Warriors Such As: Chapter 10 (Hawkquisition)

Hawkquisition Part 4: Warriors Such As
Chapter 10
Wherein things become clearer

Voices. The smell of the jungle, decay and growth in harmony. Light pressing in at his eyelids, faint but persistent. The chatter of birds overhead, but muffled somehow. The smell of bread, fresh, his stomach responding with sudden urgency…

Fenris opened his eyes to see fabric overhead, a tent of drab grey cloth insufficient to keep out the morning light completely. He blinked once in confusion before the strange events of the day before -- was it only the day before? -- rushed to memory and he sat up, instantly alert and anxious.

He was not bound. Looking around, he saw a tray near the tent flap with the bread he had been smelling, and close to hand, his sword and armor. So he had slept through someone divesting him of his armor? As he reached toward the pile, a twinge in his side reminded him of the wound he had taken in the latest Qunari ambush, and he twisted to inspect the bandages. Fresh and clean -- someone had taken the time to change them while he slept. Quickly now he strapped the pieces of his armor back on, slid his sword into its place on his back, and considered the bread.

If he had guessed correctly at where he was, it was probably safe to eat. They had neither bound him nor killed him in the fog. It was not the first time he had awakened in a tent of this sort, mystified to find himself treated as an honored guest without knowing how he had come to be there.

Fog Warriors. He was sure of it now.

Then again, considering the state in which he had left the last such camp in which he was an honored guest...He left the bread behind and slipped out into the morning.

The fog had lifted, if any part of it had ever been natural in the first place. Grey tents formed a companionable ring around a fire circled with logs and stumps where a number of elves and a few humans now sat, eating breakfast and chatting amiably. Fenris noted their numbers, their weapons, sized them up as potential foes, scanning the faces for his own comrades.

And there was Thayer. Smiling his most disarming smile, his posture conveying ease and trust, head to head in conversation with a grey-haired elf, an old woman whose garb Fenris recognized as the white robes of the Fog Dancer. He could see no hostility in either the Inquisitor or the Fog Dancer, nor for that matter in the numerous other Fog Warriors gathered around the fire or wandering around the camp.

What he did not see was most likely not there to be seen, Fenris reassured himself. He had never known anyone so open and honest before he had met the Fog Warriors all those years ago, the ones who had taken him in when his master left him behind…

The ones he had slaughtered at that master’s command. This was no place for him to relax. This was no place for him to be.

“Awake at last, elf?” Varric’s voice startled him out of his thoughts and Fenris jumped as he turned to meet the dwarf. “And brooding already, I see.”

“I should not be here,” Fenris repeated his last thought to the dwarf in a murmur.

Varric took a closer look at him, wrinkling his brow in confusion. “What? Just because the last people who gave us a bed for the night ended up betraying us to the Qunari doesn’t mean these guys will. And that whole fognapping thing was all a big misunderstanding, from what Thayer’s got out of their shaman there. They don’t like the Tevinters or the Qunari. Once he explained that neither party likes us much either, it’s all enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend and I think we’ve found some actual allies here.”

Fenris shook his head, seeking the words to explain but hesitant to even try. “Varric…”

But as he hesitated, Metis wandered up to them, holding out a steaming bowl. “Breakfast?” the mage suggested as he handed Fenris the bowl. “They make a decent stew here. Absolutely no fish in it. I checked.”

“I...thank you,” Fenris said, surprised at the gesture. He fell into step behind the others as they moved towards the fire, while Metis filled them in on the progress of negotiations.

“They’ve had some encounters with the red warriors too,” Metis explained. “They’re actually rather eager to help us, now they know we’ve come to put a stop to these experiments. I suppose the maddened ones wandering near Ath Velanis have begun encroaching on the Fog Warriors’ territory, causing them no end of problems. And I gather from some of the things she says,” he nodded at the Fog Dancer as she spoke quietly to Thayer, “they have cause to know how dangerous these warriors could be if the Venatori manage to perfect the process.”

Fenris’ hands tightened on the bowl as the Fog Dancer’s shoulders shifted at Metis’ voice, as her gaze slowly turned toward the three of them. Her eyes, blue so pale as to nearly match the fog, flitted briefly over the mage and the dwarf before fixing their intense gaze on him, and he knew. “Yes,” he murmured. “They have cause.”

In an instant, the Fog Dancer shouted to her warriors and the bowl of stew crashed to the ground as two of them closed on Fenris, catching his arms in firm grips. He did not struggle, made no effort to escape them. The lyrium tattoos remained inert, unlit, as he held the old woman’s gaze.

“You,” the Fog Dancer said, approaching him slowly even as Thayer shot to his feet, appalled, and Varric and Metis were held back by other Fog Warriors when they made a move towards those holding Fenris. He shook his head at them, and they ceased struggling, exchanging a bewildered glance while the Fog Dancer reached Fenris and stood silently, looking him up and down.

“Avanna, Domna*,” Fenris greeted her, inclining his head respectfully.

“Stories have reached us,” she continued in a low voice, circling around him, studying the markings where they were visible on his skin. “South of here, a camp of our brethren fell silent, many years ago now. When envoys of other camps traveled to see what had become of them, they found only corpses, drained of blood.”

Fenris winced. “I...was not responsible for the draining, though I suspect I know who was.”

She nodded thoughtfully. still pinning him with her gaze. “Some investigated. All they could learn of the matter was that the camp had taken in a strange elf, weeks before the slaughter. Lost and wandering in the jungle, wounded in battle and perhaps near death.”

Fenris hung his head. “Very likely.”

“And marked,” she said finally, narrowing her pale eyes and jabbing a crooked finger at the markings on his arm. “The markings were described, but no body so marked was found among the corpses.”

“No,” Fenris agreed.

“Imagine, then, my curiosity when my warriors brought in an elf marked just as the stories describe. And yet they say you put up no fight when they found you in the fog, though you were not taken by surprise as were the others.”

“Is that why I was not bound?” Fenris guessed, eyes widening as his brows rose.

“Other warriors so-marked wander these lands now,” she shrugged, “but you are the first we have seen with markings that are not red. Still, there could have been others like you. We will hear what you have to say for yourself. For instance, you say,” she recalled, leaning closer, “you were not responsible for the draining. For what, then, do you claim responsibility? Hm?”

He could not help but glance up, meeting his comrades’ eyes each in turn before answering. Thayer looked grim. Varric -- Varric knew the story, after all; had earned its telling with his friendship just as Hawke had once, she who was the first to hear it since that dreadful night when his flight for freedom began. Thayer probably knew it as well, having read Varric’s account. But Metis, hearing all this for the first time, looked at him with such horror that Fenris closed his eyes as he answered the Fog Dancer. “Domna, I...killed them.”

“All of them?”

“Yes.”

“Fog Warriors are not easily killed. What treachery was this?”

“They...Your stories are correct; they saved me from the jungle. They restored my health, offered friendship, showed me a life I had never dreamed of. They gave me everything, and I...I killed them all.”

Her eyes widened and then narrowed again. “And here you are again, a guest of those you once slaughtered.”

“I know.”

“Then you know your life is forfeit, coming here.”

Fenris met her gaze, but before he could answer, Varric’s shout rang out, “No!” and all eyes turned to the dwarf.

“You ever heard of extenuating circumstances?” Varric grunted, struggling again against the arms binding him. “It’s not his fault. Not if you hear the whole story. Go on, elf. Fenris. Tell them.”

A smile twitched at the corner of Fenris’ mouth at Varric’s defense, but he kept his voice even as he turned back to the Fog Dancer. “Perhaps it is not so simple, dwarf. I have...often wondered if I could have behaved differently, that day. Prevented it from happening. I have blamed myself. Perhaps you are not wrong to find me guilty.”

The Fog Dancer cocked her head to one side. “But?”

“I...acted at the command of my master,” Fenris spoke harshly now. “I was a slave. Danarius made me...as I am, to be his bodyguard. To intimidate his rivals. To be, simply put, a killer. I was with him on Seheron when a Qunari attack drove him to flee, but I was left behind in his escape. I barely survived to escape the city myself. When the Fog Warriors found me in the jungle, it was the first time in my memory that I had been separated from him. I saw for the first time what freedom could mean. But he found me again, somehow, and came for me. My...friends, those who had saved me, had no idea what they harbored. I was never free. I was always his weapon.” He bowed his head. “He laughed and told me to kill them, and I did not even think that I could refuse.”

The Fog Dancer regarded him in stony silence until Varric spoke up again, voice pitching high in worry, “See? Danarius was the one to blame. Fenris didn’t know any better, back then.”

“And do you know better now?” asked the Fog Dancer, sparing half a smile for the dwarf though her eyes remained fixed on the elf.

Fenris met her eyes steadily. “I am a free man now. I have killed many; most of them deserved it, and I do not regret being the end of slavers and blood mages. But this? I have long regretted this.”

“And atoned for it, don’t you think?” Thayer put in with eyebrow raised and arms crossed.

“Not to you, Domna,” Fenris bowed his head.

She narrowed her eyes in thought, then turned to one of the Fog Warriors hovering near and demanded, “His blade!” The warrior quickly drew the greatsword from its place at Fenris’ back and handed it over to the old woman. Fenris tensed in the warriors’ grips but kept still as the Fog Dancer stepped back, spun the blade through the air twice with an agility well-hidden beneath her age and robes of office, then leaned forward to place the tip of the blade against his throat in one smooth motion. He caught his breath, not daring to swallow.

“A fine blade,” she said, her tone of voice suggesting friendly conversation more than proposed execution. “Now, if I were to run you through at this moment as the confessed killer of my people, would you blame this sword of yours for the killing?”

“I...no, Domna,” he whispered.

And just as quickly, the sword was whisked away again, held out at the old woman’s side for one of her warriors to take and return to Fenris’ back. “Nor can I blame the sword of Danarius,” she said, firm and clear. And then her wrinkled fingers were on Fenris’ cheek, stroking gently. “No one should have to carry out such an order, child,” she whispered over the collective gasp of everyone in earshot suddenly letting out the breath they’d been holding. Fenris held her gaze for a long moment before he nodded, even as the warriors holding him released his arms. He rolled his shoulders, reaching to rub life back into the flesh where they had gripped.

“Thank you, Domna,” he murmured.

“If you truly wish to atone to me,” the old woman said, one hand resting on her hip as she regarded him now more shrewdly, “it seems this Danarius is our true enemy.”

Fenris smiled. “Then may your dead rest easy. Danarius no longer lives.”

“Your doing?” she asked. He nodded once, sharply. “Then only one task remains. These Venatori whom you hunt. The warriors they have marked in imitation, or mockery, of what was done to you.” She frowned and shook her head. “I think they are even less free than you were, child. One needs reason to find freedom. Dozens of them, as violent as they are mad, surround the fortress, not two days’ march from here. Some of them…” She swallowed, closing her eyes. “We think they experimented on slaves at first, but recently some of our own warriors have gone missing. I fear the Venatori think to put the markings on them too. It may be our own brothers whom they send against us next.”

Fenris nodded. “Then we will end their suffering, if we cannot prevent it.”

Thayer stepped up, nodding to the Fog Dancer. “And you’ll still aid us? You were saying something about an entrance to Ath Velanis that your people could show us.”

“Inquisitor,” the Fog Dancer smiled, “had you not come, we would have had to deal with the Venatori ourselves, even if it left us vulnerable to the Qunari. Perhaps it is you who will aid us.”

“And do so gladly,” Thayer grinned, reaching out to clasp hands with the old woman. “We are honored to ally with the Fog Warriors. And we thank you for your hospitality. And for my friend’s life, of course,” he winked at Fenris.

“Let him earn it in the battle to come,” the old woman intoned, “and all is forgiven.”

~*~

The mage’s eyes were on him again, as they made camp that night, a day’s march away from the Fog Warriors’ camp and less than a day to march on before they would face the maddened warriors of Ath Velanis. Fenris had felt Metis watching him as they walked, a strained silence replacing the mage’s usual curious inquiries.

Tiring of the scrutiny, Fenris sighed and sought him out, bringing Metis a bowl of the stew that the Fog Warriors who now accompanied them had prepared. “You were right,” Fenris remarked, taking a seat next to the older elf and sipping at his own bowl. “No fish, and it is indeed quite good.”

Metis did not answer, but Fenris, sneaking a glance at him out of the corner of his eye, thought he saw the mage’s mouth turn up in a smile even as Metis averted his own sidelong glance. The silence persisted as they both slowly ate. Finally Fenris set down his empty bowl, cleared his throat, and began, “If you have something to say --” even as Metis turned to him and said, “Fenris, I was wondering --”

They paused; Fenris finally chuckled and said, “Go on.”

“You spoke of...you were a slave of one Danarius?”

Fenris scowled at the name, but then shifted, tension draining from his shoulders as he realized that this was what Metis wanted to talk about. Was it not the horror of his revelation as a slaughterer of innocents that morning that had made the mage so awkward around him all day? Was it only yet more of his unquenched curiosity? He sighed. “I...was. Do you mean you have heard the name?”

“Only recently.”

“I am surprised. His infamy in Minrathous is widespread, I thought.” He gave a harsh laugh as Varric and Thayer, apparently sensing the imminent telling of a story, joined them, settling in on the other side of Metis. “In fact,” Fenris mused, “I was once an...instrument of spreading it, I suppose.” He narrowed his eyes at Metis. “Are you not of the Minrathous Circle?”

“Oh, indeed, but only in the last few years, as a researcher,” Metis spread his hands and leaned back on the rock he had made his seat. “Before that I was trained at the Circle of Qarinus. And before that I was a slave myself.”

“Also in Qarinus?” Varric asked, eyes glinting.

“What does this have to do with Danarius?” asked Fenris at the same time, eyes narrowing.

Varric waved him down. “Hold on, elf. Let him tell it from the beginning.”

Fenris glowered, but Metis nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, I suppose that is the best way to go about it. Very well, then. In brief: I was born on Seheron myself. My grandparents, like many of the natives here, had been slaves, fleeing their masters to live free on this island. My parents were born into such freedom, though in the midst of a war, and so in turn was I. But everything on Seheron is in flux, freedom no less so than the lines the Qunari and Tevinters draw on their maps. The war caught up to my family when I was still young, with a wife and a daughter and another one on the way.”

He closed his eyes with a weary sigh as the tale continued. “I was tending the trees when they came -- even then I had a knack for growing things, you know, even before my magic had shown itself. We had a proper cabin, with an orchard out back. It was a decent living. Simpler times. Well, as simple as anything ever was on Seheron. So -- it was a raid. Tevinter slavers caught the village unawares. I wasn’t even there when they took my -- my wife. My little girl. I kissed her goodnight the night before, told her some prattling story, and never saw her again.” His eyes shone when he opened them, looking fiercely at Fenris. “Your boy. You kissed him goodbye, I hope?”

“I -- yes. Of course.” Fenris cleared his throat, looking down from the intensity of the mage’s gaze. “Yes. Ser.”

“Hold on to that,” Metis said more gently. “Just -- You’ll see him again, of course. But I -- I never knew that would be the last time. I have held onto that last memory for -- oh, decades now.”

“You never learned what became of them?” Varric asked.

“Now, dwarf,” Metis chided, a smile lightening his demeanor, “bide your time. Were you not insisting on hearing the tale in full?”

“Right,” Varric laughed. “Go on, then.”

“They took half the village in that raid,” Metis explained. “When I came into town with the fruit to sell and realized what had happened, I joined a handful of the survivors intent on going after the slavers, getting our loved ones back.”

“Unsuccessfully, I take it?” Thayer guessed.

Metis nodded. “In the end we were only captured ourselves. I was sold to a magister in Qarinus without seeing my wife or my daughter or learning where they had been taken.”

“You gave up?” Fenris frowned.

“I...I am afraid I did,” he admitted. “I was a slave. You must know, lad, what that means. How was I to make inquiries? I left my heart behind on Seheron. I thought of them as dead, after a while.”

“So how did you end up in the Circle?” Varric asked.

“Ah. How quickly fate may change!” Metis brightened. “I had served the magister for many years, mostly in his gardens when my knack was known. Oh, and he knew it was magic, but beyond the basic training so I wouldn’t slip up and summon demons or anything so unfortunate, he had no intention of letting me hone my skills. He had no need for an apprentice -- I served in a more practical fashion,” Metis said with a faint laugh, pulling up a sleeve to reveal several deep scars running along his arm.

“He used your blood,” Fenris growled.

Metis nodded. “He was one of those superstitious about how much more effective blood magic could be if fueled by blood bearing magic, but too practical to use up too much of his own precious blood. There were several of us on his estate, slaves with some magical talent, guarded closely lest we do anything dangerous with it, but kept close to the master in case he needed us to fuel his spells.” He shrugged and let the sleeve fall. “It was...not all so terrible. The gardens were very pleasant, the bleedings infrequent, and I could have gone to far worse masters.”

“That is true,” Fenris said darkly. Metis eyed him thoughtfully before continuing his tale.

“Then one day, there was a Qunari attack. I happened to be near the docks, tending to errands, when it happened. There was fighting in the streets once one of their dreadnoughts breached the defenses, magisters and slaves and soldiers all running about in chaos. I was trying to run to safety when I came across a pair of Qunari cornering a girl in a blue dress, fiercely flinging fireballs to hold them back.” He chuckled and shook his head. “I suppose she reminded me of my own daughter, in a way. Whatever foolishness drove me, I had the two of them wrapped up in roots before I really knew what I intended to do with them. Fortunately, she had ideas, and I gave her the space she needed to put them into action.”

“That, I suppose,” Thayer said, “was Maevaris Tilani?”

“Of course,” Metis nodded. “Not yet a magister, but already a promising mage herself. Apparently I impressed her with my fumbling, for she insisted that I had saved her life and that magic such as mine should not go to waste. So she followed me home, argued with my master for hours, and ended up signing my manumission papers herself and sponsoring my admission to the Circle of Qarinus.”

“She freed you,” Fenris gaped.

“Well, not on the spot,” Metis admitted. “It took years, in fact. First she had to bully my old master into selling me to her. Then, in fact, I served at her estate for a few months, in which time she trained me and tested me herself before finally deciding I needed formal training.”

“Including formal manumission,” Fenris insisted.

“Slaves,” Metis shrugged, “are not admitted to the Circle. But liberati are.”

“But you are serving her now.”

“She is my patron now,” Metis explained. “All that binds me now, my friends, is gratitude. In truth, most of my time now is spent at the Circle of Minrathous, where I’ve been researching the red lyrium, as I believe we discussed previously. But when Mae wrote to me about the Venatori experiments here and asked if I would investigate on her behalf...well, I would gladly repay her kindness in this way.”

Fenris nodded, looking away as he thought this over. “But then,” he asked finally, “why did you ask of Danarius? Is this connected to your investigations?”

“Oh. No. Not on behalf of Maevaris, at least,” Metis shook his head. “You...asked earlier if I never found out what happened to my family in the raid. And of course, as a slave there was little I could do to learn that.”

“But then you were free,” Varric caught on.

“So I was. Yet even then, for many years I did not think to pursue the matter. After all, I had let myself think of them as dead for years, lest it be too much to bear. I had gone on as if I were a different man, I think. But then, a few years ago I began to wonder what I might find if I were to look.”

“And did you?”

“Oh, I looked. Maevaris helped me gain access to auction records, and after months I came across the records of that raid, the year we were taken from Seheron. At least, I was taken from Seheron; as it turned out, my wife and daughter were at first sold to a Tevinter Altus to work on his plantation on the island. But when I traced the man down, visited the plantation, they were long gone. He had sold them to another master, back in Tevinter. Then it took time to track down that master, and the one who had bought them from him, and so on. I nearly gave up. But I did at least learn that they had been kept together -- my wife and daughter, and -- a baby.”

Varric looked as if he were itching to go after his notebook. “Say what now?”

“I didn’t even know, for all those years,” Metis laughed. “She was pregnant at the time of the raid, only we didn’t know it yet. For years, I didn’t even know I had a son, born on that plantation and then sold along with them. It’s a wonder, really, that the three of them were kept together in the sales, but the children were both so small, I suppose no master would have bought them without their mother.”

“And did you find them at last?” Thayer asked gently.

Metis shook his head with a sigh. “The trail ended with a magister called Danarius.” He looked up at Fenris’ sharp intake of breath. “So you see, that was what I wanted to ask. If you too were in his service, perhaps you knew of them? I heard that they had been freed, but the magister was traveling when I visited his estate, and no one would tell me anything more. And now of course he is dead. Her name was Mara -- my wife -- and my little girl was Varania. Not so little now, I suppose. I do not know what they called the boy --”

But at the names, Fenris had first frozen, and then flew to his feet, staring at the mage agape before turning to disappear into the jungle without a word.

Metis looked around at Thayer, half risen as if to follow the elf, and then Varric, equally agape. “Have I said something wrong?” the mage asked.

“Professor,” Varric said finally, shaking his head and staring at the trees where Fenris had staggered out of view, “I have a guess what they called your boy.”

Metis followed his line of sight, frowning, then eyes widening as he took the dwarf’s meaning. “You can’t -- Do you mean…?”

“I met his sister a few years ago,” Varric said, “in Kirkwall. Varania. It was...complicated. Don’t know where she is nowadays, but he didn’t kill her, at least.”

“He didn’t -- what?” Metis gasped.

“It’s complicated,” the dwarf repeated with a shrug.

“If he...Can it be? Maker!” Metis started to stand, to follow after Fenris, but Varric put out a hand to stop him.

“Word of advice, Professor,” he said. “Give him a moment. That is one elf whose brooding you don’t want to interrupt.”

~*~

The sun had nearly set when Fenris finally returned to the camp. Most of the Fog Warriors lay wrapped in their bedrolls already, but Thayer and Varric sat silent before the fire. At his approach they looked up, starting as if caught mid-conspiracy.

“I...should apologize,” Fenris began.

Thayer shook his head. “No need. That was...er, Varric’s explained the bits that weren’t in his book. This is all a bit overwhelming, I should imagine.”

Varric laughed heartily, pounding the Inquisitor’s back. “Apparently I didn’t explain enough, or you’d realize what an understatement that was, Shiny.”

Thayer looked affronted. “I was trying to be polite, Varric.”

“Still,” Fenris said, “that was...not how I would have wished to...well.” He looked around. “He’s not here?”

“Ah…” Varric almost flushed, reaching to scratch at his grizzled chin. “He ran off right after you did. Opposite direction. Looks like brooding maybe runs in the family.”

“Which way?” Fenris asked, straightening, definitely not brooding now, a frown crinkling his nose beneath the slant of his eyebrows. Thayer pointed, and Fenris strode into the darkening woods as to the executioner’s sword.

“Er, elf?” Varric’s voice caught him at the first tree. Fenris looked back over his shoulder, arching one eyebrow. “Go easy on him?” the dwarf gently urged.

“As I said,” Fenris answered, “I intend to apologize.”

~*~

He found the mage near the bank of a stream not far from the camp, sitting with his knees drawn up and arms wrapped around them, curled into himself in a way that, despite his greying hair, made him look so young and vulnerable that Fenris halted at the sight of him, trying to reconcile the image with the smiling, curious mage he had been growing used to.

He approached quietly, lowering himself to a crouch at Metis’ side near enough to touch, despite the sense of a vast distance between them. Though he had come intending to apologize for his abrupt reaction to the mage’s story, now that he was here, he could not seem to find the words.

Metis, eventually, spared him. “Is it...true?” the mage asked quietly, not looking at him, resting his forehead on his knees.

“I suppose,” Fenris mused, staring out at the stream in the last of the day’s light, “it might not be, for all that.”

“Varric said you...had a sister called Varania.”

“I do,” he said. Metis dared a glance in his direction at the present tense. Fenris continued, “It is not such a common name.” And dared a glance of his own. “She...favored you, I think. Eyes and hair. Magic, too.”

“You...believe it is true, then.”

“I have given it some thought.”

“As have I. What of your mother? Was she called Mara?”

“I…” Fenris shook his head. “I cannot remember. I remember little of who I was before these markings. Varania says that I competed for them, and as a boon when I was selected I asked for my mother and sister to be made free.”

“Well. That explains why...I heard the women had been freed, but not what had happened to the...the boy.”

“Varania...was not so pleased with the boon.”

Metis chuckled. “Mm. Freedom brings its own troubles.”

“Yes.”

“I remember her being an awfully stubborn little girl,” Metis sighed. “But Maker, how I missed even her tantrums.”

“Perhaps I am glad not to remember that part,” Fenris smiled. “I...have no memory of my father, though.”

“Which...also fits the story, doesn’t it?”

“I suppose...it might.”

“Fenris. Tell me the rest of the story? What happened to you, to Mara and Varania?”

“I know little of it. If not for Varania, I would have only flashes, the faintest memories.”

“And Varania said…?”

“I competed for the markings. I became Danarius’ pet,” he spat, “and the boon was granted. They were freed. She said that freedom was no boon. My mother died. I don’t know how. Varania entered another magister’s service for a time, in Qarinus, then returned to Minrathous to make a living on her own, as a tailor. She had no patron to send her to the Circle, so she…” He cleared his throat awkwardly as he realized what the story was coming to. “In the meantime, I was Danarius’ bodyguard, having lost all memory of my life before receiving these markings. And then came Seheron, and the Fog Warriors.” He looked away.

But the awaited censure did not come. Instead there was Metis’ hand, gentle on his arm, the warmth of the touch drawing a tingle from the lyrium. “I am so sorry, Fenris.”

“I was...a monster. A terrible thing.” He glanced at the mage’s hand. “You...do not think so.” It was not a question, but a realization spoken in quiet wonder.

“More terrible he who made you so,” Metis answered, chin tucked and eyebrows tilted as he appeared to study Fenris’ markings once more. “Perhaps we should continue to the part of the story where he meets his well deserved end?”

Fenris smiled. “I ran, when I saw what I had done here. Danarius was injured but followed soon, sending hunters after me. I evaded them for years -- and then I met Hawke. I...owe her much, Metis. I would likely still be running were it not for her support.”

“You tracked Danarius down, I take it?”

“Not exactly,” he winced. “Varania...led him to us.”

“What?”

“When I learned that I had a sister still living, I sought her out and asked her to come to Kirkwall. But Danarius made a trap of it and came with her.”

“How could she -- her brother! She knew you were her brother?”

“She blamed me, I think. And Danarius promised her an apprenticeship.”

“Still, that hardly excuses…”

“No. It does not.” Fenris turned wide eyes on the man who might -- he was beginning to believe it -- be father to them both. “Let us not speak of her. I have not seen her since that day -- we defeated Danarius and Varania fled. I...would have killed her, I think, if not for Hawke.”

Metis shuddered. “This...this is not quite what I expected when I was trying to find her. You. All of you.”

“Nor are you what I expected,” said Fenris with a wry chuckle.

“Well!” Metis smiled. “Given your tendency to expect the worst, I think perhaps I’ll take that as a compliment.”

Fenris shook his head, returning his gaze to the stream, now shrouded in darkness. “Do you think it’s true, then?”

Metis was silent in thought so long that Fenris turned back to look at him. The mage’s eyes were closed tightly, head bowed to touch the fingertips of his hands clasped over his knees. He might have been in prayer; dark as it was, Fenris thought he saw his lips move slightly. Then his head rose and he turned to meet Fenris’ gaze with a ready smile. “Fenris!” he said. “I...I would like to think so, at least. Perhaps it can never be proven beyond doubt, but I would be glad to call you my son.”

Fenris’ shoulders straightened as a weight he had carried unawares seemed to lift from them. He returned Metis’ smile with his own crooked, tentative one. “And I,” he said, “am glad to find in you a father, mage. Even if you are a mage. Because of course you would be,” he grumbled, taking an unexpected pleasure in the irony as they both turned again to face the stream, falling again into silence as they thought over the weaving together of their stories.

“So,” Metis finally broke the silence, standing, stretching, and reaching a hand down to help Fenris up, “tell me of yourself? We have years -- decades! -- of catching up to do, haven’t we? All the little things I should know of my son. For instance, I gather that you do not care for fish.”

Fenris could not suppress a sheepish laugh as he stood and they turned to walk back to the camp. “I...do like apples.”

“Apples. Excellent. I can plant you an orchard. Though I am partial to peaches myself,” he offered as if such facts were currency, one detail exchanged for another, glancing sidelong as if to gauge Fenris’ reaction. In this way they made their way back to camp, gradualy coloring in the details of their lives.

~*~

Hawke:

I’d love to say I’ve never seen your broody husband speechless before, but obviously you’d call me on that one. However he is at least so at a loss for words that he’s turned over the writing of this letter to me.

I promise, I’ll get him to write a nice footnote at least before I send it.

Anyway, apparently today was one of those days that has overloaded his brooding meter to the point where he can’t talk of it until he’s mulled it over a good long while. I told him that this is VERY IMPORTANT and HAWKE WILL WANT TO KNOW and BESIDES, YOU PROMISED TO WRITE TO HER, and he threw the scraps of parchment at me to prove he’d been trying to. (I’m gonna enclose them. Consider it a historical document, Hawke. Blackmail also comes to mind.)

Consider also that your elf is alternating between crumpling those attempts at letters, smiling off into the darkness like he sometimes does when he’s thinking of you (I’m just going to assume so, anyway, for your sake, and because I’m essentially ghost-writing a love letter here, aren’t I?), and telling the most random bits of his life story to a near stranger.

Because that (until a few days ago) stranger is Metis, the mage Maevaris sent to work with us. I think you’ve heard of him? Broody claims he has written of him before.

And that stranger, it turns out, is your long-lost father-in-law.

Yep. Fenris’ dad, it turns out, is a mage in the Circle of Minrathous. It’s quite the story, actually, and I am itching to tell it to you, but Fenris is shouting something about JUST TELL HER WHO HE IS AND LEAVE THE REST TILL LATER (all while pacing, I should say) and I think he really wants to explain it all in person. He’s giving me the fish-eye like he’s certain I’ve already written every sordid detail down.

All right, I’ll save the story for later (besides, it gives me time to write it down properly, with suitable polishing, because you’d better believe I’m getting a book out of this one), and just say: I can’t wait till Malcolm meets his granddad.

He’s a nice guy, Hawke. You’ll like him. Malcolm should like him. Sod it, FENRIS seems to like him well enough for a mage.

Oh, and we’re storming the Venatori fortress tomorrow. Thought you’d want to know.

Varric

[addendum, written on a fairly pristine scrap of parchment amidst a handful of rather crumpled ones with many a false start scratched out:]

Hawke,

I truly, sincerely, earnestly wish you were here. I hope Varric has not overdone things -- perhaps I should not have let him write for me -- but…

I have a father. I wish you were here.

That is all.
Fenris