Just a BioWare Fan

Struggles and Striving

By the afternoon Sebastian and I talked through our discontent we’d spent hours together in one parlor or another, chatting politely with yet another noble family that simply had to host the Champion one time more than their neighbors. We’d danced a hundred stately rounds when I couldn’t face another boorish rich boy who’d never done anything more exciting than walk through Lowtown once on a dare.

His presence at these balls and dinner parties gave him unprecedented access to the nobles of Kirkwall. I often tried to deflect attention to his cause. Talk of betrayal and murder in Starkhaven meant a welcome relief from scrutiny, short-lived though it might have been, and genteel Sebastian made quite the impression on the ladies of Hightown.

The prince’s genuine sorrow and piety won their hearts but no breath of scandal ever touched him. Their husbands found him honorable and masculine enough to be likable, as well. In fact some of them told him how much they enjoyed his company much more aggressively than their wives. He told me of their advances in hushed tones and oblique language.

Growing Pains

During this quiet void after what we came to call The Year of the Qunari, I happened upon a book about Shartan, the elf famous for helping Andraste free the slaves a thousand years before. Naturally my thoughts turned to Fenris, with whom I had fallen into a delicate friendship laced with tensions we tried to ignore.

I wandered up to the mansion one night when I knew he’d avoided The Hanged Man. Most nights he joined us but he also had Donnic and a few others over for cards once a week or so and some evenings he simply didn’t come. After so long alone it sometimes made him very uncomfortable to have so many people near, even if most of them were his friends.

We never knocked on one another’s doors. I called up from the foyer, surrounded by cobwebs and beams of moonlight that shone through the holes Fenris never could be bothered to repair. He could afford it but it never mattered to him. It did not, after all, belong to him.

Hawke: Was Andraste a virgin?

Sebastian: No, of course not, Hawke. She was married to Maferath before the Maker came to her.

Hawke: And after she became the Bride of the Maker, did she abandon that marriage?

Sebastian (as if reciting a lesson): The Chant teaches that Maferath continued to fight at her side until he became jealous of her sweeping success in battle and in winning the hearts and minds of all she conquered.

Hawke: Do you suppose she remained chaste, then, as she and her husband fought their way across Thedas? Did they sleep in separate tents?

Sebastian (chuckling): I’ve no idea, Hawke, but you must remember that she had two husbands at that time. The Maker would never feel jealous of any mortal but I imagine Andraste gained much spiritual satisfaction from communing with him.

Hawke (raises eyebrow): Spiritual?

Awkwardness

After a quick plea for Donnic to have just one more drink and another few minutes of excruciatingly-awkward conversation I looked up to see Aveline pacing behind the others. She turned her panicked face toward me, waving her arms, and mouthed, “I’m sorry.” Then she fled back up the stairs to Varric’s rooms.

Donnic had noticed my nonplussed expression and turned to see at what I had been staring. My friends hurriedly pretended game of Wicked Grace and he looked back at me, frowning. I gave a little “heh heh”, about the only thing I could think to say for a moment. “So,” I finally came up with, “that Aveline is great.” I gave him an encouraging smile.

He shook his head disapprovingly. “Look,” he said sternly, “if this was all a plot to get close to me through the captain I have to tell you, you’re not my type. I like a woman with a little backbone, none of this pussyfooting around.” He stood brusquely and gave me a little nod of a bow. “Thank you for the drinks.” Then he stalked out the door before I do more than protest, “No, I…”

Suspects and Evidence

We continued our search of the Du Puis mansion, finding shades guarding several passages. By then we were suspicious enough to begin opening closets and cupboards in search of clues. Such intrusiveness yielded quick results: in one of the guest rooms we found a chest filled with luxurious dresses.

Emeric had told us that Gascard was single and we saw no other evidence of a woman living in the house. It certainly looked incriminating, though Anders pointed out that the good messer could enjoy wearing the clothes himself. They alone wouldn’t have convinced me but then we found a rack of blood vials sitting on a desk on the second floor. Anders confirmed that they had been used in some sort of blood magic, though he was unfamiliar with the exact enchantment.

The expansive sitting rooms down the corridor held a reply from the Starkhaven Circle of Magi to an inquiry about their missing mages. Unsurprisingly, it told Du Puis in no uncertain terms that lost enchanters, if any, remained the province of the Templars and not some minor noble in a different city. Why the man would be looking for a lost mage in the first place none of us could guess.

Interrupted Investigations

Varric would be sorely disappointed in my ability to weave a story, even after so much time spent at his side listening to him effortlessly pull a dozen such lines together. Yet again I’ve forgotten an important thread in my own tale. But our investigation into Kirkwall’s disappearing women came home to roost with a vengeance that even Justice could have envied.

It started early on, one of the first jobs I took after my year with Athenril when Bethany and I were still amassing the funds we needed to buy our way into the Deep Roads expedition. A thoroughly distasteful but wealthy man by the name of Ghyslain de Carrac, his Orlesian accent so thick you could have used it for mortar, hired us to find his wife. Apparently she’d disappeared and her family suspected him of foul play, a concern he found more disturbing than the fact that she’d gone missing.

The only hint he gave us was the name Jethann, a whore at the Blooming Rose. Ninette had been rather free with her favors, it seemed, even with those whose favors were not free. Ghyslain had only found out about the elf when Jethann had sent the woman lilies just before she’d gone but the prostitute wouldn’t talk to his customer’s husband.

Confrontation and Dismissal

Anders face settled into a serene smile and I wanted to take him in my arms to protect him from himself. He stared into my eyes, that pain I’d longed to erase hiding as he simply looked at me for once. That little crease between his brows that never seemed to disappear had gone and we just stood quietly. It was the most content I’d ever seen him look.

“Maker, I love you,” he breathed, snapping the moment. The enormity of what had happened struck me with the force of one of Varric’s bolts. I pulled free of him, my face aflame as I tugged my smalls into place, my eyes on the floor. My brain worked furiously trying to decide how to respond to him.

I hadn’t come here with the intention of seducing him, hadn’t meant any of this to happen. Yet here I was, half-clad and sweaty, catching increasingly confused looks from the corner of my eye as I restored my blouse to something resembling decency. Oh, sweet Andraste’s flaming left ear, what had I done?

A Plague of Dragons

Suddenly frustrated, Fenris spun and stepped even closer, stopping with his face an inch from mine. He growled, “Maker’s breath! Are you a mage, like your sister, to have bewitched me? Ever since we talked I can think of nothing else.”

I blinked at him, unable to form a response. The heat in his gaze and the sudden change of mood made it hard to think. It was nice to know that he’d been thinking about me, at least. Yet his markings began to glow as he continued.

“How can I accompany you into danger when I’m more concerned with keeping you safe than completing any task? How can I fight at your side distracted by watching the muscles of your shoulders slide under your skin when you swing your shield, by seeing the flash of sweat trickling down your neck as you spin to strike down a foe?”

I came home, damp from a drizzly afternoon of battling slave traders along the Wounded Coast, to find the Prince-in-Exile of Starkhaven standing near the fire talking to my dog.

Mabari war hounds are widely known for their ability to understand what is said to them and obey complex commands but not for their sparkling wit. It was getting a little ridiculous how often I found one of my friends chatting with him of an evening. If they hadn’t often stayed for a drink and a game of cards I might have started to think they liked him better.

Prince Vael’s swept-back hair still sparkled from the light rain, showing he hadn’t been here long. His back was to the door and he hadn’t heard me enter. I kicked off my boots, wincing at the noise their mailed tips made in the corner, while I loosened or removed what armor I could without being thoroughly indecent. Then I stepped into the room, pretending to be preoccupied with a stubborn buckle, and bumped lightly into his back.

Like Déjà vu All Over Again

Petrice was, with the help of her pet Templar, busily erasing every trace she’d ever been in Lowtown. Being a sporting soul I spoke to her before the planned shield back-hand. I was stunned by the venom in her voice as she attempted to explain why she’d laid such a trap. She seemed to think that our deaths at the hands of the Qunari would have caused an uprising and that the people of Kirkwall would turn the godless heathens out of the city, despite the disdain or disgust with which most of the citizens regarded us refugees and outsiders.

In the face of such delusion I couldn’t bring myself to actually strike her. Clearly she had problems that the Maker alone could fix, all of them in her head. I made a mental note to ask Sebastian about her and then ordered her to get out of Lowtown and not return. Finally, the rest of us went to get those drinks. We’d well earned them by then, nearly dawn or not.

That was the sum total of my experience with the Qunari before I travelled to the Deep Roads, three accidental encounters, only one of them with the Arishok. So you can imagine my surprise when I received, at the end of those three years of relative leisure, a summons from Viscount Dumar who proceeded to tell me that the Arishok had specifically requested my presence for an unspecified reason. What had I done to draw his attention beyond killing other Qunari? I could only spread my hands in confusion when the viscount asked.

Pirates and Play

Clearly I lack Varric’s facility with weaving elements into a story so seamlessly you barely notice their beginnings. In telling this tale I have neglected to introduce both another of my companions and the force that complicated the lives of everyone in Kirkwall.

Yet Isabela was as entwined in these events as any of us, perhaps more so at the beginning, and without the Qunari I would never have been named Champion of Kirkwall in the first place. Had I known how byzantine my life would get after returning from the Deep Roads I might have taken my spoils and returned to Ferelden, familial mansion be damned.

There was plenty else afoot in the city to occupy us even before we solved the mystery of the Starkhaven assassinations and brought Sebastuan into our fold for good. It seemed that Fereldens and exiled princes had not been the only folks washing up on the shores of Kirkwall. In the midst of the flood of blight refugees came a ship’s worth of Qunari from Par Vollen.

The Frisky Prude

When Sebastian and I arrived at the Hariman estate the front door hung open and a foreboding silence surrounded the property. The neighbors studiously avoided looking at the place when they passed and I wondered for how long everyone had been pretending it was fine. Certainly they’d been ignoring the neglect that Fenris visited on the mansion in which he squatted nearby. The residents of Hightown seemed to put self-preservation above property values.

Fenris and Varric arrived and we walked into the foyer. Sebastian told us how close the Harimans had been to his family. They would never have left their home so vulnerable when he had been regularly visiting the place as a boy. We saw no servants and no Harimans as we explored.

Something was clearly amiss in the mansion. Half of the doors were blocked from the other side and we could hear a woman shouting somewhere deeper in the building, muffled by the stone walls and tapestries.

A Stolen Sister and a Princely Request

When finally I arrived at my uncle’s grotty little apartment it was to find Knight-Commander Cullen at the door and my mother screaming. It seemed Bethany had been forced during my absence to be more open in completing jobs and had come to the notice of the Chantry. Cullen could no longer pretend not to see her.

Our previous help was not for naught, however. He promised as much leniency for her as he could manage and tried to ease the sting by vowing that our family would not be punished for hiding her. He offered as courtly a bow as the circumstances allowed before he and his men took my resigned sister and headed back to the Gallows.

Naturally, mother blamed me for this development as well, particularly since I’d given most of our coin to Bartrand for the expedition and taken the two most helpful friends we’d had with me. I tried to deflect some of the blame on Gamlen, the lazy lout who had put us in this position in the first place, and asked if she would rather Bethany had gone to work at the Blooming Rose. Mother was having none of it.

While my family struggled to maintain even our humble place in Lowtown Aveline had joined the city guard and moved into the barracks in the viscount’s palace at the very top of Kirkwall. Her skills and integrity had quickly brought her up the ranks but I avoided visiting her much for fear of dirtying her reputation.

She threw jobs our way when she could, however, and had remained a fast friend that joined us for evenings of cards and carousing at The Hanged Man from time to time. She acted more as a babysitter on evenings when we got snockered on cheap whiskey; losing control and looking like an idiot in public held no interest for my straight-laced friend. But she clearly enjoyed seeing us act like fools and seemed at ease fostering our banter and restraining us from joining the not-infrequent fights that erupted there.

The city swarmed with corruption, dock officials and city guards taking bribes and involving themselves in even the nastiest business in Darktown much less the more affluent sections of the city. Aveline was shocked every time we uncovered another scandal, unable to believe that everyone who served the city did not do so with her commitment to the public good. I found her naiveté adorable and teased her mercilessly every time she hired me to recover goods from a sleazy dockmaster’s assistant or to corral criminals that had bribed a guard to look the other way while they looted someone’s home. She kept her ear to the ground and had paid me to thwart many a criminal enterprise but there was always another brewing.

A Shining Example

I first saw Sebastian Vael arguing at the chanter’s board. He had a stumbling, lilting accent like none I’d ever heard and piercing blue eyes that flashed as he insisted his point. And when the Grand Cleric tried to remove his request he almost pinned her hand to the board along with it, sending an arrow so quickly I hardly saw him draw the bow. I knew I had to have him.

I didn’t want him for myself, you understand. I was drawing together some people to help me effect a change in this most melancholy of cities, the former slave trade nexus, Kirkwall. Namely, that change involved me making a lot of money on an expedition to the Deep Roads with a dwarven crew so that I could move my family into some decent quarters. The altruistic, helping-my-fellow-man part came much later.

I’d fled Ferelden with hundreds of others, escaping the blight of darkspawn that was poisoning my home. Instead of welcoming and helping those of us who had already lost everything the citizens of Kirkwall had relegated my countrymen to slums and former slave pens. We were disdained and spat upon, treated like leeches, and hired for only the jobs that no resident wanted.

I’m not quite ready to start publishing The Champion’s Side, recounting femHawke’s version of the events of DA2, just yet but I’ve decided that I’m deep enough into it that I really will tell the story. It took me a long time to find the door to this one but I think I’ve finally settled on a plot arc.

In part it was so hard to settle on a Dragon Age 2 story to tell because the game kept taking these horrible left turns every time I thought I knew where I was going. I was blindsided by Anders, stunned by Sebastian’s response to our “romance”, and every time I thought Fenris might be starting to settle down I’d say something nice and he’d start screaming at me.

Isabela lied to me and betrayed me over and over again, Merrill refused to quit slitting her wrists for a mirror I knew would bring no good, and Aveline got mad when I brought her a present. The first two trips through the game were fascinating, yes, but frustrating in the extreme for the writer in me.

That's why I avoided spoilers, so that I could come at them all with fresh eyes. Now I’m on my fourth run and I believe I’ve got a pretty good handle on motivations and characters. Naturally I’m taking this one off into left field a bit, following the general arc of the DA2 story but embellishing it with explanations and conversations that the game lacked. And you already know how I feel about Fenris.

So next Wednesday I’ll start Sideline Wednesday with Chapter 1 of The Champion’s Side. I hope there are some surprises and entertainment in store for everyone. I just have to fix some spelling issues with these names...Petrice? Really? Dang.

Last week I posted a furious response to the romance arcs with Sebastian and Anders in Dragon Age 2. I was just starting a run in which I would romance Fenris and threatened violence against David Gaider if he wrecked that one as thoroughly as the others had been.

I’d like to officially announce that Mr. Gaider is safe from me, still. He writes my favorite Mass Effect and Dragon Age characters and Fenris is no exception to this rule. I admit that I had my doubts in Act 2, though it was nice of Mr. Gaider to let us deflower another grown man. When Fenris bailed out of my Champion’s bedroom and didn’t mention it again for three years I was pretty miffed at him. But I persevered and ended up with such a lovely, passionate finale for that romance that it swept away all of the disappointment. I hardly even minded executing Anders once again!

The friendlier you are with the lyrium-infused elf the more fun he is to have in your party. And I may be imagining things but I could swear that, as my character was an archer, Fenris spent more time leaping to my defense when I was swarmed in that last act than flying around slashing bandits or darkspawn into bits all over the battlefield. I didn’t set his tactics for that!

I’m going to try a rivalry romance with him next and I’m very curious to see how it goes, particularly if I let Anders live this time.

As a bonus tidbit for those of you who don’t visit the Bioware social boards, the woman who wrote Sebastian has specifically said that our erstwhile prince’s story has not yet finished. I’ll get that boy out of the Chantry yet!