gait as that of a long-lost or long-dead relative. The effect was disconcerting at best. Only once the arc of her path flattened and she neared them did they realize how very young she must’ve been. The thick, grasping webs of cataracts over her eyes had at first given her the air of some ancient crone living in the darkness, but up close, her skin was smooth and unblemished, save for the perpetual blush of windburn across her nose and cheeks. “Wonder, wonder, wonder…” she continued, standing first in front of Damien, blind eyes not looking at him so much as through him. “Do they come in hope of word? No…no I think they do not.”

“No, they do not.” Stormbreaker paid the group of them little mind as he spoke with the augur, lowering the hood of his furs when her back was turned. All at once, the hut was stiflingly hot, the air thick and the atmosphere frightfully close. “They go where I lead.”

The odd light of the candles made Napoleon’s eyes that much bluer, that much sharper, and they all but glowed with indignation as he snapped, “That’s hardly the—” His voice promptly died in his throat as the augur stepped instead in front of him, tall enough that she had to look downwards to find his eyes.

Contessa had only seen Napoleon turn that sickly, sallow color once before—when one of Damien’s gargantuan Mabari had torn through its harnesses and burst into their sitting room. For all his swagger and volume, he had been cowed quickly enough.

“Hmmm…curious. I…” Another tinkling sound as the girl turned her head, the ornaments woven into her hair clinking against one another. She looked not at Stormbreaker, not to the candles, not to anything in particular, her head cocked to the side in what appeared, for all intents and purposes, to be rapt attention. A smile almost heartbreaking in its earnestness spread across her face, sending those peculiar ripples across her features once more. “Adventures, eh? Many and more!” She blinked, lips pursed as though preparing to kiss some unseen specter before her. “A Tevinter burning black! A hungry mouth in the sky! A castle of ice and glass, but where is the water, Torsten Stormbreaker?” Then she did turn to him, abandoning the other three as quickly as she had fixated on them.

“Too far for my tastes.” With a low grunt, Stormbreaker sat himself down on the short stone wall surrounding the open brazier, setting his elbows onto his knees and allowing his hands to dangle between his legs. Even sitting, he was only just shorter than the ghostly young woman. “I’ve come for guidance, Augur,” he said, that same reverence still flavoring his low voice. “From whosoever will offer it.”

She swept over to him, her movements somehow too fluid, too smooth. It was as though she were a seal gliding through the water, riding on the currents as they rushed around her. The augur wasted no time considering Stormbreaker, simply laying a heavily tattooed hand against his cheek before nodding. “And guidance you shall have, Torsten Stormbreaker. Voices! Many and more, many and more. Some familiar, some not, some…” her head turned towards a darkened corner of the hut, and for the barest moment, there seemed to be a faint flicker of a human shape there. It was gone in a blink, the effect surreal enough to dizzy the newcomers. “Some louder than others.” A crease appeared between her eyebrows, wrinkling her smooth forehead. “Much louder…bigger. Colder.”

The look that passed between the two of them was significant in a way the others couldn’t even begin to parse. With her back to them, Napoleon allowed himself the full-body shudder he’d been holding back since those unsettling eyes had focused on him, turning to Contessa with a disdained expression she understood better than anything he could’ve outright said. She responded with a shrug of her shoulders so minute that only an Orlesian might notice. Surprising neither of them, Damien brooded. His eyes followed the back of the augur’s head like a hunter tracking a boar.

“You haven’t yet seen the proving grounds, Torsten Stormbreaker.”

“Aye, I’ve only just returned.”

“Be wary: The breeze has whispered to me that Skarde Ulfsson has not yet forgotten how you dishonored him before the foam.” Her head tilted again, creating another wave of gentle chiming, and she reached out the hand not placed on Stormbreaker’s face. Fingers grasping towards the darkness, there was no mistaking what the others saw that time.

The shadows against the far wall danced in the candlelight, morphing and warping into shapes with long, grasping arms and disjointed legs; they flickered with the light, taking more solid shape until three…things took shape. There were not people. They were the suggestions of shadows, echoes of bodies. It hurt to look at any one of them for more than a moment, their shapes leaving brilliant tattoos of light imprinted on their eyes if they tried.

Whatever they had suspected, this was too much.

Damien reacted viscerally, already two steps in front of Contessa and Napoleon. His hand was on the pommel of his sword, which he no doubt would’ve unsheathed had Contessa not grabbed his forearm in warning. He was much too polite, far too well bred to say as much, but it was clear from the look on his face that he was giving heavy consideration to jerking out from her grasp. He wanted absolutely nothing to do with whatever was about to happen in that hut. “You speak to spirits.” He kept his eyes trained on the augur, his distrust evident. “Demons.”

There were not words enough to express the boiling fury in Stormbreaker’s eyes as he turned to them. And truly, that was a feat in and of itself, all three of them being well versed in Reagan’s fits of blind, uncontrollable rage.

In comparison, the augur’s face was perfectly blank. Serene, even. “The words of the gods are not meant for all ears, true. And it is not for you to pass judgment on them. They cannot and will not be judged by your words, lowlander.”

Maybe it was the look on Stormbreaker’s face, maybe it was the weight of Contessa’s hand on his arm, maybe it was the undulations of the things against the far wall…maybe it was all of those things that made Damien stand down. Regardless, he took a step back, disengaging from the two Avvar. “This, perhaps, is not an errand meant for us, after all.”

“There is no worry there, Andraste-child.” The augur spoke with the easy confidence of a leader, waving him off with a casual flick of her wrist. “The gods do not want you here either. You may go.”

It was all the permission he needed. Damien cast his eyes down to Contessa, asking without words, and the shape of his mouth softened when she nodded. Without wasting another second, he reached for the door...

Only for his hand to swipe at dead air. He stumbled heavily, struck with the same uncomfortable sensation as one who’s missed the final step of a staircase, just barely managing to catch his balance with a mad pinwheeling of his arms.

“Wait.” A voice rang out, at once the augur and not, familiar and strange, otherworldly in its timbre. She turned back to them, but it was Contessa she focused her attention on, her hand and fingers outstretched towards her. “Crow daughter,” she sang out, speaking with ten tongues instead of only one, “Death bride. Maiden of glass. The Lady sends her word, her envoys. You need only listen…and watch…and taste the air. She favors those who use the ashes of others to patch their wounds. She has much to offer you, if you are willing to offer to her.”

Frowning, Damien pawed for the door again, finding it successfully on the second attempt. He threw it open wide, the icy wind from outside rushing over them in a wave, extinguishing the candles and causing the smoke to dissipate. Napoleon managed to slip out first, ducking under one of Damien’s arms to escape the hut.

“Now, why is it that I’m always the one to make exciting new friends wherever we go?” Contessa asked, watching the door close them off from the augur’s lair. She thought perhaps Napoleon responded (something snippy, no doubt), but her attention was riveted by something else. A frown tugged at her face as she saw the familiar bluish glow from under the door, encasing the hut all but immediately. They’d all seen the candles gutter out, so then what…

Damien adjusted the skins wrapped around himself, flexing his hands uncomfortably. “The sooner we can leave this blighted place, the better.”

“Pagans,” Napoleon muttered, tucking his hands into the deep recesses of his wrappings.

“I think you’re both just bitter that the kindly demons didn’t have anything to say to you,” Contessa commented breezily. “Guess I’d best start learning how to taste the air, hmm?”

“Antivan,” she corrected without missing a beat. Her porcelain mask was tucked away somewhere in her bags below deck in the hold, but the faint spray of salt air on her skin felt like a mask of a different sort. It was another of her many talents: switching so easily between Orlesian ideals and Antivan ones. Standing there on the rocking deck of the ship, illuminated by nothing save the moon and stars, lulled by the sound of the waves around them, she felt closer to a Crow than a Harlequin. Maker, it had been…a long time since she’d felt that way.

The Avvar scoffed loudly enough for her to hear. “Ah. Antivan. Aye. Such a difference, the two…” he tone grew mockingly pensive, “Such a difference.”

There was a difference. There was an entire world of separation and subtext that lay between the intricate societies, but she didn’t much care to explain that to him. The difference between Orlais and Antiva was as clear as the difference between her dear, sweet Napoleon and herself. Orlesians were ostentatious and backhanded, prone to histrionic meltdowns and weak for gold filigree. Antivans were prideful and as quick as the daggers hidden under their clothes, they were passionate but patient. Had Napoleon not already been asleep, the captain would’ve seen it clear as day: At the mere suggestion that Orlesians and Antivans were one in the same, Napoleon’s head may very well have exploded with righteous fury. Contessa simply watched the sky with careful eyes.

Because the Avvar were not Orlesians nor Antivans nor Fereldans nor Marchers nor Tevinters nor Navarrans nor much of anything else, and loath as she was to admit it, she didn’t have nearly enough experience with their sort to have as solid a read on him as she would’ve liked. That meant the scales were not particularly tipped in her favor. That would have to change. Soon.

The Avvar turned to her only slightly, the cast of the moon making the pale blue ink on his skin appear almost black in comparison. His eyes were hooded by the jut of his brow, and something about his face called to mind the warning tales her grandfather used to tell her about the beasts that lived in the ocean’s depths. “I don’t suspect you came up here just to nanny the crew, eh?” His head rolled back against the netting as he glanced down to the water once more. “So what is it that troubles you, lowlander? Ah. Apologies. Antivan lowlander.”

She could hear the smirk in his voice, filed it away for later, and pretended to ignore it. “Why did you agree to take us?”

He turned fully to her then, examining her with a breed of contemplation that again brought to mind something scaled and hungry. Still he said nothing, only watching her with those inscrutable eyes.

Ah, so he hadn’t expected directness from an Orlesian-slash-Antivan. Good to know. “No one else on the dock was willing to transport us, regardless of what we promised. So why is it that you would?” She had her suspicions of course—Contessa always had her suspicions—but it had been a full day without the Avvar or his crew letting on in the slightest. It was setting her on edge.

The air between them was silent but for the waves. Somewhere far off, a bird cried out in the darkness.

Slowly at first, the Avvar nodded, and then cast his gaze back out to the oily black waters of the ocean. “I suppose you’ll be wanting the real answer, Antivan, but oh, I’m not sure the real answer is something you’ll be willing to hear.” He heaved a heavy sigh as though it weighed on him.

She had considered making an accusation, drilling down on what he had meant, but years had taught her that men often hanged themselves best with the nooses their own hands had tied. So she let him speak.

His answer was…not even in the realm of what she had expected. “Mayhap the reason you’re aboard my ship is that it’s what the gods want.”

It was only decades of honing her craft that kept her face as impassive as it was. “The gods?” Contessa asked, blinking in disinterest. “I didn’t take you for a pious man. But if you feel the Maker has—”

There was a strange sound from him, caught somewhere between a cough and a laugh of derision. He forked the fingers of his dry hand towards the sky in a lewd gesture. “Stuff your Maker. Neither him or his fiery tart have say in what we do on this ship.” He offered her another sharp, withering look. “Our gods answer us, Antivan. When has yours ever done that?” He fixed her with that stare for a long while before jerking his head, signaling for her to join him at the edge of the boat. “Our gods,” he began again, “Look for those of us who are worth something. Those of us who are capable and strong. If we are strong enough, if we make our offerings, if we speak to them…sometimes they present us with…unique opportunities.”

Warily, she crossed the space between them, the boards of the deck creaking under her feet as she joined him. She leaned her hands against the side of the ship, craning her head over to get a better view of the choppy waters being churned up by the boat’s wake. From that vantage, she could tell exactly what ropes would need to be cut to send the great brute of a man crashing into the water; the thought occurred to her again that he must trust his men a great deal if he was so willing to put himself in such a stupidly vulnerable position. Contessa Ravenna did not trust in that way. “Unique opportunities,” she repeated, looking down at him.

“Whether you believe me or not is your burden, lowlander. You asked me a question and I answered. The gods brought you to me. There is a reason for that, though for love of The Lady, I can’t begin to fathom it.”

She had the desire to wrinkle her brow, but it was a fleeting thing, gone as soon as it occurred to her. “I can’t help but notice one tiny insinuation you’ve made, there. You say that your gods help those they find worthy. Does that mean you believe yourself to be one of those lucky few?” It was a pointless question to ask. In her experience, there were hardly any men, Orlesian, Antivan, Avvar, or otherwise, who thought themselves unworthy of anything.

The Avvar did not speak. Instead, perplexingly, he lifted his right hand, the one that had been in the water since she’d first come above deck, and reached across himself. He turned his palm up and waved his fingers to beckon her to give him her hand.

Contessa stared at his mammoth palm for a second, maybe two, thinking to herself that he was truly a madman if he thought she was about to entrust her own physical wellbeing to him. And then, in a show of bravery or stupidity—she hadn’t quite decided—she acquiesced, allowing him to take her hand.

“Bend,” he ordered, his tone surprisingly gentle, given the deep, thunderous rumble of his voice. When she did, he placed her hand into the water where his had been only a moment ago. Once her hand was submerged, he shifted his grip to her wrist, turning his gaze to her face. He stared with a dark sort of intensity, looking for something Contessa couldn’t quite place…

And then she felt it.

Against the pads of her fingers, something solid. Something rough. Something large.

Finishing school be damned, that time she did react. Her gasp was quiet, more a sudden intake of breath than an actual cry, and she pulled her wrist free of the Avvar’s grip with a sudden jerk. Part of her wanted to look at him, wanted to demand what had happened, or how he was doing that…but her eyes were riveted on the dark shape just under the water, the tip of a fin she had mistaken in the darkness as just another wave.

It was difficult to tell in the dark of the night, but she cast her eyes down towards the stern and thought she caught sight of another fin for the briefest of moments. If she had, and if that had been its tail…the shark was nearly the size of the boat itself. Her hand dripped, spreading a cold wetness through her bodice as she pressed her palm to her stomach in disbelief.

Black in an Orlesian Château? How curious. But he’d heard the whispers from his little spiders, had heard the name muttered behind fans and gloved hands, and thus the colors began to fall into place: Château de Corbasse was perhaps the name on the maps, the name carefully scrawled on invitations to fastidiously planned salons, but it was Château de Glace murmured when no one was listening. Or, in true Orlesian fashion, when only the right people were listening.

The Château of Ice.

For a spymaster, his smiles came easily. Frequently, too. He supposed that was a bit gauche while waltzing through the land that had birthed and refined the Grand Game…alas, the games he played weren’t carried out behind masks. Tevinter nobles didn’t hide their faces like the Orlesians did—they kept them on display, some going so far as to draw attention to their eyes and mouths with dark kohl. Different breeds, he and his hosts. Different breeds, entirely.

He looked about the manse as his retinue was led to the solar, clasping his arms behind his back; he didn’t need to turn his gaze directly to any of the help to feel their eyes on him. Confused? Perhaps. Intrigued? Likely. Nervous? Oh, most certainly.

It was about that time that he began to notice the greens in the décor. And the golds. And yes, they were…subtle. Nuanced, even, but they were there. Placed carefully for him to see, one wouldn’t wonder. After all, most Orlesians would rather be flayed alive than allow anyone to see their estate done up in the colors of the dread Imperium.

And yet.

These two were going to be complicated, of that much he was already quite sure. He’d of course done his due diligence when the rumors of Cephon’s presence in Orlais had reached him, but there had been so few Orlesian estates he’d thought worth his time. They were flighty things, Orlesians, creatures of fashion whose favors were as easily won as they were lost. And chatty! They were like little songbirds perched high in their colorful nests, warbling out any- and everything to any- and everyone who could hear. Those voices had their use, to be certain, but the sudden disappearance of the would-be-future Archon of the Imperium was not something he wanted shouted from the treetops. He would need to be more…selective.

In the end, it was they who requested an audience with him. Stranger and stranger. There was a hole in the sky, tall tales of ancient Magisters floating about the ether, and these two had the audacity to invite him for tea. What must their fellows have thought?

Then again…in Tevinter, if one’s position was strong enough, solid enough, even word from the Black Divine himself may have fallen on unexpectedly deaf ears. Perhaps their forwardness reflected something similar. Perhaps these little Orlesian birds were cuckoos, waiting to peck their brethren to death to allow themselves more room to spread their feathers. Perhaps, thought Alistair Blackburne, they could prove useful.

He’d listened to the rumors first, the whispers that filled the air if only you knew where to stop and listen. Rumors, he’d found, were a significantly better way to form an accurate image of whosoever it was you were contending with. They weren’t tied down by ceremony or societal mores, they simply were. And in his tenure, the old adage that all rumors started with a grain of truth had proven incorrect at best—there were no grains of truth when you chipped away the pearlescent embellishments, but often there were nuggets.

What he’d gleaned of the masters of Château de Corbasse? Intriguing in every sense of the word.

The biggest, most unavoidable tidbit floating around about them was the matter of their lineage. There were too many different stories regarding that particular issue. Far too many. In his expert opinion, that usually meant one thing: For whatever reason, it was what they wanted the public at large to focus on. They wanted their fellow nobles to wonder whether it was circumstance or sabotage that made it so difficult to lay hands on any legitimate proof of their heritage; why couldn’t anyone provide a bona fide family tree for either of them?

Was it to cover up the fact that neither were truly related to the previous owner of the Château—one ancient, doddering Henri de la Fournise who had, Maker rest his soul, shuffled off this mortal coil under circumstances that might’ve been considered questionable by anyone with eyes or ears—a man whom they both claimed had been a great-uncle?

Was it to hide some horrible secret about their breeding? It was not unheard of for noble families to set fire to the old records to try and hide a murderous brother or a father who had brought shame upon their house. A sister who had given birth to some baseborn bastard, perhaps? Were there relatives hidden in the branches of their family trees that they simply preferred to keep hidden? Was it possible, most horrendous of all, that they weren’t of noble blood at all, and had somehow managed to wriggle their way up the ladder until they found themselves comfortably seated at the head of the table?

Alistair doubted those possibilities. Heavily. Plausible though they were, he was a man who knew how to follow his gut, and his gut promised him that Ravenna and Martinet were as noble as they came, blue-blooded through and through. Had they done away with the estate’s previous owner? Likely, but that was just par for the course in Orlesian society. Were there embarrassments in their family? Unquestionably. Every family had its humiliations, but something told him that bad apples didn’t long cling to the branch where these two were concerned.

No, no. There was another scandalous piece to the puzzle…and it was the only piece that he considered usable.

He suspected that the reason it was so difficult to pin down their lineage had to do with the nastiest of the rumors he’d heard about them. It was suggested that they were cousins, his hosts, either first or second (though even those claims seemed to waver with the season), and while that may have raised a few eyebrows, it wasn’t unheard of. It wasn’t reviled. Yes, they lived under the same roof, and yes, there were still those whispers that suggested their bedchambers were connected by hidden halls for ease of access…but still, such trysts were not unheard of among the higher tiers of nobility. Certainly, there were those Tevinter houses that only wed cousin-to-cousin, for sake of protecting the purity of their blood. Careful breeding, they called it, ensuring that the high houses remained the high houses, that magic was kept in (or out) of the line.

Where the problems began creeping in were the suggestions, hushed and apprehensive though they were, that Martinet and Ravenna were not cousins. Perhaps they were just living in sin in full view of the Maker and his Bride; as pious friends of the Chantry, there were few things that would flutter fans as quickly as that revelation. Of course, there were those bold few who’d glommed onto the idea of their blood, he’d heard, who’d gone so far as to claim them twins, making whatever it was between them more than just taboo; were those whispers true, then his hosts were not just objects of public attention, but they were monsters. Aberrations.

Curious, then, how very little effort went into quashing those voices.

Curious how very little effort went into quashing any rumors about the Château’s masters.

Almost as though any potential source of scandal, of embarrassment, was appreciated.

Curious, indeed.

He hadn’t been able to get his hands on any solid proof of their lineage of course, but he had his sources, and he’d gotten much closer to the truth than anyone else, he wouldn’t wonder. Not that he had needed to—again, his gut had led the way. It was easy enough to rule out the frankly ridiculous notion that they were siblings (let alone twins, for Andraste’s sake); Martinet’s line was purely Orlesian, spanning back to the Exalted Age. Ravenna’s was more complicated, harder to trace, but it seemed it had come out of Antiva, not Orlais, and considering he couldn’t find hide nor hair nor suggestion of any Antivans in Martinet’s family, well. That was that. And while it was still entirely possible they were first cousins, second cousins even more so, he had his doubts. Heavy doubts.

No, he didn’t think his hosts were related at all.

If he knew the Grand Game, and of course he did, he thought it much more likely that they only wanted people to believe they were family. They wanted there to be doubt sown in those fields, they wanted the voices to follow them wherever they went. It kept them in the spotlight, it kept them in the public interest, and, he thought, it provided a beautiful distraction for those movements they made under cover of dark. The movements that had nothing to do with their blood or beds, but instead the chess pieces on their board.

Oh yes, these two were going to be interesting. And he was delighted.

A servant, thin and mousy, opened the doors to the sitting room, eyes wide behind her half-mask as they fell upon the Tevinter delegation. It was hard to say, really, what it was that made her face pale so quickly. Perhaps the two mages standing behind him, the forked horns of their helmets making them seem so much taller than they were; perhaps the rogue to his right, hood drawn and eyes hidden; perhaps the silent, sickly Dalish elf to his left, her skin still waxy and swollen from the swirls of lyrium gifted to her; perhaps it was just him, the tall Tevinter with an uncomfortably warm smile. He was, after all, one of the dread bogeymen of Thedas.

Whatever it was, it seemed she took just a moment too long in ushering them into the sitting room. From behind her, there was a snap so loud that it almost sounded as though it had come from a whip instead of human fingers. It was followed by a rush of Orlesian, swift but sharp and undeniably angry. The girl stepped backwards with a quiet excuse, sweeping her arm inwards in a mimicry of the doorman earlier.

“Merci,” he said as he crossed the threshold, precisely loudly enough to be heard. The barest wave of his own fingers and the others followed him inwards, the soles of their boots clacking loudly against the painstakingly shined marble floors. The color was a hazy, translucent grey, only adding to the cold illusion of the place. Above them, a large domed ceiling allowed natural sunlight to flood in, carefully crafted stained glass panes guiding it in such a way that the dais at the front received the most illumination.

...as though the skies had parted and the Maker Himself had shone the sun down onto the two of them.

The effect was hardly understated.

Oh, they were going to be fun. It had been too long since he’d been given an opportunity to dance like this with foreigners—and non-mages, to boot. Soporati were always a treat to, well, treat with.

As though they’d only just realized he was there, the two stood from their plush seats to turn and face him. “Magister Blackburne, you honor us with your presence.” Lady Ravenna stood with the perfect posture expected of a fine Orlesian lady, holding her arms and hands at the stiff right-angles dictated by polite society. Her movements all seemed effortless, loose and flowing, a perfect contrast to the tight lacings of her dress.

“Your journey was not too strenuous, we hope.” Lord Martinet stood only a few inches taller than her, his doublet the exact same shade as her dress. Even the accents—buttons, laces, trimming—were identical. They seemed a matching set, one way or another. Clever. Precious, in a sophomoric sort of way. Perhaps they really were just another pair of run-of-the-mill Orlesian sycophants, more obsessed with the image they made than anything of substance.

Still, he inclined his head towards them, offering the polite half-bow expected of his own rank. “Oh, nothing to complain of. Any weariness has been sufficiently wiped away by the beauty of the countryside, I assure you. And, of course, the incomparable charm of your estate.” A beat as he let the muscles of his face settle more comfortably into his smile, “Might I say I am particularly fond of your choice in color scheme, my lady? My lord?”

Lord Martinet’s mask was a pathetic slip of a thing, covering little more than his eyes and the bridge of his nose, made of some strange metal that appeared perfectly black until the light caught it just so, creating a faintly blue and almost opalescent gleam that gave his eyes an eerie sharpness. There had been no rumors of Martinet’s vanity—there had been detailed, consistent reports. And there the proof was, staring him in the face with its chiseled cheekbones, wicked lips, and all else. Martinet’s was a mouth meant for smirking and scowling, he thought. “Ah, bien sûr, we aim to please.”

In harsh contrast, only Lady Ravenna’s eyes could be seen from behind her mask, more grey than blue, but just as cold and just as sharp as Martinet’s. Her face was hidden by another, cast of what seemed to be an exceedingly high-quality porcelain and painted with the careful strokes of an artisan. A white doll’s face, it was, lips bow-shaped and black, a careful overlay of silver and black diamonds and whorls making it appear almost as if it were wearing a mask of its own. The poetry of it was not lost on him. He couldn’t tell what her response to his comment was…or if she’d reacted at all.

The point of the masks, he knew, was not anonymity—not with the way Orlesians threw their names and pointless titles about—but obfuscation of the truth. It was much easier to play The Game, much easier to win The Game, if one could keep prying eyes from the traitorous curve of a lying mouth or the nervous tick of a cheek. If Martinet felt himself comfortable in a mask so small, covering almost nothing of his expression, Alistair felt it safe to assume his control must’ve been extraordinary; and if Ravenna need cover all but her eyes…well, there would be a reason for that, as well.

“You flatter us, truly.” It was a marvel that her voice could be heard so clearly, even through her mask. “However, much as we would absolutely love to sit and better get to know one another…unfortunately, we must contend with one formality.” 

Behind him, the door was whisper-quiet. The heavy stomp of boot soles was not.

Alistair was not, himself, a military man—nor would he ever be—but he recognized the approach for what it was. A pincer-strike. In his periphery, he could see the others turn around at the noise; he remained facing his hosts, lifting his shoulders in a slight, understanding shrug. “We are all slaves to formality, are we not?” His smile never faltered. Not even as he felt the shift in the air—a buzzing sort of weight that slowly pushed through him from the back, not unlike an unpleasantly warm breeze. Heavy was the word that occurred to him first, and then numb. His hands felt suddenly stiff, suddenly empty, as though someone had reached inside of them and stripped away the muscle and flesh, leaving nothing but bone.

He knew without knowing that had he made any attempt, he wouldn’t have been able to produce so much as an ember of flame. Not a spark. Not even a weak wind.

Something on his face must’ve shown, despite his best efforts.

Martinet’s smile hooked into a smirk as he glanced down, making a grand show of examining his nailbeds. “I was going to ask if it’s true, what they say about the Imperium’s Templars—how they aren’t able to dispel magic.” He peeked back up towards Alistair and his group. “But…given the expressions on your…associates’ faces, I do believe I have my answer.”

“Oh, not to worry, Magister Blackburne, this is simply our…” Ravenna rolled a wrist vaguely as she searched for the right word, “Our retinue. You brought yours, after all…”

There was a small, but perfectly audible scoff of derision from beside her as Martinet’s eyes flicked to Alistair’s side, eyeing the somber, silent elf standing in his shadow.

“So, we’re sure you can understand. One simply prefers some manner of security when there are so many people about—particularly when there are honored guests in our midst.” She gestured again in the delicate, flowery way Orlesian nobility had, fingers held out daintily as she gave a little half-bow with her shoulders in his general direction.

Not one to be cowed, he inclined his head, turning his gaze more fully on Ravenna. It was maddening, being so unable to read her face. “Certainly! I can sympathize.”

“We are so greatly relieved to hear that,” Ravenna continued. “After all, it isn’t every day that we are fortunate enough to welcome such high-ranking officials into our home.”

“High-ranking mages, no less.” Martinet’s smirk was quickly becoming less and less fetching. His mask needed to be larger.

It was only then that he allowed himself a brief glimpse behind him, a momentary turn of his head to get a look at the newcomers standing at the door. His first impression was that they were…impossibly large, but that was of course the illusion granted by the imposing plate of the Templar armor. So…two Templars, fully suited and helmeted, and what had to be the largest human being he’d ever seen in his life, a giant wrapped not in armor or Orlesian finery, but furs and skins that suggested the Frostbacks.

He had come to the Château prepared for a great many things—an Avvar guard dog was not one of them. How novel. How quaint.

“Oh, please excuse our manners! Of course we will introduce you to our good, good friends.” Ravenna turned incrementally towards Martinet, bobbling her shoulders in the sweet, demure way good Orlesian ladies had. “I do believe you should start, my dear. Magister Blackburne seems particularly riveted by our newest addition, don’t you think?”

“Understandably so. Magister Blackburne, here we have the Champion of Shark Maw Hold, of the Frostback Basin of course, legend-marked for proving stronger than the hunger of the beasts that sleep on the floor of the sea by surviving a tempest that swallowed hundreds before him.” Martinet delivered it as smoothly as he might’ve delivered his own title, suggesting more practice than perhaps one would give a mere guard. There was something else there, Alistair saw, though he couldn’t quite decipher it yet—the presence of the looming Avvar giant was, admittedly, distracting. Nearly seven feet tall, if he had to hazard a guess, his pale skin covered in thick bands of ink that nearly matched the grey-blue of his eyes. One side of his grim face was torn and scarred as though having been bitten through. He was heavy in the corded muscle of a seaman, with a jaw that jutted out in the perpetual scowl of an underbite.

The Maker had meant to make that one a Qunari, Alistair thought, but in all of His infinite wisdom, He had simply forgotten to throw on the horns. All the same, he nodded his chin towards the Avvar ogre in acknowledgement. 

Letting out an airy sigh, Ravenna spoke up again, gesturing to one of the Templars. “Ser Reagan Cron, of the Templar Order, originally of the Free Marches.”

Before he could respond in any meaningful way, Martinet was speaking again. “And Ser Damien Koieos, of the Templar Order.” He folded his arms across his chest, the corners of his mouth tucking into a displeased shape. “Dog lord.” The Templar in question turned to him for the barest instant, his own expression masked by the clunky shape of his helmet.

Dissention in the ranks? Good to know.

“Something tells me that our discussions are going to be heavily…political in nature.” Martinet crossed his arms over his chest, head cocked to the side just so. “Such talk should be reserved for the involved parties, don’t you agree? If only to spare the innocents, so to speak.”

This, unlike the Avvar, he had expected. There was no acting involved in his smile just then, not when he could take such comfort in knowing he’d taken an accurate read of them. “I’m sure we would positively bore them all to tears with our talk of trade routes and tariffs.” If nothing else, he was ready to be rid of the Templars and their awful, oppressive aura. Without further delay, he turned to his delegation, specifically the mages, dismissing them with a wave of his hand. “Benefaris,” he said airily enough, “Go, I’m sure the good messeres will give you quite the tour of the grounds.”

“Ser Koieos?” Ravenna called, just as the mishmash of Templars and Tevinters and terrified elf reached the door. “Perhaps you could lead them about?”

There was a clanking of armor as he saluted, ostensibly in agreement, and then they were alone in the sitting room, the doors falling shut behind him.

“An interesting assortment of compatriots,” Blackburne commented, turning back to his hosts. “I wasn’t aware the southern Chantries lent Templars out to private citizens.”

“I would imagine Val Royeaux is quite different from Minrathous in many ways,” Martinet responded.

He chuckled, shrugging his shoulders. “Perhaps not so many as you might think.” Gesturing to one of the seats, he lifted his eyebrows. “May I?”

Ravenna spread an arm wide in welcome, daintily lowering herself back into her own chaise. “I must admit, Magister Blackburne, we were most surprised to hear you’d accepted our invitation.” As she spoke, she lifted a hand to the back of her head, carefully undoing the strap of her mask; now that it was them (and only them), the show of propriety was no longer needed. “Considering the complicated climate of northern Thedas, as it stands…I’ve heard such awful rumors about the wars. Seheron and Nevarra, now? Dreadful, that.”

“Not to mention the hole in the sky.” Martinet had waited until she’d and Blackburne had taken their seats to resume his own. He did away with his mask much more quickly than Ravenna, simply sliding it off from where it had been perched on the bridge of his nose. “Adding a few of its own complications, I wouldn’t wonder.”

As they turned back to him, masks removed, Alistair felt the first tiny lurch of doubt bloom in his stomach.

The certainty he had held about their lineage was suddenly thrown out the window; in the light, they could have easily been siblings. The whispers of them being twins, having shared the same womb…those made horrible, terrible sense all at once. True, his face was slightly more heart-shaped than hers, her lips more bowed than his, and their noses seemed subtly dissimilar, but beyond that…there they sat before him, dark haired and pale skinned, eyes cold and smiles fetching, the very picture of careful breeding.

A matching set. Blue-blooded through and through.

“Tevinter has seen calmer times, of course,” he admitted, folding his hands on his lap. “The wars are nothing new, unfortunately. Such are the times we live in, Lady Ravenna.”

“Oh, please, Contessa.” She pronounced the name with a distinctly Antivan flare. “If we’re to be allies in all this mess, I should hope we can speak to each other in more familiar terms.” Turning to Martinet, she laid a delicate hand against his arm, “Wouldn’t you agree?”

His eyes flicked to hers for a moment, but that was really all it took. The disdain Alistair thought he’d noticed earlier was back in full effect: there was a crease between his perfectly kept eyebrows, his tongue pressed hard against the point of an eyetooth. The spymaster was suddenly overcome with a singular thought—Martinet didn’t much care for mages. But when he responded, Martinet’s face was as fetching and welcoming as ever, his voice casual. “Of course. Donc, Napoleon,” he said, nodding towards him.

“Alistair.”

Contessa’s expression remained as demure as the face painted on her mask. “I wonder, Alistair…how much of your journey to us is to do with securing more lyrium routes for the Magisterium, as you suggested in your response, and how much of it is to do with the sad little runaway?” As she asked it, she reached across the table between the three of them, taking a teacup in her hand and raising it to her lips. “We are to assume that the precious fugitive in question is someone important, correct? Perhaps someone whose absence might explain why Radonis hasn’t yet been dethroned?” She took a dainty sip from her dainty cup in her dainty fingers, raising her eyes to him once she swallowed. “Or were we supposed to pretend we hadn’t heard anything about that?”

There was another strange, alien lurching in his gut as he came upon his second realization, this one much more horrendous than the first. He had misread them entirely.

Napoleon wore his sad excuse of a mask for his vanity, such that his face wouldn’t be hidden from the swooning masses of those clinging onto the rungs of Orlais’s tenuous social hierarchy just below him. There was no ulterior motive, no desire to flaunt his subtlety or finesse—the man had none. Contessa wore hers, it seemed, so that men like Alistair would assume of her precisely what he had assumed, so that they would write her off as another fiery Antivan waif who could no better control her face than her temper, only to pull the rug out from under their feet and leave them stumbling.

He had figured them both minimal threats—interesting and useful at best—but now…now he was forced to sit back and reconsider. In his experience, the only thing more dangerous, more destructive, than the errant whims of slighted megalomaniacs were the quiet, unspoken machinations hidden beneath still waters.

Château de Glace was making more and more sense by the instant.

Napoleon was the storm that sent shards of ice slicing through your skin until your eyes glassed over and you choked on your own frozen tongue, but Contessa was the serene pond that seemed comfortable enough at first, though it was slowly leeching the warmth from out of you. Only once your lips purpled and your blood thickened would you realize anything was amiss, and by then it would be far, far too late to escape.

His mind had not been changed, nor did he feel anything remotely similar to fear, but the fact remained: These two were a much more considerable danger than he had initially anticipated. And that was good if he wanted to find the Cephon whelp. It was not as appealing, however, when he took into consideration what it would mean to enter into an alliance with them.

“Well,” he said, leaning back in his seat, steepling his fingers under his chin. “I suppose we may as well skip the niceties and get right down to it, hmm?”

“That would be preferable,” Contessa said, nodding once, curtly.