Chapter Text
The third rift closed and a Commander left behind, you make your way forward. The drop, that final little bit of distance traveled, brings the dead into view. You ask what you should have earlier: “How did I survive?”
“To survive such an explosion of magical force would be nearly impossible,” Solas says from behind. “No, I theorize your continued existence is the result of the initial swell of transference. The build-up, as it were. Whatever connects you to the Fade pulled you in, to relative safety, before the explosion.”
“Pulled me in? Wait. No. If there was a transfer of energies, would the result” and you wave your glowing hand at the burnt bodies as to include everything in ‘the result,’ “be from something done this-side of the Fade, then? Something actually happened at the Conclave?”
“You doubt this?” And it is with tone and expression Cassandra calls your intelligence into question.
You want to say you doubt everything on principle and her truth in particular. You don’t.
“Both sides exist,” you say, instead. “This, here. And the Fade. Separate but equally real.” Your eyes catch on something, patterns etched into blackened glass. It’s in your right hand before you think about picking it up, so you must be something of a magpie. No matter, it will be a souvenir, a memory made of twisted glass spiraled into the form of lightening preserved. A memory all jagged edged and transparent darkness. The crystalized lyrium is a potential bonus secreted away with a sleight-of-hand you don’t remember learning.
“So?”
“So,” you repeat, “if both places exist, why then would your stone temple be the one to house the explosive? Why couldn’t it have happened in the Fade and this- this here- this destruction be the result of what happened there? You accuse me of doing this, this unknown thing, but you don’t know. You don’t know if anyone could do something like this. You assume, like the city humans, and look for the easiest explanation – the easiest to blame: an unconscious elf.”
“Mage,” Cassandra corrects immediately. “You fell from a tear in the Fade leaking magic. You could have been possessed, dangerous—No, you are dangerous.” The look she gives you is not pleasant, “And there is no proof of your innocence.”
“Nor of my culpability. You don’t know what happened. I do not remember. Still, I have been locked away in a damp dungeon, shackled and parted from that which is me, for naught but suspicion in face of survival. I have been told that even should I live through this insane quest you and your lot will bind me again for execution.”
“Trial,” and now the word is a growl. “You would have a fair trial.”
“And who is to me my judge? You? No. I would be taken and paraded around, a villain. Did you not say your people clamor for someone, anyone, to blame?”
“I did. Yes. But you will get a trail, none the less.”
You laugh, it’s short and harsh and it’s barely a sound, more an exhale, but it’s all disbelief. “And when was the last time an elf was proven innocent against a claim from the noble class? And Dalish, at that. So unwanted by society that the only safe place is the seclusion found in wooden lands too savage for the civilized. How do I defend myself when I canna remember a thing?”
“I.” Cassandra tries again, “I do not know. You are our only lead, however. Mayhap your memories will be returned.”
“Oh yes,” your searing is undisguised now. “Oh yes, let’s pray. Let’s do.” There is something about this you do not like; there is a lot about this, actually, you like not at all. There’s hate and anger and frustration and it is a rip-tide dragging you under. You might have just had an unfortunate encounter with the humans, or the Templars, or the mages. You might be justified. Or you might just be cracking under the realization that this is real, that this is happening and it doesn’t matter anymore. You cannot stay silent, not here, not so close to the root of this, not so close where you have been brought- on a lark- to see just how useful you could be to the Truth Seeker.
Hours old and slated for death, it seems senseless to mind your tongue and keep your silence; so you don’t.
“Only,” you say “your apostate, who seems a scholar of Fade magics, has theories. Theories that allow for possibility and uncertainty and yet still finds it hard to believe that ‘any mage has the power’ to do this. There were others at the Conclave, surely. Take a look at the list of attendees yet, Seeker? You have made in light of your ‘ongoing examination into the facts,’ yes?”
“Solas’ word is not absolute and you are not on trial here.”
“No” you say in agreement. “No. Trial by Combat would be too easy and who wants to see an armed elf, besides? Trial by Ordeal? Well, your Templars have already gotten my answer through force. It is unchanged, since, by the way. The very fact I have survived- them, the Fade, the Conclave- should be proof enough that the Gods wish for me to live. Oh, but wait. I am heathen. There are no gods, only one, and he is your Maker and we know where elves rate in your chant.
“You say I will have a fair trial? The truth will be decided by your Banns and your Earls and your wounded Chantry. There is no one to stand as my second, no one to speak for me, no one who can.” And here you throw back the words that greeted you, the second time, when she came to see you awake from her blow: “Everyone is dead, but me.”
“There will be justice, in your trial and for Divine Justinia’s-“
“-Death. Yes. I got that. Thank you. But I’ll tell you this, shem, should I have wished to assassinate your knock-off Keeper, I would have chosen the subtitles of poison and been well free of your lot. Shame no one thought or managed it before now because it looks like might have saved a lot of lives.”
“Shit,” comes from Varric just as Cassandra takes a swing.
Your barrier snaps into place without thought. Good thing too, you think, for her strength could knock a tree down. Even so, you cannot keep your footing. As you fall, you find you are not one to go down alone. The telekinetic blast of power doesn't come as easily as you think it should, but it is just as quick and it is just as effective.
Before either of you can retaliate, there is the feel of Solas’ magic that brushes against your senses and entangles you. It is a glyph of paralysis and he has written it into being with enviable skill.
You would feel betrayed had you not held him as Stranger and had he not held the human as well.
“Perhaps,” Solas says, looking down at the both of you, “being that we are this close to the Breech, we could put such things aside.” And by ‘such things’ you translate his words to mean ‘petty squabbling’. Only this isn't anywhere near ‘petty’ and it’s insulting to be dismissed so. “As neither one of you might live beyond the next encounter, I suggest we press what little advantage we have and move now. While we can. Had you but asked for an update on the Fade, I would have told you as we drew ever closer that I sense the spread and increasing instability of the tear.”
There is silence between your group and if the Seeker looks at you for agreement or truce, you do not know it. You swat at the magic at your legs and rise with as much grace as you can, fighting between chastised yearling and wronged adult.
You turn from them and lead the way, as you have lead since the Seeker’s insistence at the broken bridge and a battle you wish had claimed the her life.
It is minutes spent in silence as you walk through charred ground and melted stone. It doesn't take much to find the new path of booted make, to follow it as you remember following tracks in a hunt. A small army has moved through, going and coming. Only the blind would miss it. It is how you know the way, why your steps to the epicenter of destruction know no hesitance, and it is how you can lead them unerringly through impossibly intact hallways bleeding with magic you don’t recognize. You do not lose the trail, not once. You are hunter trained, after all. Magic came latter.
When you get there, rocks are in the sky and light is bouncing between two Fade tears.
Two. Not one. You do not think of luck or laughing gods. You are too relieved at the implications of such a complication. Time. It means you have more time. More time for something to go wrong and you can leave with head intact.
You very carefully do not smile.