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Chapter Text

He could have easily set the templars after Anders, ultimately saving Elthina’s and others’ lives. He could’ve done it on the sly, so Hawke would never have discovered his friend the future Prince of Starkhaven was behind it. He could have. Should have. Would have, had it not been for Fenris himself – as much as the elf detested the mage – refusing to turn him in, instead deferring to Hawke's authority. Sebastian had respected that, given that he wouldn't know any of them at all without Hawke having taken care of Flint Company for him. In hindsight, however, he knew it was only because Fenris loved Hawke and therefore would never have done something like turn Hawke’s favorite mage other than Bethany, over to certain tranquility. Or even death.

Death was what Anders deserved for the mass murder he’d committed.

Death, death, death. He would raze Kirkwall to find him, sure he would, but Sebastian knew damn well the mage was nowhere near Kirkwall. Nobody in his right mind, after being told to run for his life, would stay in the city he’d helped destroy, most especially not after hearing Sebastian proclaim quite loudly that he’d be back to show Anders true justice.

True justice. Ha. The play on words was not lost on the prince, whose horse galloped so fast and so hard it jarred every bone in his body each time her hooves met the prairielands.

Fuck, he hated that mage. Hated Hawke for sheltering and coddling the man. Hated Fenris for refusing to do the one thing that would’ve actually fit in with his character and the venom spewing from his mouth every time he was in Anders’ presence. Hated Merrill for being an actual blood mage that none of them also turned in but should’ve. A blood mage. Even Hawke was at odds with the diminutive woman about it constantly, yet not once did he tell Cullen where she lived and what she got up to.

He hated himself for his waffling and his weakness. For not clubbing Elthina over the head like he’d joked about and dragging her out of the chantry to keep her alive. Hated Varric for refusing to take any side but whatever fine line Hawke was balancing on at the time. Hated Isabela for everything she represented, which was the exact opposite of everything Sebastian represented. Hated Aveline, the blasted Guard-Captain of all things, not only turning a blind eye to Hawke’s friends and their shenanigans, but for actively steering her guards away from Anders’ clinic to spare him.

What had they all been thinking? It was some kind of group-induced madness, and he’d participated willingly despite his convictions. Now everyone who’d been in the chantry or close to it, was dead. Everyone who’d been his family since he was eighteen, gone. People further away had been crushed by falling debris.

And Hawke. Had let. The man who’d done it? Go.

Incensed didn’t even begin to describe Sebastian’s state of mind. He almost feared for his own sanity as he spied a small caravan on the road ahead. The caravan stopped when they realized someone was coming. Sebastian slowed his Strider to a trot and then a walk, stopping when the horse’s nose came abreast of a somewhat short human who was dressed in traveling clothes but felt shady, like those bandits Hawke’s company was always encountering on the Wounded Coast and, well, pretty much everywhere else in and near Kirkwall.

“Messere,” the man called up, patting the heaving horse’s neck. “You look like a man who could use some help.”

“Nay, save if you know of a watering hole for my animal,” Sebastian replied cordially.

“Some mile hence,” the man replied, with a jerk of his thumb toward the front of the caravan. “You won’t be able to miss it for the wildlife surrounding it.”

“Thank you, friend,” Sebastian nodded, making to steer his horse off the trail to pass them by. The bandit grabbed hold of her halter. Sebastian narrowed his eyes. “I find myself in rather a hurry.”

“Surely you could use some food or…” The man turned to look at the nearest wagon, which was completely walled in by a wooden construct with a small door in the back of it. “You wouldn’t by any chance be looking for some mageflesh, now, would you, my good man?”

Sebastian started. Mageflesh? This man was offering to sell him a…person? “Are you a slaver?”

“Nah. Don’t mess with the stuff normally. We came across this poor creature unable to care for ‘imself and took pity on ‘im but he’s not doin’ us any good nor payin’ back what we’re expending to keep him alive. Had ‘im with us two days now.”

Two days. Sebastian blinked. Two days ago was when Anders had blown the chantry to the void. So these bandits must’ve left Kirkwall at the same time Sebastian had and found some hapless fleeing mage along the way.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t engage in buying and selling people. It goes against the Maker’s will, and I’ll not be doing those types of things any longer. May Andraste forgive you for dabbling in such untoward undertakings.”

The bandit snorted as he released the prince’s horse. “Suit yourself, then. Lucky for you our wagons be full, else we might not be parting on such a kindness.”

Sebastian shook his head and moved to the left of the covered wagon. “Your threats fall on deaf ears, serah,” he declared as he rode by it, honestly a bit curious as to who was trapped within. “You cannae scare a man who’s spent more than twenty-five years in Kirkwall.”

Off the man’s incredulous stare, Sebastian returned to facing forward and was just about past the wagon when he heard a tiny voice call out his name. Quickly reining his horse in, he turned it just a bit to the right. “Did you hear that?” he asked of no one in particular, as a couple other bandits looked curiously at him from the other two wagons.

One of the two men seated on the driving bench at the front of the wagon nodded toward the covered back end of it. “It was the mage. Sebastian, that your name? You know him, then?”

“Aye, my name it be. Yet how would I know if I know him given that I’ve never seen him?”

“Sounds like he recognizes your voice?” the lead bandit offered. He pulled the slide bolt out of the door’s flimsy latch and opened it. Sounds of struggles and quite a few curses from the bandit ensued until at last a man half-stumbled, half-tumbled out of the door to the ground, the bandit having to haul him to his feet as he pulled him to the side of the rutted dirt road while Sebastian turned his horse completely around so as to be facing them.

“Maker,” Sebastian breathed. For the man was none other than, “Anders!”

At first, he couldn’t believe it and then he did. He believed it so hard that he knew beyond the shadow of a doubt it was the Maker’s personal gift to him, delivering the man he wanted to kill right into his arms out there on the steppes of the Free Marches in the middle of bloody nowhere with a bunch of bandits who didn’t give a rat’s ass what happened to the murdering bastard.

“Let’s let him show off a bit for you, then,” the bandit leader said mockingly. The mage’s wrists were bound in front of him. He’d long since lost his hair tie and what had once been shiny, sunset-colored hair hung oily and stringy against the sides of his face. His clothes – those damnable green and brown and – ugh, Sebastian just wanted to retch at the stench that wafted to him even from this distance – clearly the bandits hadn’t even been bothering to let the man relieve himself outside of wherever it was he’d been kept.

“What – ?” he began to ask, but the leader’s attention was on Anders.

“Go ahead, pretty boy, that’s right. Walk to your new master.”

Sebastian scowled at the shady arsehole, then watched as Anders raised his tied hands out in front of himself and started walking onto the grasslands. Before the prince could wonder why the hell he was walking away from where he’d been told to go, and formulate the opinion that even bound he thought to escape, Anders stumbled over a group of very small rocks and fell, with a cry of pain, to his knees.

Dismounting so fast it was barely the span of a blink, Sebastian strode quickly to the felled man, swallowing hard against the stench. He grasped Anders’ chin and raised it, but though he could now see the eyes of Darktown’s healer, those eyes were not looking directly at him...nor did they look anything like they once had.

“What have you done to him?” Sebastian demanded to know.

“Nothing. We found ‘im that way, curled up on the side of the road weeping like a babe. Picked him up, threw him in the back and he’s been a disgusting, pointless mass of flesh ever since.” The man twirled a staff that Sebastian was all-too-familiar with in his hands. “He won’t be needing this no more.”

“What would you want with a mage’s stave?”

“I can sell it. But he ain’t a mage no more.”

“Sebastian,” Anders whispered.

The prince jerked his hand away from the man’s chin. “What in Andraste’s name is wrong with you?”

Anders’ bound hands caught Sebastian’s before he could retract it completely. “I…” He hauled in a wavering breath as one lone tear escaped his right eye. “I’ve gone blind.”

Chapter Text

The confession took a moment to sink in. Sebastian stood frozen in disbelief as the implications of Anders' whispered words washed over him. The man he had chased halfway across the Free Marches, the man he had been prepared to kill for the atrocities he'd committed, was blind. More than that, he was very obviously helpless. There was something fundamentally wrong with the picture the scene painted, and Sebastian found himself at a loss for how to react.

"Sebastian..." Anders whispered again, and this time the words were tinted with fear. It wasn't the voice of the confident mage, the revolutionary, the cheeky flirter, the raging terrorist that Sebastian had expected to face. Instead, it was the voice of a man who was lost, frightened, and utterly alone. It shook something inside the prince, stirring a feeling that he was unwilling to name.

With a sigh, he extended a hand to help Anders up, his mind racing with questions. He had expected to find an enemy. Instead, he had found a broken man. What was he supposed to do now?

The only thing he could, really. Against his better judgment he agreed upon a price with the leader of the bandits, had them remove Anders' bindings and bought a set of traveling clothes for him from their merchant, along with a strap of leather with which to create new hair ties.

They found a creek which allowed Anders to bathe, only needing enough help to get into and out of the water without falling or drowning. The whole while Sebastian's brain felt like it was on fire, his chest felt like he was drowning, his head sought to pop right off his neck in apparent apoplexy and to top it all off he felt...Void take it all, he felt sorry for the man he'd have been perfectly happy not two hours before, to strangle slowly and painfully with his own two hands.

Without a word between them, Sebastian found a relatively flat and mostly well-hidden little clearing where he made camp for the evening. He calculated it to be far enough from the merciless bastards he'd bought the mage's freedom from, to at least afford them an evening's uninterrupted rest, all the while Sebastian trying to make sense of it all.

He did his best to care for Anders, despite the bitter taste it left in his mouth. Helped him wash and dress. Walk from one place to another. Made the hair ties, a primary and a spare, with his flaying knife. Killed and butchered a wild dog to supplement the potatoes, cheese and bread he'd brought along from his last village stop for an evening meal.

Despite what he himself had wanted to do to Anders, Sebastian found that there was no joy in seeing the mage reduced to a shadow of the man he had once been. He provided him with the food and showed him where he'd placed everything by moving his hands to each item and telling him what it was. Later on he made sure the man was comfortable, and tried not to think about the implications of a twist he could never have seen coming.

But when night fell, leaving their dying campfire as the only light by which to see, the stark reality of the situation truly began to sink in. Sebastian found himself struggling with his own thoughts. This was Anders, for Maker's sake! The man responsible for the deaths of so many innocents, his beloved mentor, the woman who'd been more a mother to him than his own, chief among them. This was the man who had torn Kirkwall apart by fanning the flames of the Templar versus Mage conflict. And yet, the Prince couldn't deny the pity he felt for him, the empathy that stirred in his heart every time he heard the pain, the sheer wretchedness, in Anders' voice.

The man was more than just blind. His connection to the Fade was gone, as he explained it, much as if he'd been made tranquil; his magic snuffed out, leaving him hollow and adrift as well as blind. Had he been in possession of his healing skills, he might've been able to cure his own blindness but as it was, there was naught to be done. It was a fate that Sebastian wouldn't wish upon his worst enemy, a thought which startled him given that he'd never had problems thinking of mages being made tranquil before and had often envisioned that exact fate for this very man.

As he sat by the fire that night keeping watch against the sundry threats that plagued most Thedosian nights, Sebastian couldn't help but wonder if this affliction was the Maker's own form of justice. It was a bleak thought, one that left a hollow feeling in his chest. He had devoted his life to the Chantry, to the teachings of the Maker. He had believed in justice as they taught it...justice tempered with, and forged inside, the flames of Andraste's righteous pyre. But the sight of Anders, a man he'd traveled with, fought with, argued with, like this? To see him so...small in a newly-dark world, when he'd always been so much larger than life? Somehow, the situation made him start questioning everything, including his own mind.

The once-and-future Prince of Starkhaven had absolutely wanted to come face-to-face with the self-righteous harbinger of war that Hawke had allowed to escape with his life. Face-to-face in a battle of man versus man, apostate versus brother, vile murderer versus Maker-backed prince. Instead, he was now tending to the needs of a near-invalid, a dichotomy that didn't sit well with his soul. For he would have cared for anyone in this manner, during those many years in Kirkwall's chantry, and thought nothing of it. But this was Anders. This was...Anders. It was...Anders.

And that right there, he realized with no small amount of confusion, was the problem. He wanted to kill him. And he wanted to help him. For the first time since meeting the apostate all those years ago when he'd been by Hawke's side as the demise of Flint Company was made known to him, Sebastian Vael began to understand why Hawke had never turned Anders in. Why Fenris had refused to participate in any scheme to bring Templars to the free clinic's door. Why Meredith and Elthina never did anything about the escaped Circle mage they both knew damn well was hiding out in Darktown.

Damn them. Damn Anders. Sebastian very nearly damned the Maker for good measure, but instead decided he'd already damned himself, the moment he'd...bought...the mage. Something he could not even believe he'd done. Yet there'd have been no way to take all those heavily armed bandits on by himself, with Anders incapable of assisting. It was with no small amount of surprise that he suddenly understood the reason he'd paid money for a person...for Anders: Sebastian could not have walked away from the scene, leaving the mage in those heartless bastards' hands. He...couldn't have left him there. Even if he'd tried.

For this was a man he knew. A man who had healed him, even saved his life many more times than once over so very many years. He'd drank at the Hanged Man with him. Argued with him. Laughed alongside him. Listened to his stories. Watched as he deteriorated more and more, year over year.

And he had done nothing. None of them had, not even Hawke. Every one of them had buried their heads in the sand, possibly assuming one of the others would do something to help Anders. As much as the man had done for them for more than a decade? As often as he'd healed them, made and given them various potions at no cost, been their on-the-spot healer for battles that otherwise may have claimed more than one of their lives? Everything he had done and none of them had helped him. Not that he would've accepted it. Not that it would've changed anything, what with Justice being unavoidably part of the equation. Yet none of them – himself included – had even tried.

They had failed, he began to see it so clearly all of a sudden. Anders had made the original mistake of taking the spirit into himself to begin with, to be sure. But had anyone ever even tried to get him to part ways with it? Had anyone actually sat and listened to him – really listened?

Sebastian had not.

Perhaps the Maker had delivered the mage unto his care not in support of Sebastian's desire to have his head on a platter, but...to give the former brother a chance to atone for his sins.

As Anders slept fitfully on the single bedroll Sebastian had to his name, the prince closed his eyes, whispering into the night, “Spite ate away all that was good, kind and loving till nothing was left but the spite itself, coiled 'round my heart like a great worm.”

That the Canticle of Maferath best applied to him in this moment, was not a fact of which he was proud.

As days turned into weeks the dynamic between them shifted, sometimes in subtle ways, often in more obvious ones. They traveled together, Anders astride the horse as well, plastered to the prince's back and holding to shiny white armor for many long hours on paths and roads and across wide valleys and rolling foothills, through creeks and rivers.

They faced the dangers of the Free Marches together, Sebastian being the eyes for them both as Anders discovered his hearing becoming more acute. Despite their differences, their shared history, their mutual fears and discomforts, they slowly figured out a way to coexist. And Sebastian found himself drawn to the mage not out of affection, but out of a sense of responsibility. Regret.

Shame.

He found an alien sense of comfort in the routine they inadvertently developed; in the relatively silent companionship that formed at a snail's pace between them. But every time Sebastian looked into Anders' eyes, almost completely washed-out, looking nothing like they had back in Kirkwall, he was reminded of the stark reality of their situation. Anders was, quite simply, less than a shadow of the man he'd once been. And for the first time, Sebastian didn't know what justice meant anymore.

Anders, for his part, was entirely dependent on a man the Spirit of Justice had considered their foremost nemesis outside Meredith and the Templars. He couldn't fend for himself, couldn't perform the simplest of tasks without assistance. From finding a place to relieve himself to locating and cooking food to battling enemies, it all had to be done for him by a man who wanted him dead.

It was a humbling experience, one that left him utterly vulnerable and exposed. But despite the humiliation, despite the despair and the insanity of where he now found himself, he clung to Sebastian's presence like a lifeline. After all, what and who else did he have but the man who had quite literally bought his freedom even though Anders had killed everything Sebastian loved in Kirkwall?

He didn't know what to make of the whole thing, truth be told. Anders had called out so weakly from within his two-day prison upon hearing a voice that couldn't possibly belong to any other. He was so bruised and battered from that horribly uncomfortable covered cart those bandits had put him in. He didn't know what had happened before he woke to their rough manhandling two days earlier. He didn't know why he couldn't see or where Justice was or what had happened to his magic. He only knew that he felt weak, hollow, scared.

And the bandits had been...rough. They had...abused him. Had their fun with him. He was too weak to even care. Besides, he'd gotten used to such abuse for a good number of years in the Circle before escaping for the final time. So when he'd heard Sebastian's voice, of all people who could have been there in that moment, his great hope was that the prince would hear him, find him and kill him.

But Sebastian had not killed him and what was more, he'd paid gold for his freedom and what was even more, he was now helping him.

Why? Why? And where were they even going? To Starkhaven, to be tried and hanged? Kirkwall, to be turned over to Cullen? Anders did not know. Could not fathom. Felt grateful in a way but was far too confused to appreciate it. So he plodded on, one foot in front of the other, standing still and frightened until a hand took his to guide him somewhere, a soft voice murmuring directions if a bit of uneven ground or a rock or stick was in his way. He just didn't know what to make of it, ultimately resigning himself to the fact that he was now and probably for the rest of his life – however long that turned out to be – at the mercy of Sebastian Vael.

Boy, did the Maker have a twisted sense of humor.

Chapter Text

A distant rustling disrupted the once peaceful sounds of the forest, followed by the telltale clink of metal on metal. It was subtle, but to Anders’ developing sense of hearing, it might as well have been a war horn. His sightless eyes narrowed and a chill ran down his spine, one that had nothing to do with the night air.

"Sebastian," he whispered urgently, his voice just above the nocturnal chorus of the forest, hand reaching out, grasping, until he found the man’s armor-clad shoulder. "We're not alone."

The prince stiffened. Despite his initial confusion, the sudden intensity in Anders' voice was enough to make his heart pound in his chest. He gripped the handle of his grandfather’s bow, fingers wrapping tightly around the smoothed wood. "What do you mean?"

"Footsteps...many of them, and...metal...armor?" Anders insisted, the words barely escaping his lips before they were drowned out by the growing sound of heavy boots stomping the earth. "We need to go."

But it was too late. The barely perceptible sounds swelled into a formidable presence. Men, heavily armed and armored in familiar Templar wear, emerged from the forest like specters, their leader stepping forward to cut off an easy escape as everyone but that man drew their weapons. His face was as familiar as it was shocking. Sebastian's heart skipped a beat.

"Cullen Rutherford," he greeted, trying to keep his surprise from showing. He hadn’t expected to run into the Knight-Captain of Kirkwall in the ass-end of the Free Marches, after all.

"Prince Vael," Cullen nodded, acknowledging Sebastian before his gaze shifted to the mage beside him. There was no recognition in his voice, but a palpable hint of disdain. "I must confess my surprise in your choice of companion."

Sebastian took a deep breath, trying to quell the tension bubbling within him even as he became aware of Anders trembling. The atmosphere grew thick with unspoken words and concealed intentions. For the first time, the former Chantry brother wasn’t altogether certain Cullen had ever truly been on his side, considering the complexities of their relationship since Cullen’s arrival in Kirkwall. Then again, Cullen had never been given reason to doubt Sebastian’s adherence to every one of the Chantry’s tenets until now.

"We don't want any trouble," Sebastian stated firmly, stepping forward to put himself between Anders and  Cullen. He could have sworn the mage let out a small sigh of relief.

"You should have thought of that before you started traveling with a wanted apostate," Cullen replied, his voice as cold as the steel of his sword. “One whose crimes cannot be forgiven or forgotten, I might add.”

"Cullen," Sebastian interjected, unwilling to let any more of the Templar’s words fill the silence between them. "I understand your concerns, but I assure you, he's no threat. He can’t even see, and he's been cut off from the Fade. The demon and his magics are both gone."

Cullen’s gaze softened at this, surprise flickering across his features as he glanced just beyond Sebastian at Anders, taking in his sightless eyes. But as his gaze returned to Sebastian’s, his countenance hardened again quickly. "He’s still the man who committed mass murder, Sebastian. Still a criminal, and both the Chantry and I, in my role as Acting Knight-Commander of what’s left of Kirkwall’s Templars, will see justice served."

Sebastian gritted his teeth in frustration. Despite his hopes, it was clear that Cullen was not in a listening mood. He had to try another tactic. His mind raced and suddenly a possibility came to him. "Cullen, as one leader to another, please, allow me a moment to speak.”

Cullen nodded once in deference, arms still ominously crossed in front of his steel-clad chest.

Sebastian’s hands felt clammy. What in the name of – he almost laughed as he heard in his mind Anders’ voice saying “Andraste’s delectable arse!” so many times over the years – but in this case, it was probably best to keep the Maker’s bride out of things, especially given Cullen’s apparent lack of humor in the moment.

“Kirkwall is teetering on the edge,” the prince finally said. “With Hawke, Meredith and the Grand Cleric gone, the city has no one to turn to. Without you there to keep the peace, how many more will die? Abominations could run rampant, the poor could loot the city, and more innocent lives could be lost in the crossfire."

Cullen’s posture changed. Stiffened, to the point where Sebastian wondered if the man might snap in two. He could see the internal struggle on his longtime acquaintance’s face. This was his city, his people, they were talking about. Or at least, it had been for a very long time. Why would the Templar have even come out here looking for one man?

He ashamedly realized he’d threatened to do just that, only with an entire city-state’s army rather than the ten soldiers flanking their commander in a semi-circle. By the ancient pagan gods of Starkhaven, Sebastian suddenly knew himself to be a great fool indeed.

But this was about Cullen. He needed to redirect him and fast, so he pressed this apparent advantage. "Anders is my responsibility and in my custody, for I gave my word that I would return and see true justice served. I will make sure he answers for his crimes, for no one lays greater claim to the resulting grief than I, and well you know it.”

Cullen nodded in agreement – or at least, in understanding – as his hands fell away from his chest.

“But right now, your city needs you more than it needs visible vengeance. Or would you disagree?"

The Templar leader seemed to consider Sebastian's words for a moment, his gaze shifting between Sebastian and Anders. "Truly, he no longer has access to the Fade? Has he been made tranquil, then?”

Sebastian glanced back at Anders, because truthfully he didn’t know the answer to that question. Yet without being able to see any visual cues, Anders spoke anyway. “I don’t know how it happened. I woke up being violated by a group of bandits. I could not see. I had no magic. And the spirit that has dwelled in me since I served at Vigil’s Keep was gone.”

The prince was certain Cullen flinched at the word ‘violated.’ He narrowed his eyes at the man, suddenly wondering if Cullen participated in or at the very least was aware of even some of the horrors Anders and other mages had to endure in the Gallows.

He didn’t want to know, he realized, as bile rose in his throat. He really, really didn’t.

Cullen’s attention was now directed solely at Anders. “You expect me to believe that the most talented spirit healer since Wynne just up and lost his magic, his demon and his sight without having any idea why? Come now, Anders. Surely you can’t think me that thick.”

“If I knew how it happened, I would tell you.”

A female Templar standing near Cullen’s left arm, spoke up, voice laced with venom. “He’s lying, ser. I see it all the time with these Circle mages.” Every word felt like she was spitting rotten food from her lips. “He’s obviously using his magic to suppress or conceal his capabilities. Preying on your longstanding acquaintance to play you for a fool, just like this so-called brother he cavorts with.”

Another Templar, this one male and standing the furthest from Cullen off to the man’s right, jumped in with, “’e’s got the brother in blood magic, ‘asn’t ‘e, then? ‘e’s ‘is, what you call it, thrall?” He whipped his sword out of its scabbard. “We’ll just see about that, won’t we then, magey?”

Sebastian’s razor-sharp daggers were in his hands so fast he wasn’t at first even aware of pulling them from their sheaths. He backed up slowly until he felt Anders’ chest against his back. “There is no need for further violence,” the prince stated, hardening his own voice to match the tense situation. Three other Templars drew their swords. One raised his shield. Still none of them moved beyond that, their attention drawn toward their commanding officer. “Surely you don’t wish to perpetuate the violence that set us on the path to this unpleasant meeting, Knight-Commander.”

The thug who’d called Anders ‘magey’ wasn’t going to wait, though. He lunged forward. Sebastian prepared to strike. But his leg was still raised in the air to take a step forward when Cullen’s own sword unsheathed and whirled on his charge, the pointed and very sharp tip of it landing effortlessly against the man’s throat.

“You are hereby placed under reprimand for acting outside the boundaries of your position, Initiate Benson.”

“I’m a Knight! Ser.”

“No longer, for I have seen fit to demote you and will thank you to turn your sword over to Knight Hana until such time as you have served the one hundred and eighty days of solitary confinement you just earned."

“You can’t do that to me! I’ve been ‘ere longer than you ‘ave!” The Templar made to thunk Knight Hana on the helmet with the pommel of his sword. Like lightning, Cullen moved and the man was in a chokehold the likes of which would be certain to send him unconscious inside thirty seconds.

Finally Benson dropped to his knees, gasping for air as Cullen released him. He nodded at Hana to pick up the sword from where the Knight had dropped it while in the chokehold. Then he turned back to face Sebastian.

“I’m afraid discipline is more difficult than ever to maintain, but I’ll not have Templars become as unlawful as those they seek for purposes of justice.” His eyes moved back to Anders again, who was very nearly cowering behind Sebastian by this point, stooped and looking away as though wondering if he could somehow make a break for it despite not even being able to tell they were surrounded on the three non-Templar sides by underbrush so thick even Merrill wouldn’t have been able to squeeze through.

“Clearly I have other duties to attend,” Cullen finally said, eyes resting on Sebastian’s again. “But make no mistake, you are charged with being absolutely certain Anders answers for the crimes he committed against the chantry, Sebastian. Kirkwall has little appetite for starting a war with its largest trading partner in the name of wrongful imprisonment or death of its prince.”

Sebastian nodded. “I thank you, Knight-Commander, for your wisdom.”

“Make no mistake,” Cullen replied testily, “that the only reason I am not arresting you both right now is because of who you are, Sebastian. Maker help us all if your word is not kept, for the Chantry will not take kindly to a former Brother of the Faith harboring its most wanted fugitive inside Starkhaven's walls." He stopped and turned to leave, tossing over his shoulder, “Nor to the Knight-Commander who allowed it to happen.”

As the others turned away and Cullen made to take his final leave, Anders stepped forward. "Cullen?”

The great big lion of a man stopped so quickly and completely that he looked like a statue. He did not turn back to look at the man who'd spoken.

Anders’ eyes were filled with unshed tears, which could easily be heard in his voice. “I wish Hawke had killed me for what I did," he confessed, voice echoing in the haunting silence. "It would have been better than...this."

Cullen’s head bowed for just a moment. “Maker go with you,” he finally said after his soldiers had all melted back into the forest. And then like a wisp of smoke in the wind, he was gone.

Sebastian turned to Anders, speaking the man's name, his voice low and solemn as he found himself almost shaking with the sense of relief that washed over him. Shaking as badly as Anders was, he realized. The mage reached out a pale, golden-skinned hand, flailing for a moment until Sebastian reached out to take it.

“Thank you,” Anders half-sobbed, squeezing his hand much harder than the prince would have thought he had the strength for. “I don’t know why you’re helping me. But I’m grateful.”

Sebastian didn’t know why he was helping him exactly, either. He sighed, squeezing his hand in return. “Come. We need to keep moving, and preferably in the opposite direction of Cullen and his men. We’ve a long journey ahead of us.”

“Where…are we going?” Anders asked, curiosity overriding some of the emotional fallout as he turned his face toward Sebastian’s voice.

Sebastian’s thoughts were a whirlwind. He and Anders were entangled in a web of crime and politics and religion the likes of which seemed far too difficult to untangle, one from another. And yet, there was a small glimmer of hope in Sebastian’s mind. Hope that maybe they could find redemption, somehow, for themselves and the sins they’d each committed, and maybe even for one other.

After all, if he could talk a man like Cullen Rutherford down from arresting the one and only fugitive he should have wanted to capture above anybody else still living, then maybe even more seemingly impossible feats were perhaps not so impossible as they liked to believe.

“Starkhaven,” he replied at last. “I think it’s time for me to go home.”

Chapter Text

Their path skirting along the southern foothills of the Vimmarks, in order to reach the safest path through the mountains that’d get them north, had been much less fraught with dangers than Sebastian had expected, a fact for which he was profoundly grateful. It eventually led them to Wrenwith, a small village just north of Kirkwall. Wrenwith was one of those typical nondescript Free Marches locations, the usual hustle and bustle of its streets by the nameless, faceless masses clearly subdued.

Sebastian found himself troubled by the look on Anders’ face as they entered the village. “What’s wrong?”

“There has been a recent darkspawn raid here. The odd silence…people are still afraid.”

“How do you know there’s been darkspawn here?”

“I can…sense them.”

He’d forgotten the man was a Grey Warden. “Do they pose a threat?”

“Not at present. They’re some distance away, and underground.” He swallowed thickly. “Their blood still can’t kill me, but there’s no way I can fight them off in my condition, Sebastian. If…if they do come. I mean, if I sense them, and I warn you, you must…”

“What, man? What must I do?”

“Leave me behind. Save yourself.” Anders shook his head and looked away as they came to a stop in front of an empty market stall. In truth, only four had vendors at them at all.

“You can’t be serious.”

“Sebastian, listen to me. I’ve fought these creatures. Their ogres. Their broodmothers.” His mouth twisted in distaste. “They’re vile, relentless, without remorse or pity. They want to kill us. They want to eat us. They want to turn our women into breeders, our men into abominations. I don’t…I can’t…”

For a fleeting moment, Sebastian felt a painful tug in the general area of his chest. “Anders, I didn’t buy you from bandits only to leave you to the mercies of darkspawn.”

He huffed out a laugh. “It’s good to know you still have your priorities right.”

The prince chuckled in spite of himself, feeling the tension that’d been building up since they’d neared the village finally dissipate some.

It was easy to forget, amongst the political upheavals and magical chaos, that Anders was not merely a tool or a weapon or a renegade apostate, but a man. One who’d lost everything he’d ever had in life, even something as unwanted as the free room and board of a Circle. His clothes? His very life? Both paid for by a man who was feeling increasingly like a slaver or Maker forbid, a slaveowner and that did not sit right with him in any way, shape or form.

No, there had to be some way to release them from this mad bondage they now shared. Not for the first time, Sebastian regretted leaving Kirkwall before all was said and done. Though Hawke had never been much more than cordial with him for the past few years, he did wish he’d stayed to help Fenris, quite possibly the only one of the lot he’d ever thought worth his time.

And oh, wasn’t he just the spoiled brat his father had always pegged him for? The chantry hadn’t done as much to humble him as he’d thought, clearly.

While exploring the nearly empty village marketplace, and keeping a very close eye on Anders indeed, Sebastian overheard a voice that sent a chill down his spine. Though It’d been years since he, Hawke, Merrill and Varric had encountered the man in the Deep Roads after Howe's sister had asked for their help, Sebastian recognized Nathaniel immediately. He’d also known Howe during his time squiring for Ser Rodolphe, who’d been a frequent visitor to the Vael palace. He and his fellow archer had never been terribly close, Sebastian had been so young.

The prince turned to Anders, taking the look on the man’s face as confirmation that he was aware of Nathaniel's presence and identity. Despite the mage's – former mage's – evident discomfort, Sebastian decided to follow Nathaniel, curiosity getting the better of him as to what the man was doing here so close to Kirkwall. And because his presence alone presented a tiny sliver of hope that help for Anders’ plight could be mere steps away.

"Nathaniel!" he called out after a few moments.

The archer turned, surprise apparent on his face. "Sebastian, was it? One of the royal family of Starkhaven and a member of Hawke's party. What are you doing here?" Nathaniel’s eyes drifted to Sebastian’s reluctant companion. His expression fell when he recognized the mage, concern washing over his face at what he saw. "Anders?" he breathed.

Before they could speak, an Orlesian woman's voice came from Sebastian’s right. "Anders?" she exclaimed. She rushed toward them, hair as bright as spun gold flying in the wind. Juliette Caron, Warden Commander of Ferelden, current ruler of Vigil's Keep, Arlessa of Amaranthine and the woman who had inadvertently set the events leading to Anders’ possession in motion. Her face lit up in joy upon seeing him, only to fade into shock and sorrow as she looked into Anders' very obviously sightless eyes and his clearly fearful face.

Overwhelmed and looking to avoid further spectacle, Sebastian guided the group to a quieter location away from the village's small market, all the while explaining the situation to Juliette after introductions and low-key pleasantries had been exchanged. He implored her to help, even though he'd no idea whether she had any knowledge of spirit possession and its effects.

Juliette looked at Anders after hearing about Kirkwall and its aftermath, her eyes brimming with guilt and regret. "I wish there was more I could do," she stated, her voice barely above a whisper. "But it's a miracle he's alive at all. The sudden departure of a spirit from a mage's body could have...well, let's just say it could have been much worse."

As Juliette and Nathaniel offered their support and promised to reach out to their contacts for potential help, Sebastian found himself stepping away, needing a moment to breathe, to think. He couldn't help feeling profound disappointment as he watched the trio from a distance. Nathaniel, during a lull in their reunion some minutes later, seemed to realize that Sebastian was gone. He looked up and around, spotted him and inclined his head to the side, an invitation to join him away from Anders and Juliette, who continued speaking quietly as the men stayed within sight of them, yet far enough away so as not to inadvertently eavesdrop. A few minutes later Sebastian was seated next to Nathaniel on a hand-hewn wooden bench watching the fading light of the evening sun.

"I never knew him before...Justice," Sebastian confessed, breaking the silence between them. "He was always so volatile, so intense. I am quite certain he harbored a strong dislike for me from our first meeting."

Nathaniel chuckled, a sad, bitter sound. "That doesn’t sound like Anders. At least, not the one I knew.” He sighed and shook his head, eyes on the subdued former mage. "Before Justice joined us...well, Anders was different. He was...” The man shook his head. “Brilliant. Vibrant, full of life. Cheeky, even. He had a goofy sense of humor, was always trying to lighten the mood, oftentimes in ways that made him seem more court jester than spirit healer. To tell the truth, he annoyed the shite out of me."

Sebastian looked at him, surprised. The picture Nathaniel painted was unexpected, to say the least. "I recognize nothing of what you describe in the man I spent years fighting alongside, sharing tents and meals. What happened?"

Nathaniel looked down at a stick he was deftly rolling around in his hands, though he was looking inward more than anything. "Justice happened. Anders had lamented the treatment of mages by the Chantry frequently, mostly to make light of his experiences, yet was never given to thoughts regarding more…revolutionary bends. But Justice saw Anders’ words as evidence of a grievous injustice that could not be ignored. Once he got his tenterhooks into Anders, it...”

He scratched his chin, shaking his head. Part of Sebastian just wished he could go back in time, find this Anders he’d never met and warn him off the decision that would set so many terrible events in motion.

“The spirit’s ideals eventually consumed him. The creature twisted him into something he wasn't, and it happened so slowly we didn’t any of us recognize it until it was too late." He heaved out another long sigh. “I watched a devil-may-care boy who wanted nothing more than a mug of ale and a wench or two for an all-nighter,  morph into a magic-infused zealot, culminating in the deaths of Templars who’d infiltrated our ranks just to capture him and render him tranquil. But this?” He looked up again, gesturing toward Anders. “I can hardly believe what I’m seeing, what I’m hearing.” Nathaniel swallowed hard. “He’s so…broken.”

They fell silent, the weight of the tragedy settling heavily around them. But Sebastian found himself looking at Anders in a new light as Juliette helped the man settle near a warm fire with a bowl of rabbit stew and a handful of fresh-baked bread. He was seeing him not just as a fallen enemy, but as a man who had been lost long before the Chantry explosion. A man with a happier past, with people who'd known him before Sebastian's path had ever crossed his.

That night, after the Wardens had taken their leave of them, Sebastian helped Anders to his makeshift bed under the light of Thedas' two moons, some half-mile from Wrenwith. He pondered Nathaniel's description of the Grey Warden he'd once known. Watched as Anders lay down, milky white eyes staring into the darkness, the faint outline of what was left of his irises barely visible. Every line of his body screamed tension and terror, as if it was taking everything within the man not to lose his mind.

Sebastian wondered how he’d be faring if their situations were reversed. Or if he’d be faring at all.

He pondered the boy Anders was while living at home with his parents. Thought about the man he’d grown into back in the Circle, the man he could have been, and the man he had eventually become. It was heartbreaking to imagine it all, but also served to fill him with a new determination. Sebastian would help Anders find his way back, not just for the sake of true justice rather than that meted out by a Fade spirit, but for Anders himself.

"Sleep well," he said softly, a quiet promise echoing in his words.

As he retreated to his own resting place, he caught a glimpse of Anders’ face bathed in the moonlight, tears spilling from now-closed eyes. A silent testament to the disasters he’d endured, the resilience of a man caught between worlds, obligations, causes and spirits. Trapped by the ways of men. Haunted by the consequences his own decisions had wrought.

Sebastian didn't envy him. But what could he do? He could barely parse his own life for meaning or direction or any indication at all why he was even here, why he was with who he was with, why he’d even been interested in speaking with Nathaniel about the man. Yet the part of him that had overflowed with the love of the Maker and His Bride, the Chantry Brother who’d listened to hours upon hours of confessions and tears from Kirkwall’s lost and lonely souls, could not simply let the day end this way any more than he’d ever been able to let parishioners leave the chantry without knowing the Maker’s love.

“Anders?”

His eyes opened, accompanied by a whispered, “Yes?”

Are you all right seemed wholly inadequate and downright stupid, to Sebastian’s way of thinking. What’s wrong, if answered truthfully, might keep them here until the next Blight for all the things that probably were. He settled instead on, “You know them well?”

A nod, and then, “Juliette conscripted me to keep me out of Templar hands.” He raised his head a little, tucking his folded arm beneath it as an extra pillow. “I always suspected it was she who kept me from falling into Meredith’s clutches. The last thing the Chantry would want is to start a war with a group that much of Thedas still idolizes for saving them from the five Blights.”

Sebastian thought once again of his fellow archer’s description of a man he simply didn’t recognize. “I spoke with Nathaniel. We knew each other in our younger years, while he was squiring with a family friend.”

“I wonder if he and Juliette ever got together.” Anders smiled in spite of himself. Sebastian was taken aback by how good it felt to see it. “I actually gave him some advice about pursuing her, can you believe that?”

Sebastian barked out a short laugh. “Was it anything like the advice we tried to give Aveline when she was fawning and failing so miserably over Donnic?”

Anders, too, laughed out loud. “No, though I’m not sure whether it’s Nathaniel or Aveline that bears the hardest head when it comes to matters of the heart.” Then his face fell. “I…I just…”

“Do you miss them?”

“I don’t miss being a Warden, and you know how I feel about the blighted Deep Roads. But I do miss the feeling of belonging somewhere. I miss people not caring one whit that I was a mage and indeed, seeking me out for help.” His voice softened to a near-whisper. “I almost forgot what it feels like to be treated like everyone else is. Like…just a man, with something to contribute to society, something to…to give.”

His face drooped even more, all traces of mirth gone, and Sebastian suddenly regretted speaking when the former mage finished with, “Now I don’t even have that. Nothing to give anymore. Just a burden. A sack of bones pretending to be human.”

With that, he rolled over, effectively using his back to put an end to the conversation. The sorrow in Sebastian’s heart weighed terribly upon him as he settled into his own bedroll.

“You were always so good to me,” Anders whispered, startling him. “You disagreed with me, but you treated me as an equal. You never berated me. You forgave me. Even when I didn’t deserve it.” A moment of silence and then, “You still are.”

“Still are what?”

“Forgiving me,” Anders whispered.

“Everyone deserves compassion.”

The man’s back heaved as he took in a large breath and then exhaled it in a long sigh. “But not everyone receives it, do they?”

The question hung in the air, unanswered, as both men pondered the harsh realities of the world they lived in. Never before, in all his years and with all he had encountered, had Sebastian Vael felt so utterly…inadequate. And yet he would not give up on Anders. Could not. A man blinded was still a man. A mundane was still a man. Anders…was still a man.

Now Sebastian just had to find some way to prove it to him. For he had made the decision to tread upon this path together the moment he’d handed a sack of carefully counted gold to a half-toothless, stinking bandit, and Anders – while not strictly free in the sense that he could go where he wanted and do what he wanted – seemed willing to let it happen. Regrets and what-ifs threatened to drown them both, but Sebastian would not be taken down by any of that now.

Not when he had someone so dependent on him for every little thing.

Not when he had Anders.

Chapter Text

The days stretched into weeks yet again, each morning greeting them with a myriad of mundane tasks that were given new complexities. With Anders' blindness and lack of magic he was unable to contribute in the ways he used to, resulting in a persistent sense of frustration and helplessness that clung to him like a second skin. Yet they endured, each day bringing its own set of huge challenges and small victories that edged them closer to Starkhaven.

Sebastian took on the lion's share of the duties, caring for their single horse, negotiating with locals for supplies and navigating the ever-changing landscape, including keeping an eagle eye out for anything that might trip Anders should he be on foot rather than horseback.

As they moved along at a much slower pace than he would have preferred, the prince found himself constantly thrown into a strange limbo of vulnerability and authority, his roles as caretaker, traveling companion, and quasi-jailer merging and blending into a confusing amalgam that changed by the day, sometimes by the hour. The pain of losing Elthina and the brothers and sisters he had known so intimately, was still as fresh and raw as it'd been when he'd sunk to his knees in utter disbelief and despair while debris rained down on the city back when it'd all happened in real-time.

Anders, for his part, was learning a new way of life. His world had been reduced to sounds, smells, and textures. The once-familiar full-body sensation of magic was replaced by the rough texture of a horse's mane, the cold hardness of a pebble underfoot, the various fragrances of plants and flowers and Sebastian himself, the muffled sounds of distant villages, creatures of the wild and fellow travelers. He was acutely aware of every word and tone Sebastian used, his other senses heightening slowly but surely to compensate for the lack of vision.

The duo’s conversations were the only relief from the monotonous routine. They talked about everything and nothing, their words often acting as a much-needed balm for their weary souls. They would discuss their shared past, their beliefs, their regrets, and gradually, they began to understand one another in ways they hadn’t been able to before, though often heated debates ensued as Anders found a little bit of the voice he'd lost in the aftermath of Kirkwall.

As irritating as his viewpoints could often be, Sebastian was secretly pleased to find Anders seeming to regain himself one painful step at a time. After all, if everyone believed the same things, the world would be a dull place indeed. They could just do with a lot less of…what would he call it?..everyone using their beliefs as an excuse to hate and hurt one another.

One evening as the sun was setting, Anders was seated next to a small campfire he’d actually been able to help build by touch. Lost in thought, the warm, comforting glow on his face was a stark contrast to the cold inner turmoil that he felt. As usual, it seemed he couldn’t hide his thoughts from his…his, um…what the hell exactly was Sebastian to him anyway?

True to form, the prince noticed indeed. "Is something on your mind?" he asked from across the fire. He’d learned to read the slight furrow of Anders' brows, the way he chewed on his lip when he was deep in thought. He could read so very many emotions on him now, a thought which thrilled and yet worried him all at the same time.

"I miss...seeing," Anders admitted, his voice just a whisper. "I miss magic. Being able to help people, heal them, make them feel better. I feel...utterly useless."

Sebastian’s voice was soft when he replied, "You are not useless, Anders. You have a wealth of knowledge, and your perspective, it's unique."

Anders let out a bitter laugh. "Is that what you’d call it?"

"I call it as I see it," Sebastian replied firmly, staring at the man intently. "You've been through experiences that most of us can't even imagine. You have wisdom, Anders. And wisdom, as Elthina reminded me often, is never useless."

Elthina. Just her name brought fresh pain to Sebastian’s heart. Pain Anders swore he could tangibly feel. For a moment there was silence, only the crackling of the fire filling the air. Then, Anders finally spoke.

"I’m sorry.”

It was the first time he’d apologized for what he and Justice had done. To think that he’d been responsible for murdering a woman this man thought of as a mother, a real mother, not some chantry-promoted revered one, hit home in such a way that it made his chest squeeze painfully. He imagined how he would’ve felt if he’d been taken under someone’s wing, only to stand by and watch helplessly as that person was ripped from this world.

Anders still fully believed that Elthina could have done more to stop the ill treatment of mages, for she had been told often enough of the atrocities happening right under her nose. She did, he felt, deserve punishment for not stopping the madwoman she herself had elected into the position of Knight-Commander.

Yes, there would be collateral damage, but was it Anders’ fault that Sebastian had wound up brainwashed in the cult of the Maker? A cult that didn’t really teach about the Maker and Andraste at all, but instead taught their own twisted version of the religion to suit their need for control over everyone else’s lives?

No, he concluded. But before he could contemplate this train of thought further, Sebastian spoke and when he did, his voice was laden with so much sorrow that Anders lamented for the millionth time that the man hadn’t just killed him when he’d discovered him among the bandits.

“I wish I understood why you felt so many innocents needed to die. Especially Elthina.”

“She was not innocent, Sebastian,” he stated, though with less conviction than he’d held a few moments earlier. “She appointed Meredith, who had a long history of abuse well before Kirkwall. In fact, the only reason Meredith was available to take the position to begin with, was that she’d been ousted from her Knight-Captaincy at Dairsmuid. She couldn’t handle the blithe acceptance of Seers in Rivain and went outside chantry law to take up a crusade against them.”

“I have never heard of this. Are you certain?”

“Quite. One of the mages I helped escape via the Mage Underground had been in the Gallows since she was eight years old. She escaped at forty-four thanks to me and a few others, and what she had to say pretty quickly painted the picture of what was really happening there, and had been for many years before you even came to Kirkwall.”

A long silence ensued until Sebastian, voice now laced with something Anders couldn’t quite identify but found made him more than a little afraid, finally spoke. “You never told anyone of this.”

“I most certainly did. Every mage I could find, everyone in a position to help us make their lives better, I told –”

“You never told me!” Sebastian roared, rising to his feet so quickly and loudly it nearly echoed to Anders’ more sensitive ears. “You spent years berating me for my beliefs, for my acquiescence in the atrocities you purported were being committed against mages, raging against Meredith’s methods. Against Elthina! You expected us to believe you, yet you had proof that you never shared!”

He was pacing now. Anders at first felt his anger boiling up and shot to his feet as if he was still that manic version of himself hiding out in Darktown, facing down someone who dared to malign anything he said. Until the prince’s next words reached him. Words which served to make the former healer feel as if all the blood had been drained from his body at once, leaving him cold on a slab waiting for his funeral pyre.

“If you had told me any of this, I would have investigated. I could have done so discreetly. I had inside access, to Elthina, to the whole chantry! I was privy to so many of her secret meetings, so much of the inner machinations of both the Kirkwall chantry and several others in the Free Marches. Dammit, Anders, don’t you understand? You spouted so much rhetoric for so many years and never one time did you think using facts to back up your case would help? What the blazes else do you know that you never thought was important enough to share?”

He heard Sebastian approaching him quickly and tensed, mind whirling, confusion making him not understand why he hadn’t done precisely what Sebastian was saying. It was logical. It made sense. You want something to change, you want people to change, you have to show them why, not just tell them they must change. Why hadn’t he done that? What…how…why hadn’t he even realized that until just now?

"I-I..." Anders stammered, unable to put one thought behind another.

“Damn you,” Sebastian growled, hand quickly closing around Anders’ neck, though he wasn’t squeezing it very hard. “Don’t you understand that I would have helped you? People didn’t need to die, man! There are more peaceful ways of getting the truth out into the open, of making changes! You were surrounded by people who could have helped!”

With that, Sebastian tore his hand away with a small shove, as though discarding the man it’d been holding onto. He stomped out of the campsite, leaving Anders standing alone next to the fire. His legs gave out suddenly, felling him against the low rock he’d been sitting on. The edge of it struck painfully against his tailbone but he barely registered it.

Why hadn’t he asked for Sebastian’s help? He knew. Automatically, simply because he was an adherent and a former Brother in the Chantry, Anders had dismissed him as “one of them.” He’d never gone to Cullen, either, a man who’d shown him nothing but kindness and keen interest in his healing abilities back when the boy was barely nineteen and not yet tarnished by the evils magic could bring against the mundane. He hadn’t actually asked Hawke for help at all, despite their relationship of understanding, despite Hawke’s obvious desire for mages to be treated better.

Anders realized so much more as the wagon train of thought kept barreling forward, horses on the loose, thundering hooves pushing him to see more and more and more of what he had or more importantly hadn’t, done.

Aveline and Varric consistently kept his clinic safe from city guard and templar patrols. The amount of sheer power both held in Kirkwall could have done so much for his cause, their cause, the mages’ cause. Yet he’d accused Aveline more often than not, baiting her as though he knew he had immunity and could just keep pushing, pushing, pushing. She could have helped. And probably would have, at least to some extent, given that she did already.

Varric would most definitely have helped. He’d always been open and honest with him, going so far as to spend his own money to keep the clinic a safe zone, so he’d already proven he could and would put his money where his mouth was.

Merrill was unfortunately a wildcard that Anders had correctly predicted would go off the rails, so while she agreed about mages not being in Circles, she was unfortunately the very thing the Chantry pointed to as to why they should be.

Just as Anders himself had become. And some part of him had known that, had said that on more than one occasion, yet somehow it always got shoved into the background, like the white noise of a babbling brook as it ran its soothing course. How? How how how had he let such a lapse of logic overrun him? How had he been so blind as to –

He slapped a hand over his mouth, tears welling up and spilling over before he was even aware it was happening.

He’d been blind. Surrounded by friends, people who accepted him and all his eccentricities – accepted he was possessed, that he was with demon, of all things – even Fenris never moved against him, and that man had more reason to hate someone like Anders than anyone else, very nearly.

He had not seen. Had wantonly ignored. But why. Anders was not a stupid man; he never had been. Why and how could this have..?

The answer, when it presented itself, was so obvious that if it’d been a bear it would’ve bit him: Justice. He made everything bigger. More. Larger than it really was, like some sort of cosmic amplifier. Anders had made the decision to let Justice in, having no idea what the consequences would truly be, so certain of his own strength and power. So bloody naïve. And, as it happened, immensely stupid.

He turned, buried his face in the hollow created by his arms atop his rock seat, and wept. For as right as Anders knew he and Justice had been about the injustices that had been perpetrated against mages for so very long, that’s how wrong they had been about how to fix it.

Yes, the chantry needed to be stopped. Yes, Elthina had allowed the violence, Meredith had encouraged it, and though others like Thrask and Cullen had done some to help as they could, it hadn’t been nearly enough.

Yet what had Anders done that was any better? Killed innocents, including nobles who existed under the same thumb of the Chantry as mages? Caused the Knight-Commander to call for the eradication of every mage in the Gallows because of what he had done? Forced a man who’d spent most of his life in the chantry to care for him now, the very person who’d taken away from him everything he held dear?

And all because Anders had been too fucking blind to see what had surrounded him. He had prayed and prayed and prayed for years for the Maker and Andraste to help him turn things around, change the fact that mages were preyed upon so egregiously. He’d thought Justice was the answer. If only he’d actually learned something in all those years at the Circle, and had said no to the spirit like he knew he should have.

If only he’d waited until he got to Kirkwall, until he met Hawke and by extension all the others Hawke had gathered into a cobbled-together family. Isabela had liked him, and she understood more about spirit possession and the like simply from being Rivaini. All of those he’d been surrounded by could’ve become a small army that might’ve changed everything for the better, rather than what it’d become, how they’d all been hurt emotionally and physically, and scattered to the four winds, because of what he had done.

Anders knew, as these new understandings poured forth from him in rivers of tears, that he deserved what had happened to him. For the Maker had sent him help and he had ignored it, thinking he, and a spirit already angered by what it felt was abandonment from its creator, knew better than the One who had made them all.

What a fool he was. What a complete and utter fool.

Chapter Text

The starlight shone dimly on Sebastian, standing on the outskirts of the camp. He was a lone silhouette against the inky darkness, his heart pounding in his chest. The crackling fire behind him was a dull murmur, a bitter reminder of the revelations that now left him feeling raw and exposed.

The taste of betrayal was a sour thing, a cruel slap in the face. Betrayal by Anders, yes, as he had betrayed them all in the end. But more so by Grand Cleric Elthina, a woman he had revered, a beacon of his faith, of the shared faith of tens of thousands across all Thedas. The revelations of her involvement in what happened within the Gallows and without, shook him to his core. What made him even more sick to his stomach, however, was that he truly believed those few sentences uttered by Anders barely scratched the surface.

Elthina had been a mother figure to him, offering guidance and solace when he'd felt adrift in his faith, adrift in life. He had looked up to her, seen her as a symbol of all that was good about the Chantry, about faith in the Maker, period. Now that image was tarnished, soiled by the truth of her complicity and even beyond that, her instigation! His chest tightened at the thought. The pain of her loss was still fresh, and now it was amplified, twisted into a sharper sting. He would not be able to question her. He would never know why she’d done what she’d done, the extent of what she had done, or even be able to verify if any of it was true to begin with. There would be no answers. Ever.

Sebastian kicked at the dirt, hands on his hips, thoughts spinning. He could still hear Anders' words echoing in his head, each syllable a piercing needle of truth. Anger flared in his chest, a burning flame fueled by treachery and guilt. He should have known. He should have seen the signs, should have done something. He’d been so…his brain stuttered to a halt.

Blind.

He whipped his head back toward the campsite. Just as Anders had. They were not so different, as it turned out. And that truth, the single moment of fearful acceptance of his own role in the whole thing, took the wind right out of Sebastian’s sails. He fell to his knees, resisting the urge to retch their entire meal onto the uneven ground beneath him.

He should. Have. Known.

But he hadn't, and now it was too late. Kirkwall was in ruins, Elthina was dead, Anders was blind and magicless and the truth was an ugly scar on Sebastian’s heart that he instinctively knew would never heal. His faith, once a sturdy shield, now felt fragile in his hands. He had dedicated himself to the Chantry, to the Maker's service, but now it felt like he was floating in a sea of doubts and questions. Was his faith misguided? Had he turned a blind eye to these injustices in his equally blind devotion to the tenets that’d been drilled into his psyche since birth? Was he as clueless as he felt, or had he seen but ignored the truths hiding in plain sight before him?

The crisp night air filled his lungs as he took a deep breath, trying to quell the tempest within. His chest heaved, thoughts turning to the future, to what came next. Given that he’d sat on his arse for years in Kirkwall refusing to put a foot one way or the other with respect to retaking Starkhaven from his distant cousin Goren, Sebastian felt as though he’d done enough in the inaction column. For he was at a crossroads, and that meant action was required, lest he once again squander a good quarter or fifth of his life away.

But what was the right course of action? What was the just path? He looked up at the sky, at the vast expanse of twinkling stars, hands gripping his armored thighs, hoping for a sign, a whisper from the Maker, a beacon to guide him through this storm. He’d even take a shooting star at this point.

But the sky was silent, and the path ahead remained shrouded in darkness. He felt a sense of isolation creeping in, a loneliness that made his heart ache. His hands clenched into fists at his sides, a tangible manifestation of his inner turmoil. He felt so utterly alone. There was no one he trusted enough with whom to share these secret thoughts, these painful truths. No one to go to for help.

“I cannot see the path,” he whispered, voice atremble. “Perhaps there is only abyss.”

He turned to look back at the campsite, gaze falling on the flickering campfire. But when he saw what lay just beyond, he found himself spurred into an unthinking kind of action, one that required no scrutiny or planning, or even a realization that it was about to happen. One that stemmed simply from being human.

For Anders was hunched over the rock he’d been sitting on earlier, body shaking, clearly sobbing though Sebastian couldn’t hear or see it from his vantage point. Grief, despair, overwhelm. Everything within his heart screamed out for a connection, for a salve to the wound of finding himself utterly and completely adrift, ships passing in the night, bashing themselves against the rocks and wrecks just to feel something, anything. The sheer desperation of the moment propelled him forward, almost into a trot as he reentered their small camp.

"Maker, I’m…I’m so sorry for what I’ve done!” Anders cried, voice catching on a sob as he evidently heard Sebastian’s approach.

"I’m sorry, too,” Sebastian said, kneeling beside the man, his voice barely more than a whisper. "By the Maker, Anders, forgive me. I never…I didn’t…” He huffed out a disbelieving breath, trying to remember to breathe at all. “Please forgive me.”

The words hung in the air, a silent plea amidst the crackling of the fire. Anders' body continued to shake with the force of his sobs, his despair palpable in the stillness of the night. Sebastian placed a hesitant hand on Anders' back, feeling the tension that gripped the man's body. Anders didn't pull away. Didn't tell Sebastian to leave him alone.

“Trembling, I step forward,” the prince whispered, drawing on the only source of strength he had left, faint though it was, as his fingertips pressed into the former mage’s back. “In darkness enveloped.”

Moments passed and then suddenly, so quietly he almost missed it, he heard Anders whisper, “Though all before me is shadow, yet shall the Maker be my guide.”

Sebastian swallowed hard. “I shall not be left to wander the drifting roads of the Beyond.”

“Say it,” Anders pleaded. “Finish it.”

The prince bowed his head. “For there is no darkness in the Maker’s Light, and nothing that He has wrought shall be lost.”

Anders slowly lifted his head and turned it just enough to where it looked like he was purposely trying to meet Sebastian’s gaze. Then all at once his whole body moved, collapsing into him, sobs growing louder, more desperate. “How could He forgive me?” he wailed, bringing tears to Sebastian’s eyes, for he had so often seen despair in men during his years as a Brother, but never…never to this degree. “I am lost. I’ll be abandoned just like his first children were. And I deserve it!”

Time seemed to stand still as they sat there, two broken men finding solace in shared grief and guilt. Sebastian held Anders tightly, his own tears falling freely as he whispered words of comfort, words of forgiveness, words that had once felt hollow but now carried the weight of his sincerity. They included everything from bits and pieces of the Chant of Light to platitudes he’d spoken oft to grieving folk to promises of forgiveness. Requests to be forgiven.

Anders shook his head against Sebastian’s breastplate. “I…I deserve everything that’s happened, Sebastian, don’t you see? I deserve blindness. I deserve tranquility. I’m so stupid! I did everything we’re not supposed to, everything we’re warned about!”

Sebastian knew these words to be true, yet so too were those he himself uttered next. “And I did everything the Maker tells us we’re not supposed to.” He squeezed his eyes closed, arms tightening around his charge. His…prisoner? No. His friend. “I will forgive you as freely as the Maker forgives our sins, but only if you will also forgive me for not doing more. For not doing…anything at all.”

Gradually, Anders' sobs lessened, replaced by ragged breaths and the occasional hiccup. He pulled back slightly, looking toward Sebastian with red-rimmed eyes that held a multitude of emotions despite their milky whiteness. “I don’t deserve that. I don’t deserve…you.”

Without even noticing himself doing it, Sebastian shoved a wet clump of hair off Anders’ forehead and back against his temple, only realizing what he’d done when Anders leaned into his touch like a starved man grasping for a bite of food.

“Perhaps we don’t deserve each other, but I suspect we actually do.”

Anders managed to huff out a half-laughed snort. For long moments they stayed frozen in place as though afraid to even breathe, Sebastian’s eyes locked to Anders’, their chests heaving like they’d just sprinted from Ostwick to Starkhaven and back. Eventually it was Anders who turned away, biting his lip, patting around the rock for something he apparently could not find.

Momentarily, Sebastian handed him a handkerchief, the only piece of his mother’s embroidery he had left. She’d carefully threaded his initials into the corner in thick threads of Starkhaven blue, which stood out so vividly, even after all these years, against the brilliantly white-bleached finely woven cotton.

Anders half-giggled through a series of hiccups when he felt the edges of the cloth that Sebastian pressed into his hand. “I’m to receive the favor of a prince now, as ghastly as I look?” he quipped in wavering tones.

“Well, the advantage you have is that you cannae see how ghastly I look at the moment.”

Anders smiled as he wiped his face, dried his tears and then blew his nose. He thunked down to the ground, back against the foot-high side of the flat rock and as he tucked the handkerchief away in his trouser pocket, asked, “So what do we do now?”

“I honestly don’t know,” Sebastian replied truthfully as he carefully helped Anders to rise to his feet.

“How about we sleep?” Anders offered.

“A fine idea. Elth…” Sebastian looked away and squared his jaw. He was about to say that Elthina always told him things would look better in the morning after a good cry and a good sleep, which he’d scoffed at until the first time he’d followed her advice. “I think we’re both tired enough to sleep well,” was what he lamely finished with instead.

Anders nodded, but neither man moved. After a few moments, however, the former mage reached out and placed his hand on Sebastian’s shoulder. “Thank you.”

“For the handkerchief? You’re welcome. Ask anytime.”

“No. Not for the handkerchief.”

Sebastian blinked. “Oh.” He chewed on his lip and looked away. “You’re welcome.” Then he cleared his throat and announced, “Sleep now. We shall see where the road takes us tomorrow.”

“All right,” Anders replied softly. He picked up a long stick that he’d been using to feel the ground in front of himself in an effort to enable independence of a sort, so he could at least walk a straight line on his own without falling and breaking something.

But Sebastian moved to intervene, gently taking his elbow and guiding him to the newly-acquired second bedroll Nathaniel had provided back in Wrenwith after purchasing a new one for himself at their small market. “Here you are,” he stated tiredly as he released his elbow and turned toward his own bedroll on the other side of the fire.

“Sebastian?”

“Aye.”

“Will you still be here? I mean, in the morning?”

It said an awful lot about Anders’ past if, even in this condition and after everything, he truly thought he’d be left behind. Like he just wasn’t important enough – especially after their heated argument and its aftermath – to stick around for. The realization painfully, physically, hurt because Sebastian knew exactly how he felt. No…as it turned out, they weren’t so different after all.

“Aye,” the prince replied softly. “I’ll not abandon yeh now, Anders. You have my word.”

He didn’t miss the look of surprise on Anders’ face, nor the trembling of his lower lip. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, then lowered himself to his bedroll. Sebastian did the same, quickly sliding down the slippery slope of sleep when he heard Anders, eyes open but unseeing, sing in a soft, beautiful tenor.

“I am not alone. Even as I stumble on the path with my eyes closed, yet I see the Light is here.”

And there was his sign from the Maker.

Sebastian smiled.

Chapter Text

Within the span of a week the road had led them to Llomerryn, a port city filled with diverse faces and bustling with activity. For the most part, they were ignored by the city's residents, just two more travelers in a sea of people. It was here, amidst the crowded streets, bartering merchants and echoing laughter, that an unmistakable voice called out, "Sebastian, is that you?"

The prince turned to see a familiar figure wearing a grin as charismatic as ever. Though they didn't know each other terribly well, there was no mistaking Zevran Arainai, a former member of the Antivan Crows, former companion to the Dalish Grey Warden who'd died beating the Fifth Blight's archdemon, and a seasoned rogue – and even more seasoned flirt.

The years since they'd last encountered the blond elf had done nothing to dull his sharp wit or the mischievous twinkle in his eyes. He walked with an air of confidence that suggested he was far more than your run-of-the-mill city elf, which of course, he was.

Zevran greeted Sebastian warmly before turning to Anders with a surprised raise of his eyebrows. "And...Anders? This is certainly an unexpected reunion."

As Zevran's gaze landed on Anders, he noticed the sightless eyes and the stiff posture, his grin softening into something more sympathetic and much less jovial. The elf turned to Sebastian, a silent question in his gaze. With a nod from the prince, he gently placed a hand on Anders' arm. "It's Zevran, Anders. Remember?"

"I remember," Anders replied quietly, his sightless eyes flickering in the elf's direction.

As they caught each other up, the one thing Sebastian didn't think would be possible emerged: humor. Zevran had an ability like no other to not just tell a story, but practically act the entire thing out with all the enthusiasm he could muster, voices and all. You just couldn't stay in a bad mood with the elf's often outrageous words and actions, leaving even Anders chuckling now and again as the once bustling city quieted down around them while day gave way to dusk. With Zevran, their journey suddenly seemed a little less tedious, a little less burdensome. They found comfort in the friendliness of the elf's company, a strange sense of safety in a world where that was most definitely not the norm.

Amidst the shared camaraderie and the jokes and the rather implausible stories, Zevran's attention never strayed far from the interplay between Sebastian and Anders. His eyes, sharp and perceptive, caught subtle gestures, quiet and almost intimate exchanges of words. They noticed the lingering gaze of the prince toward the former mage, the unconscious lean of each towards the other. How Anders reached out seemingly subconsciously, touching Sebastian's armored thigh or forearm lighter than a feather as though he needed that small reassurance of closeness from the man who'd clearly become his protector. He noticed the undercurrents of something deeper, something that neither Sebastian nor Anders seemed to fully comprehend yet, if they were even aware of anything at all.

As the real need for sleep drew closer, Zevran found a moment to pull Sebastian aside. "You care for him, don't you?" the assassin asked, a knowing look in his eyes.

Sebastian was taken aback, stuttering out a denial. "I...am responsible for seeing justice is served for the actions he took in Kirkwall. We are en route to Starkhaven, unwitting companions on this journey. That's all."

Zevran merely nodded, not seeming convinced. "Just be careful, mi amigo," he warned. "The heart can be a tricky thing, and I suspect there is much more at stake for you both."

With that, Zevran left them, disappearing into the city with a wink and a promise to cross paths again. But his words lingered in Sebastian's mind, leaving him with a newfound realization and a flurry of questions he felt ill-equipped to address, let alone answer.

As Sebastian laid down to rest that night, he found himself quietly watching Anders. The man was asleep, countenance lighter than it had looked since he'd stumbled upon him fetid and shackled by that disgusting group of bandits that'd imprisoned him.

Sebastian's thoughts drifted back to Zevran's words, a sense of unease tugging at him. He had been so focused on their return to Starkhaven, on the goal of seeing the blind man brought to some kind of justice for his actions, that he had barely noticed the subtle changes in their dynamic as the days and weeks of their journey passed. And of course, much had changed only a short week ago when certain bombshells had been dropped and yet somehow, here they still were.

But was it simply two men adrift seeking companionship out of the only comfortable, familiar person currently in their lives – one another? As he drifted off to sleep, Sebastian wondered how long he could ignore the truth that was slowly unfolding before him, as though each step that brought them nearer their destination was also forcing him to begin facing an uncomfortable truth that felt as though it wasn't new at all, but something that had been hidden in plain sight since their Kirkwall days.

Could it be, he wondered, that their venomous relationship had all along been hiding something quite the opposite between two men who couldn't have been more different if they tried? The thought didn't sit well with him, and yet, he found that he could not discount it.

He was still contemplating it and finding himself slightly more comfortable with it, three evenings later…although it quickly ceased to be the most important thing on his mind.

"Kirkwall?" Sebastian echoed, a note of alarm in his voice. He and Anders had just set up camp for the night when they were unexpectedly joined by Juliette and Nathaniel, who had traveled in haste to reach them.

"Yes," Juliette confirmed, her gaze holding a glimmer of hope. "We have a potential solution for Anders' blindness. There are mages currently in Kirkwall who might be able to help."

Sebastian glanced at Anders, who wore an unreadable expression. The City of Chains held too many memories for both of them, a haunting reminder of events best left in the past, of actions taken and not taken in equal measure. Never mind how far and long they'd already traveled to get away from it. But a chance to restore Anders' sight couldn't be ignored, no matter how dangerous the road.

And so, with trepidation gnawing at their hearts, they packed up their camp the following morning and set their course for Kirkwall. They were accompanied by Juliette and Nathaniel, who promised to guide them to their destination.

Upon reaching the outskirts of the city-state, and the entrance to a very strange underground tunnel that led to an equally strange destination, the Wardens took their leave, and Sebastian and Anders emerged into the oddity that was The Black Emporium. The familiar sight of a huge skeletonized body seated on a chair greeted them. Both men remembered their visits there with Hawke, and Xenon the Antiquarian had a few choice quips for his returning customers, which they largely ignored.

There, amidst ancient relics and artifacts of untold power, they encountered the Tevinter trio that Juliette and Nathaniel had arranged for them to meet: Dorian Pavus, a striking and witty young mage, his best friend, Felix, and the older, stern-looking Gereon Alexius, who as it turned out, was Felix's father and Dorian's mentor. Their conversation was cordial, but the underlying tension was palpable. The Tevinters weren't that keen on mage-hating southern chantry brothers and Sebastian's memory of Tevinter horrors as espoused by Fenris made him want to turn and run the other way, not engage in cordial conversation.

When the proposed solution for Anders' blindness in the aftermath of a spirit violently leaving his body was finally revealed, it was a bombshell they were not at all prepared for.

"Blood magic?" Sebastian repeated as soon as the words had left Gereon’s lips. He stared at the man in disbelief. “You cannae be serious.”

"It's not what you think," Dorian tried to assure, looking uncomfortable at the mention of the forbidden magic. "Alexius has perfected a way to use it safely. Else I would have nothing to do with him."

"But it's still blood magic," Anders countered, his voice a quiet murmur. He had seen first-hand the effects of blood magic, how it corrupted and twisted the minds and hearts of even the most stalwart of mages. And both men had witnessed the horrific aftermath of Merrill's own use of it, resulting in the deaths of her keeper and her entire clan. To think that this could be the only solution to restore Anders' sight, was a hard pill to swallow.

There was a long silence, punctuated only by the odd sounds of the Emporium and its eccentric proprietor, Xenon, who'd taken it upon himself to berate the Tevinters for being Tevinter. Sebastian gently laid his hand on Anders' forearm, the weight of their decision heavy in the air. Finally, he turned to Dorian. "Anders and I need to discuss this," he explained, his voice firm. "Can we have some time?"

"Of course," Dorian replied, giving them an understanding nod. The trio retreated to a corner of the Emporium near the tall appearance-changing mirror, giving Sebastian and Anders the privacy they sought back closer to the entrance.

The conversation that ensued was fraught with emotions, both men wrestling with their beliefs and their desperation. Blood magic was something they both abhorred, yet the allure of a cure, a chance for Anders to regain his sight, was beyond tempting.

They spoke of the risks, of the moral implications, and of their fears. And through it all, a strange sense of intimacy developed between them, a shared understanding of the immense choice they were facing. The knowledge that whatever the consequences, it would be upon them jointly this time, rather than falling solely on Anders' shoulders.

In the end, it was the former healer who decided. "I'd rather stay blind," he said quietly but confidently, his decision ringing loud and clear in the silence of the Emporium. "I've seen what blood magic can do, Sebastian, we both have. And I have already escaped being possessed by a demon. I...” He shook his head, whispering, “I can't risk that."

Sebastian nodded, a mix of relief and regret washing over him. "I support your decision, Anders. This is your life, and I stand by whatever you choose." Even if Anders had chosen the blood magic route, he realized, he would have stood by him no matter the consequences.

The thought was unnerving.

Their decision was relayed to the Tevinters, and although there was clear disappointment on their faces, they respected it. With gratitude for their attempt to assist complete strangers, Sebastian and Anders decided they needed to leave while Dorian was sifting through some ancient magical artifacts with barely-contained glee while Xenon made fun of the Alexius’ fashion sense…or lack thereof.

The meeting had ended on a somber note for Sebastian and Anders, but one filled with a strange sense of peace. They had faced a difficult decision and come out on the other side stronger, their bond deepening in the curious shadows of the Black Emporium.

Back on the road, the weight of sudden hope being quashed by the reality of what that hope's foundation would have been, still hung heavily between them. But through it all, there was a growing realization within both men: their journey was not just about finding a cure for Anders anymore, or about meting out justice for Kirkwall, or even about retaking Starkhaven.

Rather, it had become about finding a new path together, whatever that might entail. A path that was beginning to look a lot like a word Sebastian would never have dreamed he'd associate with the man he'd once wanted to pierce through the skull with one of his perfectly-shot arrows.

As they walked away from Kirkwall and all its ghosts for what they agreed was the last time, they felt ready to face whatever came next. For now, a silent acceptance of what may have been there all along between them, spurred them forward once more on their single horse. An acceptance of a becoming – what they themselves were becoming but more importantly, what the two of them might together, become.

Chapter Text

The next day, everything came crashing down around them after only a few hours of travel had passed.

"Sebastian!" A terrified scream tore from Anders' throat as he was dragged away, the iron grip of a Tevinter slaver unyielding. The prince was also surrounded, fighting for his life between unleashing arrows and whipping out daggers, unable to get to him.

Suddenly an elemental bolt of magic whizzed through the air, striking the slaver holding Anders, who released him as he fell to the ground dead. From the treeline, two figures emerged, moving with deadly precision. The white-haired elf was a blur, his movements swift and lethal and glowing bright blue as he made his way from slaver to slaver, greatsword making short of work of severing heads from necks. Ranged back further to draw their attention away from Anders, a man with unmistakable scruffy hair and beard to match, a splotch of red across his nose and a familiar, lopsided smile wreaked havoc with his staff.

Unbelievably, Fenris and Hawke had come to their aid.

They fought off the slavers together with relentless force, all three falling back into their old rhythms forged of many years of battle together only this time without their resident healer to round them out. Sebastian, still able to hold his own in spite of some injuries, drew an arrow, aiming at a slaver advancing on Hawke. From the corner of his left eye, he saw another slaver sneaking towards the left side of his and Anders’ hiding place behind one of the horse-drawn wagons. Sebastian, near the front of the wagon, was pinned down, unable to warn Anders or protect him as he nocked another arrow toward two female slavers approaching from their right.

Suddenly Anders, blind though he was, seemed to sense the imminent danger. Just as the slaver closest to him raised a bow aimed directly at Sebastian’s neck, in one swift motion Anders swung the long stick he used for feeling the ground in front of him. It struck the encroaching slaver square in the nose. The man collapsed with a grunt, nose smashing back into his skull, killing him instantly. Anders, a man who'd been living as a helpless ghost, who'd been stripped of his only means of defense, had just saved Sebastian's life.

In the aftermath of the battle, with the slavers dead or having fled, Sebastian rushed over to Anders. He was shaking, confused about where he was and where everyone else was, but he was alive. Sebastian didn't think, he just acted, pulling Anders into a tight embrace. His heart was pounding as Anders' arms automatically came around him in kind. Sebastian's sense of relief almost made him want to throw up.

"I...I couldn't have stood it if he'd...Anders, I..." he stammered, words finally failing him.

Anders, still caught in the shock of it all, softly stated, "I think I understand." He even managed a shaky smile as Sebastian – mindful of their audience – pulled away, keeping only the blind man’s hand in his.

Fenris, ever wary of any mage not named Hawke, gave Anders a distrustful glance as he and his lover approached their former companions. But there was a shared understanding between them that allowed bygones to be bygones, for they were all survivors, all broken in their own ways, yet after everything, standing together in that moment.

It was then, as he still stood there with Anders' hand captured in his own, that Sebastian realized he couldn't deny what he felt any longer. This man, this magicless mage who he'd once wanted to kill, had just saved his life. His debt was now repaid, of course, a life for a life...but it was so much more than that, and Sebastian knew it full well.

“Why are you still holding my hand?” the tall, thin man asked almost shyly, if Sebastian had to label it.

"I...Anders, I care for you," he admitted, his gaze holding Anders', although he knew the man could not see such. It was the heat of the moment, the fear of losing him. It was the recognition of what they had become to each other, what their original animosity had perhaps been hiding all along. Anders looked surprised, but there was a softness in his features, a quiet acceptance.

There was a brief pause before Anders replied, his voice barely more than a tremor, "I...care for you too, Sebastian."

Their confession was interrupted by Hawke, who jokingly observed, "Well, isn't this sweet," diffusing the tension as he always had. The group shared a laugh or in Fenris' case, a huff to mask a laugh, and for just the briefest of minutes it was like it had been so many years ago. There was unity. Camaraderie. The pain of a fraught shared history.

However, the moment was destined to be short-lived as Hawke reminded everyone of Anders' status as a wanted man, as Fenris reminded Sebastian of his promise to return to Starkhaven, retake it and then raze Kirkwall looking to bring the mage to justice, as Sebastian grew more and more angry over his own behavior these many years and over the fact that there truly was no justice to be had for what'd happened to Elthina and the others, nor for what Anders and other mages had endured. For Justice, the one who'd begun it all, was well and truly gone and though Sebastian and Anders had changed, the rest of Thedas had not.

Hawke and Fenris bade them farewell, citing a companion group to this team of slavers that they needed to make haste to catch up with lest they make it to Tevinter with their gaggle of captured elves – which was the only reason they’d been close enough to help their former comrades to begin with.

In the absence of those from their past, Sebastian and Anders began to argue over the consequences of possibly pursuing this relationship, things that had arisen during their conversation with Hawke and Fenris. Their love was forbidden, a former Chantry brother and an apostate mage. Never mind Sebastian's desire to formally assume his Princedom, and what that meant for his own duty. He would be expected to provide heirs, which meant he'd need to marry a person who could actually birth some.

He'd be expected to lead the Chantry in Starkhaven, as had all Princes before him. Yet how could he do so whilst declaring his lover to be the former apostate that'd killed a Grand Cleric and a whole bunch of brothers and sisters? They were still hunted, with both enemies of Starkhaven and agents of the Chantry looking for any sign of them.

When they headed back on the road, there was silence, a tense understanding they had reached as the fight left them both. Their lives were evidently bound by fate, by a journey they both felt that they had to complete. Their feelings for each other sure felt real, but the world wouldn't be ready to accept it even if it did last beyond this savior/victim situation. Hawke had made light of it but after hearing from the men what’d transpired since Kirkwall, had made clear how Cullen's acquiescence to leaving Anders in Sebastian's hands did not extend to any other templars not under his command. Fenris had bristled over the display between the two, yet his own continuing involvement with a mage after spouting for a decade how much he hated them, pretty much kept his mouth tightly shut on the matter in general.

As they set up camp under the starlight, the silence between them was tangible, like Sebastian could use the knife currently butchering a rabbit for their supper to cut through the air just as cleanly. Few words were spoken until well after their meal of meat, cheese and bread, when they sat opposite each other, the remnants of the rabbit smoldering in the fire between them. Anders, still more than just a little shaken, broke the silence.

"Sebastian...about what you said before," he began, his voice trembling slightly, "about caring for me. Did you mean it?"

Sebastian looked up from the fire to Anders. His heart pounded, not from fear of battle, but from fear of what he was about to admit. He had always been good at hiding his feelings, but in this matter he found that he just couldn't. Not anymore.

"Yes, Anders, I did," Sebastian replied truthfully, meeting his gaze even though he knew Anders couldn’t tell. “And I believe it’s much more than just care.”

A silence fell over them. The words hung heavy in the air, their implication clear.

“You care for me too, don’t you?” Sebastian asked, attempting to navigate this new territory they'd stumbled upon.

"Yes," Anders admitted, his voice barely above a whisper, “But as Hawke reminded me, it’s forbidden. You…Maker's sake, Sebastian, you're a Prince. Royalty. And me, I’m…” He trailed off, the list of his past sins seeming too heavy to voice.

“Just a man,” Sebastian interrupted. “A brave, kind man who risked his life to save me today despite the fact that he cannae even see.”

There was a long silence. They could hear the distant hoot of an owl, the rustle of leaves in the wind. The world was still moving, yet it felt as if everything had stopped between them, Time included.

In a move that surprised them both, Sebastian rose from his spot across the fire, moved around it, and sank down next to Anders. He reached out and took his hand, feeling the rough callouses, a testament to the hardships he'd been through, to the long magical staff he had once wielded with such grace and power it was apt to take a man's breath away.

“Anders, I know we have obligations, responsibilities," Sebastian began, his voice barely above a whisper. "I know the world might not understand us. But that doesn’t change how I feel about you. I can't promise it'll be easy, but I am willing to face it if you are."

Anders was silent for a while. Then he turned to him, a small smile gracing his lips. “That sounds like a fair offer. I…I'm willing to face it with you, too.”

They sat there, hand in hand, each aware of the magnitude of the moment. Then, as though pulled by an unseen force, they leaned into each other. Their lips met in a kiss, tentative and chaste at first, then deepening as they allowed themselves to experience this new aspect of their bond.

Their love was real and present, just as their challenges were. But as they shared that intimate moment, they found within it a kernel of the courage they would need to face whatever was to come. It was the beginning of something that neither could predict where it would lead.

Both were well aware that Death might just be that unpredictable destination. But they were not dead yet. And that was the only real truth they could both cling to, even as they clung to each other.

Chapter Text

It was a spy from Kirkwall, a rogue with fast feet and faster lips, who brought the damning news to the leaders of the armies Sebastian had raised. Word spread like wildfire. The rightful Prince of Starkhaven, the man they had all pledged to support, was consorting with a mage – and not just any mage, but the one who'd caused such destruction in Kirkwall. The fact that he was no longer a mage didn’t matter, of course, for Anders would always be the bane of Kirkwall.

The insult was magnified tenfold by the default position that Sebastian held as the Prince of Starkhaven; he would be the face of the Chantry now in the Free Marches, the brother who had vowed revenge for the death of Grand Cleric Elthina and the others, as righteous as they come. Many attributed this sudden change in him, this apparent loyalty to that mage, to being enthralled by blood magic or perhaps even imbued with a demon.

For a group that had banded together to support a just cause, the news was scandalous, outrageous, and, for some, unforgivable.

A week's journey away from the encampment where the armies were meant to be waiting for his arrival, Sebastian and Anders were ambushed by a small force consisting of the army captains from each of the Free Marches cities. Their demands were clear: Anders was to be surrendered for justice to be meted out by the Chantry, and Sebastian was to return to his duties and responsibilities in Starkhaven, casting aside this unholy relationship with the perpetrator such a horrific mass murder, and marrying a woman of appropriate station with which he would then begin producing heirs.

Sebastian was a man of honor, a man who had taken up the banner of vengeance for the slain brothers and sisters of the Chantry. Yet, facing this unexpected ultimatum, he felt a knot of defiance form in his chest. Not only because of his emotional attachment to Anders, though that was a goodly part of it, but because in his opinion, these captains had no right to dictate what he, a Prince, could or could not do within his own realm.

"No," was how he responded to their demands, his voice steely, meeting the stern gazes of the captains head-on. "I will not surrender him. He is a prisoner of the City-State of Starkhaven. As its rightful leader and head of the Stark Chantry, he is my responsibility."

The captains, men and women hardened by battles and the harsh reality of the Marches, looked at Sebastian in disbelief. Their faces bore their silent questions with frankness: What was this madness? Why would a Prince of such a devout city-state risk so much for a mage, a murderer, a symbol of everything they were supposed to stand against?

"Sebastian, you are a Prince, not to mention a man of the Chantry," Captain Thessa Ringgold, a formidable woman from Tantervale, declared, her voice carrying an undercurrent of disappointment as she spoke. "How can you justify this...this aberration?"

For a moment, Sebastian fell silent. He glanced at Anders, the man's features sheathed in shadow by the firelight of the torches the captains carried. He saw not a dangerous mage, but a very ordinary and yet somehow also extraordinary man who had suffered greatly throughout his life. A man who had saved him, who for so many years had brought out both the best and worst in him. A man he now cared for against all odds and one might say, all logic.

"I don't justify it," he replied finally, voice resolute. "I accept it. He is not the man he once was. And neither am I."

The confrontation escalated, tensions running high, until finally, steel was drawn. Swords clashed against the hardened wood of a bow in the darkness, cries of battle piercing the quiet night. Sebastian and Anders fought back-to-back, their movements synchronized in a lethal dance. They fought valiantly, Sebastian with his arrows and daggers, Anders with the same long stick that had once smashed a slaver's nose. They held their own against superior numbers, but both felt as though they were simply delaying inevitable.

The battle was fierce, with much blood being drawn, but as many as they felled, they were still outnumbered. Yet even as the odds stacked higher and higher against them, Sebastian and Anders both tiring - with Anders missing incoming blows and arrows due to his inability to see them coming - they refused to yield.

With every quick flash of his daggers, and every arrow nocked and loosed, Sebastian fought for more than his own survival. He fought for Anders, for their right to be together, understanding more now about inequalities that he'd never batted an eyelash over before, than he ever thought possible. Simply by associating with Anders, by refusing to relinquish him to what would most certainly be a death sentence, every single army – meaning every single one of the cities that fell under the Starkhaven Accord – was willing to see him as dead as they wanted the former mage.

That fact alone told Sebastian everything he needed to know about the politics of the Free Marches and indeed, more than likely, of the entirety of Thedas. The prospect of becoming another cog in that wheel, a wheel decorated with the blood of slaves, mages and anyone who didn’t fit in with the modern ideals of who deserved to live freely, twisted his gut into such knots that he vowed never to retake Starkhaven if he somehow survived this at all.

Their defiance seemed to fuel their opponents' ire, their resolution hardening as they stopped being cordial and slid far too easily into being brutal. But as the night wore on, the hope of capturing the pair alive to see them hung publicly for their treachery started to dwindle. There was a moment, a heartbeat, when the soldiers considered closing in, but it was clear that neither Sebastian nor Anders would go down without a fight. And the cost of that fight might just be too high, for none of the soldiers had any clue that Anders no longer wielded magic, beyond the curiosity of him not using any during the fight.

With a final push during a moment when the soldiers were discussing a new plan of action, Sebastian and Anders broke through the encircling force, fleeing into the darkness. They left behind stunned and wounded soldiers, none of whom could believe a man of such privilege and nobility and history would be willing to give it all up for the likes of the apostate called Anders. Their pursuit was called off after a few hours, the soldiers returning to their leaders to report their failure.

Wounded and weary, Sebastian and Anders continued their journey now without Sebastian's mare or saddlebags, their path veering away from the army's encampment and Starkhaven altogether. Their future had taken a grim turn, the price of their burgeoning love becoming all too clear. Yet as Sebastian explained to Anders, even had their feelings not escalated so unexpectedly, he would not have been able, in good conscience, to do as the captains asked.

Being forced to be something and someone you were not, was not a role the no-longer-Prince was willing to play. A fact that Anders understood all too painfully. Now without food, without water, without a mount and without even the most basic of necessities, they faced a wilderness full of all manner of creatures bent on killing them, whether animal or man. Or even elf and dwarf, in all likelihood. Throw a Qunari in for good measure, Sebastian thought grimly. But despite the odds they pressed on, carrying the weight of their choices and some sliver of hope that there was a better tomorrow. Or that maybe somehow they could make one.

For Sebastian, there was no turning back now, regardless what came next. He had made his decision and had little choice now but to bear the consequences. For Anders, it was a bleak reminder of his past, a stark view of the world that saw him as nothing more than a dangerous weapon, a threat to be neutralized. If even the protection of a prince couldn't save him, how could there be any hope at all?

Yet amidst the chaos of an uncertain future, one thing was clear. More than ever before, they were in this together. They would have to face the wrath of their past allies, the specter of their sins, and the trials that would come from their choice to remain together. Even if it meant walking into the mouth of the Void itself.

And in the heart of that bleak night, unbeknownst to them, their path turned to meet their destiny, leading them towards a final, inevitable confrontation. One that would not only test their mettle but also bring forth a revelation that had the potential to change everything.

Chapter Text

The crisp chill of the evening pushed them closer together, their shared warmth huddled in a tiny cave together a testament to their deepening connection. Surrounded by the sounds of a Thedosian night, they found acceptance in each other's arms, their bodies intertwining, their souls mingling on sighs and breathless expletives as sensations overwhelmed their minds and hearts.

Their first time together was not a hurried, desperate affair, but a slow exploration of each other, a dance as old as time. Anders' hands did his seeing for him, as Sebastian gave himself over to the feeling of another human being touching him for the first time in more years than he could even count. After their shared intimacy, they fell into a restful sleep, their bodies entwined, their hearts beating in sync.

But peace would not remain, as their slumber was abruptly interrupted some few hours later.

A spectral figure, glowing eerily in the darkness of the small cave, appeared before them. It introduced itself as the Spirit of Justice once inhabiting Anders. Sebastian, of course, had never seen the spirit as its own entity and Anders hadn't seen Justice in a very long time indeed, but as Sebastian described for him what floated before them, the spirit’s former host could definitively state that wasn’t at all what he’d looked like when they’d first met in the Fade.

From what Sebastian could piece together from Anders’ descriptions, Justice now looked weaker, a pale imitation of the powerful being that had once shared the man's body. It woke them with barely a whisper, nearly scaring the liver out of Sebastian and prompting Anders to instinctively move in front of the man he loved, both of them buck naked, to protect him.

Justice revealed that his departure from Anders had resulted in unintended consequences for both of them. He hadn't left voluntarily; he was forcibly expelled when Anders absorbed the magic threaded into a dagger forged from a potent artifact – not at all unlike what Meredith had done with her sword and the red lyrium statue in Kirkwall – in an attempt to protect an innocent village from a band of rogue templars seeking an altogether unrelated apostate. One of the templars had thrown the knife, which had lodged itself in Anders' thigh. For his part, Anders had no memory of the event, and sat there as shocked as Sebastian as the spirit wove its tale.

What had brought about the destruction of the man Anders had once been, Justice revealed, was that the artifact's magic had reacted so violently with his presence alongside Anders’ that it ejected the spirit from his body with no consent nor preparation, ripping away Anders’ connection to the Fade since the spirit itself was of the Fade. The final consequence, being struck blind, the spirit owed to the fact that the trauma had damaged his eyes or somehow affected how they worked. This same level of trauma had left Justice severely weakened and in rapid decline since being thrown halfway across the Free Marches at the sudden force of it all.

Though he had no proof of it, the spirit also believed that whatever that artifact’s magic had been, had somehow protected any of the rest of Anders from being broken, possibly even saving his life altogether.

Though willing to listen to someone he’d once considered a good friend, Anders believed he was owed some answers after everything he’d been through, everything he’d been either coerced or downright forced to do. So the first thing he asked was, “Did I truly give you permission to enter me without any treachery involved on your part?”

Justice seemed to deflate even more. “You deserve the truth. I confess my deception back in Amaranthine. I…greatly regret how I tricked you into accepting me, promising justice but delivering only destruction in the name of vengeance.”

The spirit paused. Anders scooted carefully back down to Sebastian’s side, reaching for and finding his hand. Their fingers intertwined as Justice spoke again.

It was easy to manipulate you, to…misuse your wish for a better world for mages. I do not believe that, without my presence, you would have struck the chantry as you did. I was the sole instigator.”

Sebastian narrowed his eyes. “But did he actually create that…explosion…of his own free will in agreement with you? Or did yeh force him into it?”

“Anders was not awake when the work in the chantry was completed. He was also not awake when he asked Hawke for death.”

“How is that possible?” Anders cried. “I remember it! I saw it, heard it all!”

“I allowed you the memory to ensure your continued acquiescence to our cause.”

“By guilting him into it, making a healer believe he had killed so many innocents!” Sebastian roared, vaulting to his feet, daggers out of their sheaths and in his hands so fast that neither Anders nor Justice were certain at first what had happened. “You will not leave this place alive, demon.”

Sebastian would not have abandoned Anders in any case, but to hear from the demon itself about what had really been the case where the possession and chantry were concerned, helped Sebastian to understand that his belief that Anders truly was a good person, and his confusion over not comprehending why someone he considered so good would’ve even let the spirit in in the first place, never mind do everything they did together thereafter, were all right on target. That he'd been correct.

Sebastian maintained silence in the aftermath of the spirit's tale and his own outburst, a storm of emotions brewing inside him. Anger, shock, disbelief, all swirled in a maelstrom that threatened to tear him apart. He sheathed his daggers and kept one eye on Justice even as he knelt before Anders, eyes boring into his unseeing ones, witnessing first-hand the devastating impact of a deceit spanning more than a decade. It was reminiscent of his own past, his own manipulations, his own regrets. And, he realized in a stark moment of clarity, how he himself had been manipulated by his own family and then by the Chantry itself.

Sebastian understood now, more than ever, the heavy burden Anders had carried, cajoled and used by a spirit of Justice turned into a demon of Vengeance.

“I didn't travel all this way for all these many weeks to find you, just to confess the injustices I have perpetrated against you, Anders.”

Anders turned his face toward the sound of the spirit’s voice. “Then why have you come? Do you seek to reenter your host?” he asked, that last bit spat out like bitters had found their way into his tea.

“I propose a solution, one that will restore both your eyesight and magic, the former due to the return of the latter, as well as save me from dissipating entirely. It is an arrangement that is mutually beneficial. And it’s the only way to set things right.”

“And I should believe you now, after you confess to prior deceit?” Anders inquired skeptically. “Surely you don’t believe me stupid enough to make the same mistake twice.”

“This time, I am not joining with you for a cause external to ourselves. I am joining with you to right a wrong. Several, in fact.”

Anders' and Sebastian's fingers intertwined, their foreheads coming together. “Will he be the same once he’s inside you as he was before?” Sebastian asked, hating how his voice quivered and hating even more the blasted spirit that had started it all to begin with.

“I don’t know, but I…to have my magic back?”

Both men understood the gravity of what was being asked. They both remembered the destruction wrought in Kirkwall, the lives lost, the chaos that ensued. It seemed almost impossible to even consider Justice's request.

Yet Sebastian saw in Anders' face the reflection of a deep conflict. He was considering it, considering giving a second chance to the spirit who had used him, considering endangering their hard-won togetherness.

"Justice," Sebastian began, unable to remain silent any longer. His voice remained steady despite his churning emotions. "I won't stand by and let you use Anders again. We've seen what your 'justice' does. You have yet to answer for the deaths of those in Kirkwall who died by your hand."

Anders nodded, his face resolute now as he listened to the fervor in his new lover's words. "You won't take me again. I will not be your pawn. You promised justice, and all we got was chaos. All I got was you using my hands, my magic, my knowledge, my very body, to take the lives of innocents. You want redemption? Then face the consequences of your actions, as I now must for the remainder of my life."

With his former host's words hanging heavy in the air, Justice seemed to shrink even further, his spectral figure flickering. He begged, pleaded, but it fell on deaf ears, Anders clinging to Sebastian even as the former Chantry Brother held a dagger at the ready. As the dawn approached, Justice began to dissipate, his essence being gradually erased.

Anders could not see the spectacle, but he knew what was happening and despite knowing this was the only decision he could have made, he found himself tearful as he lost someone he'd once considered a friend, as he steadfastly refused to budge on his decision, knowing it meant he would most likely never been able to see again, never be able to cast a spell for the rest of his days.

It was no small sacrifice. But it was the only path forward he could...ironically, perhaps...see.

And so there was only Sebastian to watch as Justice finally faced the inevitable conclusion of his actions, his spirit fading for good with the rising sun. There was a finality in the moment, a sense of closure. It was not the resolution they had expected or hoped for, but it was one they and no other, had created. One that felt right despite the consequences for Anders.

They were left alone again, their path cleared of the spectral reminder of their troubled past.

Despite the daunting reality of Anders' continued blindness and lack of magic, they found a new strength in their bond as it seemed to build layer by layer by layer; this, an unspoken promise that held them more closely together than either had ever expected. It was a powerful moment, filled with the conviction that no matter what, they would be there for each other.

After they slowly gathered their belongings and redressed themselves, preparing to face a new day and the challenges it would inevitably bring, they paused to share a quiet moment of unity, a moment of understanding. As Sebastian looked into Anders' sightless eyes, he found more than he ever had when they had glowed with Justice's power: he found the real Anders, scarred but not broken, manipulated but not a puppet. He found a partner, a friend, a lover.

He kissed him then, fully and openly, reveling in heat that warmed him, the love that calmed him, the touch that soothed him. Thus they embarked on a new journey: their shared future. They were not the men they once had been, as Sebastian had said to the heads of the armies he was supposed to have commanded. They were more now. They were, to Sebastian's way of thinking, better. Most importantly, they were together.

The ultimate fate that awaited them was unknown. But whatever came their way, they knew they would find a way. They would create their own kind of justice, their own brand of peace, their own flavor of love. They were no longer defined by their pasts or by futures that others had planned out for them, but by the choices they made in the present.

The chapter of their lives marked by Justice closed with a whisper, automatically opening a new one, blank and full of promise. A promise they would fulfill together, in defiance of any odds. While the dying strains of their past still echoed all around them and informed their present, the men now faced every moment with resolve.

They stood atop a rise, bathed by a brilliant sun rising into a cloudless sky. Sebastian and Anders, just two men wandering the prairielands ready to create a harmony of their own, born of the blind devotion they now had to each other.