andraste’s herald

He wished he could say the water tasted like heaven itself, but it still tastes like copper. Thin, wet copper that made his sore throat feel much better. Normally he hated people fussing over him, but right now he accepted it with open arms. Especially because he can’t move his arms very much.

He rubbed at his wrists, blood shot eyes taking in his wife. She looked upset and tired, like she needed to see the sunlight and get some fresh air. Maker knows how long they’ve been locked down here for.

“Fine,” he lied. If it was a good lie was a different story. He looked at Ev’s green eyes, leaning into her touch. “You should go rest. Eat something, take a walk. The worst bit is over and you look like you need a break, my love.”

Alistair himself wanted a bath and to change into clean clothes that didn’t smell sour. Comfortable ones, maybe a good cup of tea. But that took a bare minimum of strength that he simply did not have. Being sat up alone felt like fighting a dragon, getting himself up, undressed and into water sounded like fighting two archdemons with one hand tied behind his back. Evelyne didn’t need to know all those details though. He shouldn’t have put her through this to begin with.

He said fine, and one of Evelyne’s eyebrows shot up in obvious disbelief. Her thumb gently caressed his cheek, and it took all she had not to climb onto the cot with him, sweaty or not. 

She was sure she looked as tired, as strained, as she felt -- if not worse. Whilst some in the room might have been worrying about what would have happened to the Ferelden throne, Evelyne honestly hadn’t given it a single thought. Of course, she recognized her husband’s title, respected it -- but he was, first and foremost, her love, her companion, her friend. It would’ve felt like losing her other arm, had the worst happened.

“Perhaps,” she agreed, shrugging. “But where I want to be -- need to be, I think -- is here.”

He gave a curt nod, or at the very least hoped it looked like one. Her words with twisty-turney in his ears, but Alistair could still put two and two together. He couldn’t comfort her though. Even if he could move properly, there was no comfort to give. He’d welcome a swift knife to the chest or even a slow one to the gut. Something.

At some point, his will gave out, as did his ability to struggle against the pain or even cry or speak. Instead he simply laid there and let fate run its course, unaware of the movement of time at all. Not that it was easy to measure it down here, what with there being no windows.

After what felt like two thousand years, something changed. He felt utterly exhausted and sore, but the burning was gone. He could see.

Alistair desperately wanted to roll on his side and curl up in the blankets, but he was still bound. His eyes fluttered half way open. “I think—I think it’s done. Can someone…?” He waved his hands a little, fighting to stay awake as best as he could. For Ev’s sake, if not his own.

He felt gross. Sticky. Like he’d run one hundred miles in the midst of winter. “May I have some water? Everything tastes like blood.” He scrunched up his noise, trying and failing to put on some what of a cheery tone.

This time, when Alistair spoke, the room sprung into action. Because this time, he wasn’t pleading for the end -- he wasn’t screaming, he wasn’t seemingly on the precipice of death. He sounded like him, albeit incredibly exhausted.

Someone ran for water, and while they did, Evelyne worked with remarkable speed at undoing the restraints that had held him in place. He’d no doubt have burns, scratches, and bruises because of them, but otherwise, he seemed -- he seemed -- to be in one piece. 

She wanted to crush her body to his, to hold him tight, so relieved was she. But someone soon appeared with water, and then began to work towards propping Alistair up. Evelyne placed her hand atop his -- that would do for now. 

Maker, they’d been through so much. Hell and back, really. Maybe, just maybe, they could start working towards calm. She’d have said normal, but she suspected normalcy was not something that would ever be in their cards.

If you had told her all those years ago that she’d not only befriend the Gray Warden Commander who would eventually become King of Ferelden but marry him, and then set to finding a cure for the Blight -- she would have laughed in your face. Andraste knows that marriage and love and all that went with it had not been in Evelyne’s periphery when she’d become Inquisitor. But if anyone could have won her affections, well, it was Alistair. 

anyway it just reminded me of an idea i had a long time ago that i never threw out b/c i was being shy so: if any cullens would be down to write a slow-burn romance to the tune of the da plot, like…actually writing what their relationship is like as it unfolds with the in-game events (sprinkled with our own interactions ofc), i just…i am a sucker for slow-burn and i feel like cullen/inquisitor is the ultimate form of that

but that idea also goes for other characters, too, and relationships that we can write canon or decide we do what we want with them — so companions, advisors, etc. i don’t know if it’d bore anyone but i would love to do like, deep multiparas of the events as they unfold

Dagna opened her mouth to speak, only hesitating when she realized the Inquisitor wasn’t looking for an indepth analysis on blood usage. Not sure why Evelyne would care but wanting to be useful if it would make her stop looking so sad, Dagna attempted to recall what she could remember.

“The Wardens have some of the best archives in the world. One of the highest positions you can get in their order is to be an archivist, sort of like how it is in Orzammar. Except Dwarves strip things from their records if we don’t like them or if someone shames their family. The issue is that there’s a lot of stuff in the history of everything, and it’s impossible to hide all the juicy bits.”

She wrung her hands together. “The only Warden in history to get rid of the taint is Grand Enchanter Fiona. That’s not really a secret, she’s in a circle, you don’t hide that kind of stuff from the templars. So I…may have found out what Circle she was from and asked about the rumors. Someone had to hear something, right? But here’s where things get crazy: the Circle she was First Enchanter in is Hossberg, which is controlled by the Grey Wardens. My—Er, sources from there get to work in the libraries in Weisshaupt Fortress and there’s no one more reckless than a bored mage. No offense, Dorian. So they managed to go through some old records and even though there was a lot of redacted information, most of it was pretty easy to piece together. Also, utterly useless. She got enlisted, in 9:10 she got pregnant, in 9:11 she was dismissed for not being tainted anymore. All but her and one other Orleasian Warden got killed in 9:10. The other one died in 9:30 at Ostagar.” She shrugged.

“I’m sorry it’s not all that exciting, but I thought it was interesting. Whatever killed everyone that same year must have done the opposite to her. I’m guessing her son died or was taken away by the Chantry.“

“ --- Huh.” Evelyne sounded, tilting her head, now thoroughly distracted from her possibly-dying husband, at least for a moment. Strange, that...did that mean that her son was running about Ferelden? Her green eyes settled on Alistair’s frame and, for a moment, she thought -- wouldn’t it be funny if...

She shook her head, as if literally ejecting the ponderings out via her ears; she could muse and wonder later, when she was sure of her husband’s mortality. And she couldn’t help herself from checking on him, either, standing up to go walk over to his side, where she rested her palm on the edge of the cot he laid upon.

Dorian was still meditative, legs crossed and eyes shut. Evelyne looked between Dagna and her friend, and then shifted her gaze back to the man whom she loved so much that it almost actually ached in her chest. She was wary of touching him, as she didn’t want to send him into a frenzy, but it felt...odd, to sit away from him, to pretend as if he weren’t putting his life on the line.

“I almost want to get all my notes bound in leather and send it up to the Warden headquarters just to rub it in their faces. How lazy can you be to call something ‘incurable’ when you haven’t even tried to fix it. I mean, the Grand Enchanter got cured, lived, and had a baby at basically the same time and they didn’t even try to study it. That’s two whole people who have some weird taint resistant thing and no one cared at all!”

She sighed and threw her hands up. 

“Man, what I would give for some of their blood. Especially baby blood, it’s the best since there’s no outside impurities yet. Hypothetically, and it’s very very hypothetical because I’m just making guesses here, you could synthesize it and use it to cure any Warden you wanted. Maybe even make a version of the Joining that cuts out the Calling part and leaves the ‘rawr, I’m really good at killing darkspawn’ part intact.”

Dagna paced the room before going back to her desk and falling onto her stool with a thump. “It’s too late for that now,  but I wouldn’t complain if I somehow got some of the Grand Enchanter’s blood—voluntarily, of course.”

There’s something odd that Dagna says about the Grand Enchanter — that she’d gotten cured, lived, and had a baby. When had she...did Evelyne know this already? Evelyne already felt out-of-it; maybe she’d misheard Dagna. Yes, that’s it. 

Besides, Dagna soon said something else equally as concerning shortly after, though it was concerning for different reasons. Evelyne, who had previously been leaning against Dorian, sat up with a quirked brow. “Did she just say she wanted...baby blood?”

“Yes, my dear,” came Dorian’s reply, said with a strange sort of maternal affection. He wrapped an arm around Evelyne and squeezed her shoulder. “It’s...not worth getting into.”

@trevelyann​ // lyric starter call // crystal clear - hayley williams

“we don’t know how this could END - let’s hope it won’t have to.”