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Deep in an alienage somewhere in Ferelden, in a particularly narrow alleyway between two ramshackle buildings, a portal to another world opened, and a space marine stepped through. He wore armor painted blue with a green hydra on the pauldrons, save for one gauntlet—which was black and had a screen mounted to the back. The marine had tried to remove it many times—as had others—and had always failed. Now, however, he knew how to use it—and his first step was to close the portal through which he’d come. His second was to stow his armor and kit inside a nearby empty barrel, which he then used the glove to shrink until it could fit into a belt pouch. His third was to use his training to make himself look less like a marine (not that anyone in Ferelden—or anywhere else on Thedas—would know what that was, save for members of his own legion) and more like the city elf he had been born as. This included activating a set of biomechanical implants to sharpen his ears into points. His fourth was to ‘borrow’ some clothes someone had hung out to dry—for these, he left a short note of apology and a small pouch of coin to pay for their replacement.
Well, he wasn’t a monster, no matter what the Imperium said. Fifth, of course, was to disguise the archaeotech gauntlet as a plain leather thing. No one would question an elf who only had one.
This done, he slid out from between the buildings, blending in with all the other poor, beaten-down souls of the alienage (being a foot taller than everyone else was a thing that could be hidden with skill such as he possessed). He was recognized quickly, and word of his presence spread rapidly, but quietly. Everyone there was particularly subdued, and the legionary—now using his birthname of Tavish—soon found out why.
The arl’s son had come not four hours ago and forcibly taken several elven maidens. Tavish’s sister was among them. Tavish—who had come only to briefly visit with his old family under the rule of ‘no one can stop me’—set about a new mission with the sort of cold fury he typically reserved for the most hated foes of the Alpha Legion. Most of the alienage had seen the event. All of the kidnappers had been human. They had gone to the arl’s palace. Senriel—a younger elven man, one Tavish remembered being sweet on his sister—had gone after her alone, and stolen the keys to the servant’s entrance and a dagger.
Tavish commended the boy’s daring as he followed. He was, naturally, delayed by a member of his own legion, disguised as a delivery man for the keep. To them, he gave a brief report (mostly regarding the status of his primary mission, current location, and the basic powers of the archaeotech gauntlet), followed by a statement that he was going to rescue his sister. And if his battle-brother wished to continue delaying him, Tavish was going to find out what they had for breakfast the hard way. They had no further questions.
Tavish had no trouble whatsoever getting into the keep (Senriel hadn’t bothered to re-lock the entryway), nor did he have any trouble finding where the boy had gone (the trail of blood and bodies was rather obvious). He wasn’t particularly shocked to find Senriel had been defeated at last by the young noble’s own hand; one of the other party members had apparently left the rest of the group behind to torment the dying elf.
The noble evidently did not expect anyone else to have followed Senriel. Tavish pulled him off the fallen elf and pushed him up against a wall—no one in the ‘party’ just up the stairs noticed. “How many of you are there?” Tavish asked, so quietly that only the noble heard him.
“Who are—six!” the noble answered, suddenly learning about a new and interesting place in which to feel pain.
“And are you doing what I think you’re doing?”
“They’re just elven whores, what does it—” the noble spoke no more, having somehow managed to shatter his jaw on the stone wall he was pinned to. Tavish allowed him to slide to the floor then, letting him sob quietly. Then again, even if he screamed…no, the party upstairs wasn’t going to hear him.
Tavish then knelt by Senriel, who was just conscious enough to recognize him. He gently cradled the other elf in his arms—they had never been close enough that Tavish would consider the word ‘friend’—and saw Senriel’s eyes focus. “You came back,” Senriel said.
“I did,” Tavish replied. “…would you give anything to see these humans destroyed?”
That mad spark of bravery that had led Senriel into the keep with nothing but a set of keys and a dagger lit his eyes one last time. “I would give my soul,” he managed, no longer able to speak more than a whisper.
Tavish took a deep breath and drew a sinister, curved blade of his own. “Then I grant you entry to the Prince’s gardens, Senriel.”
~~*~~
Senriel, oddly, no longer felt any pain. In fact, he didn’t even think he’d been wounded. Before him was a pearlescent path, and above him a velvet-dark sky glittering with diamonds. Around him was a forest, the trees pure gold, their leaves emeralds. Perhaps he could…Senriel’s hands itched.
Take nothing, Tavish had warned. Senriel drew in a deep breath. He sought an audience with the Prince. To do that, he needed to pass through all six of the outer gardens. So he stuffed his hands in his pockets and bit his tongue whenever the urge to leave the path grew too strong.
At long last, he came to the shores of a lake that stank of wine. Good wine, or at least what the human house he’d served in life would call good wine. Senriel had never been able to stand the stuff. But in the center of the lake were islands connected by slender bridges, and he instinctively knew the way forward was there.
Be strong, Tavish had advised. Senriel dove into the lake, swimming with all his strength. He had always been a strong swimmer, but the wine made him nauseous. He had to slow down, to pace himself, even if that meant more time spent in the vile liquid. But he made it, and climbed out of the wine onto one of the islands, where he found a banquet had been set—a banquet filled with foods that would have made the richest Orlesian noble sick with envy.
It only made Senriel sick in general. One plate at one table would have fed three of his people’s houses for a week. The entire banquet would have fed the whole alienage for a month—maybe more. He walked on with tears in his eyes. Be strong. Stay strong.
He found his way over the graceful bridges—after a few false starts and getting turned around a few times—he found his way to the center, and found himself in a grassy field with pitched tents. Senriel stopped in his tracks, trying to place a sudden scent he knew for a fact he had smelled before—and the moment he glanced in one of the tents, and saw what looked like a demon and some human entwined together, he knew what it was. It was the perfume worn by Madame Ruby, the human who ran the largest brothel in town. The human who had ‘helped’ Senriel’s mother out of debt by putting her in more.
This was much worse than the banquet. “Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope—!” Senriel said, power-walking through the field and very decidedly not looking at anyone—or anything—that might be inside the tents. He thought he heard someone—or something—let out a disappointed “Aww!” as he passed the last one.
Senriel found himself behind a heavy curtain in fine—in kingly dress, and found himself in front of a small round human, who was helping him rehearse a speech. He had, apparently, rooted out the corrupt human nobility, put them to the sword, and was now about to take his rightful place as the first elven king of Ferelden. Senriel looked at the little man before him, who was trying to encourage him to work through his coronation speech ‘from the top’, and eventually spoke.
“I don’t think you understand how badly my people are oppressed. This would never happen,” he said. The little man blinked at him. “Sir, the sun would rise in the north before the human nobility of Ferelden even had nightmares about an elf being on the throne. Even if all the events you just described did happen, said nobility would be more likely to skin me alive and feed me to their hounds before they a) admitted that they had done wrong by my people, and b) apologized for said wrongs, and c) allowed me to get within spitting distance of the throne.”
The little man looked peeved, and then a cold wind blew the illusion away, revealing a barren plain of black soot, charred bone, and rotting corpses. The little man was no longer a little man, but a menacing demon. It grinned at him. “Did you know that you’re the first in six hundred years to make it past me? Well done. Also, your world is shit.”
Senriel wasn’t sure what to make of this. “Thanks…?”
“Just hurry up and go through the gate,” the demon said, gesturing at a wrought iron gate behind it as it walked off. Senriel obeyed, doing his best to not step on any of the bodies surrounding him. He realized only after he reached it that not all of them were corpses.
Senriel found another forest. Here the trees were normal, at least, and the air was cool. The path meandered through the trees, allowing Senriel time to think. What would he do once he reached the Prince? Would he—or was it a she? Tavish hadn’t been clear on that point—even bother to hear Senriel out? Or would they (yes that was the safest word) simply dismiss him out of hand like all the other human nobles Senriel had ever served?
But if they did hear him out…what would Senriel do with their power? What could he achieve? Perhaps the demon in the garden before had a point—maybe he could kill enough of the evil in humanity that they would finally listen to him. Senriel found himself in a glade, with a reflecting pool, and almost unthinkingly settled by its edge to gaze out over its surface. Perhaps there was hope for the future, if he could just—
Senriel heard something rustling nearby and almost too late remembered Tavish’s third warning. Heed no whispers! He swore and rolled away from a vine that had started snaking towards his throat, and kicked at a thorny branch creeping up on him. The forest itself hissed in displeasure, and Senriel realized with horror that it had gotten far too close to strangling him. He kept a close eye on the vegetation as he found the path again, keyed up and now deeply distrustful of it. As he should have been from the start.
He took a few running steps away from the forest’s edge—brushing off the stray leaves that stubbornly clung to him—before he registered where he was. Senriel had never seen the ocean. Had never seen a beach. He wanted, more than anything else, to stay. To enjoy the pure white sand, the sound and feel of the waves lapping against the shore, to finally have time to lie down and truly rest. Even with Tavish’s warnings ringing in his ears, he nearly gave in.
Instead, wearier than he had ever been in his life, he walked on. He could not bear to look at anything other than the path but three feet before him. He walked, and walked, until he passed through another gate, and found perfectly manicured grass beneath his feet instead of sand. Only then did Senriel look up.
Statues carved of some pure white stone were scattered throughout the garden on plinths. Around them were perfectly pruned trees and bushes, and between them were flower gardens of riotous colors. There was a wall just beyond them, but not a defensive one like the keep where he’d died—
That’s right. Senriel had died in order to get here. The air had begun to still. Senriel panicked, remembering Tavish’s last warning, and fell to his knees, desperate to find something—anything—that had somehow made it this far that the Prince might appreciate, and found nothing. What does one give to someone who had everything?
An idea struck him. He dug his fingers into his face—into his eyes, and bit back a scream as the Prince themselves rounded a corner. Senriel felt them smile at him. Shaking, summoning the last of his strength, he kowtowed to the grass and stretched his hands forward, his freshly plucked eyes cradled in his palms. “I have brought to you a gift, my Prince,” he said.
~~*~~
Back in the keep, Tavish watched Senriel’s dead body carefully. It had been exactly six minutes since Tavish had completed the ritual to sacrifice him to the Dark Prince. Assuming he had made it, then right about now… Senriel’s body began to float. Tavish breathed a sigh of relief, and stood up, then moved to the side. The noble he had beaten up—the one who had just managed to gather his own strength and had been starting to sneak up on Tavish—suddenly stopped in his tracks and stared, bug-eyed, at the dead elf—now floating at about eye level.
And then something began to twist the body in strange ways—as if a creature unused to physicality were in the process of climbing in. Which, Tavish knew, was exactly what was happening.
…
He wished he’d thought to prepare tea.