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Iras ma ghilas, da'len
Ara ma'nedan ashir
Dirthara lothlenan'as
Bal emma mala dir.
-Mir Da'len Somniar, a Dalish lullaby
Abelas's voice was calm, too calm for Eloni's frazzled nerves.
"The Dread Wolf had nothing to do with Mythal's murder."
Between the brutal fight with Samson and his templars, the humming, hungry presence of the Vir'abelasan behind them, its song calling for someone to drink, and Morrigan's insufferable blathering about things she didn't understand half as well as she thought she did, Eloni felt stretched out, a bowstring ready to tear. This was almost too much for her to take. Just one more thing the Dalish got wrong, she thought bitterly.
Solas touched her shoulder, bringing her back. "Breathe," he said quietly.
She swallowed, nodded, sounds beyond her own heartbeat filtering back into her ears. More of Morrigan's prattling. She turned her gaze back to Abelas. "Are you leaving the temple?" she asked him.
He spoke a bit more, before bidding them goodbye, Solas imparting his wish that Abelas find a new name. It made Eloni smile a little, even so overwhelmed as she felt.
She and Morrigan turned back to the Vir'abelasan. "I alone have the training to make use of the Well's knowledge, Inquisitor," she was saying.
"You alone?!" Eloni snapped. "This is my heritage!" She normally didn't like anger. She had been chosen by the Keeper to go to the Conclave specifically because she could always brush everything off with a smile, and wriggle her way out of definite answers with a clever joke to conceal that she was on no one's side but her own.
But she was too exhausted. Her anger burned hot and sharp, seething behind her teeth.
Morrigan continued to prattle, Eloni's rage building with her every word. Solas admonished the witch for her greed, but warned that the price of the Vir'abelasan was great. "You don't want the voices," Cole warned quietly.
However, Eloni couldn't bear giving the smug human what she wanted.
She pushed her aside and walked down into the water, breathing deeply as the ancient magic hummed along her skin, made her palm itch and ache. She stood in the center of the pool and readied herself, then cupped her hands and drank. The last thing she saw was Solas standing at the water's edge, arms crossed, eyes worried. She smiled as the fog closed in.
Voices hummed all around her, hissing, whispering. "Ma halani," she pleaded.
They obliged. Vir Mythal'enaste.
She woke to Solas's voice. "Inquisitor, how do you feel?" He watched her warily, approaching her as one would a wounded animal, all deliberate movements and sharp eyes.
She couldn't find the words. The voices all spoke at once, clamoring for her attention, drowning out her own thoughts. She forced herself to her feet, but she felt weak and off-kilter, her mind truly at its breaking point.
Cole stared at her balefully from the edge of the empty pool, his mouth set in a tight frown. He had warned her.
Eloni stumbled, her magic seeping out in orbs of light at her feet, the lack of control reminiscent of a young mage just awoken, not the accomplished warrior she had become.
Corypheus's appearance was well-timed, the shot of adrenaline forcing the voices back for a time, enough for them all to escape through the eluvian and back to Skyhold.
They were louder in the Crossroads, the eerie quiet of the realm making them echo in her ears. Cole stood close beside her, guiding her with his hand. Solas was grim, keeping three paces away from her even though all she wanted was his touch. Cassandra, stoic as she always was, said nothing. Eloni wondered briefly if her unshakable faith was at last being rattled.
Morrigan, at least, was blissfully quiet, deprived of her prize, navigating back towards her mirror.
--
When they reached Skyhold, Cassandra immediately went to send a message to the advisors back south, to tell them what had transpired. Eloni followed Solas back to the mural room. When the door closed behind them, he whirled on her.
"What were you thinking?!"
Pushed so close to the breaking point so many times in the past few hours, Eloni swayed on her feet, then to her chagrin, began to cry.
Solas stopped in his tracks, anger petering out as quickly as it had flared up. "Inquisitor," he said gently. "I'm sorry. This can wait."
She hiccupped, fighting through the voices to find words. "They won't… I can't…"
"Shh," he murmured, taking her face into his hands, pressing their foreheads together. "You can calm them. Focus on my voice. Listen to me. Pretend you are in the Fade. They are temptations whispered in the back of your mind. You can choose to block them out. Breathe, vhenan. Breathe."
She did. Her tears cooled on her cheeks, her hands reached up to hold Solas's, her breath came in and out in a steady rhythm. And slowly, slowly, the voices faded, still there when she thought about them, but far enough away that she could once again hear herself.
She fell into Solas's arms, tears of relief now springing to her eyes. "Ma serannas, ma vhenan," she whispered.
He sighed and held her. "I am still angry with you," he said. "But that can wait until we have both had some sleep, agreed?"
She nodded against his shoulder.
"Come, I'll escort you up to your room." He pulled out of the embrace and offered her his arm.
She smiled as she took it. "What a gentleman, even if we both smell like blood and death."
"I hardly even notice anymore," he said with a chuckle. "We so often do."
Once upstairs, he helped her out of her armor and into bed, sitting with her until she fell asleep, then joined her in the Fade.
She was physically in the Fade once again, this time alone, on a rash expedition to retrieve the body of a fallen comrade—who turned out to be not so fallen as they had assumed. After Anders and Hawke were through the rift and safe, Eloni turned back to the spirit of Purpose who had helped them. As she watched, it glowed white and shifted shape, until it was a young elf child. She recognized the face as belonging to a boy who had recently awoken to magic before she left her clan for the Conclave.
The spirit stared at her with watery blue eyes, so stark against the brown of his face and the darkness of his hair.
"You know what I want, don't you?" she asked him. "Will you show me where I can find him?"
The boy smiled and held out his hands.
As she took them in her own, the Fade began to shift around her, until she was standing in the Dirthavaren, near where they had freed Solas' friend from the summons of those idiot mages. Shifting so that he was leading her by one hand, the boy began to walk, taking her to an old ruin, its purpose lost to time.
As they passed through a crumbling archway, Eloni saw a barrier, glowing brightly around a sleeping elf with a bare head and tattered clothes. The spirit dropped her hand and abruptly they were back before the rift.
"The plains are quite a journey from here. Will he be there when I arrive?"
The spirit only smiled.
She sighed and ran a hand through her hair. "Well, I suppose I just have to trust you, don't I?"
The spirit grinned, revealing the gap in his two front teeth, and vanished in a flash of light.
Eloni left the Fade, and closed the rift behind her.
--
After the others left, Anders and Hawke to Rivain, Varric and Cole to Skyhold, Eloni swung her bag over her shoulder and stared up at the empty blue sky, the scar of the Breach swirling gently to the east. Leliana's letter said that he had gone west, so the Dirth fit (she hated that the shem name, the Exalted Plains, came to mind even as she called up the true name of Dirthavaren). But the spirit had been insufferably vague about whether she would actually find him there, or if he was there now, and thus would be long gone by the time she arrived.
With a sigh, she ruffled her hair, and turned to face east, the sinking sun at her back. It was the only lead she had. "Mythal, Mother, Avenger," she said quietly. "Guide my steps. Bring me to him. I have questions he must answer."
The sand cooled underfoot as the sun faded from the sky, and Eloni lit the top of her staff to guide herself in the dark. The constellation Fenrir glimmered overhead. When she noticed, she laughed, her voice sharp and bitter in the cold, empty air.
The day after drinking from the Vir'abelasan, Eloni found herself drifting through Skyhold, trying to listen, but only able to hear, the different voices speaking over and under and on top of each other until they were only static. How could she help anyone like this? Leliana, Cullen, and Josephine were on their way back to Skyhold as quickly as they could travel, and so far Eloni had nothing to give them.
Maybe it would have been better for Morrigan to drink.
She pushed the voices away entirely and returned to her quarters, sitting on the balcony of her room, staring blankly up at the Breach. As afternoon turned to evening, there was a knock on the door below, then the sound of it opening.
Solas sat down beside her, holding out a tray of food. "I offered to deliver it instead of the usual kitchen staff. How are you feeling?"
She took the tray, picking up the loaf of hard bread and dunking it in the soup until it was soft enough to eat. "Frustrated," she groused. "I can push them away, but I can't focus them. Either I hear them all at once, or I hear nothing. And if they're all talking at once, I can't understand a word."
He raised an eyebrow. "Morrigan seemed to think she had the 'proper training'. Perhaps she has some advice?"
Eloni gagged. "I wouldn't ask for her help if I were drowning and she were the only one who could swim."
Solas chuckled. "I can't say I entirely disagree with you. She has an arrogance I haven't seen in… Well, she is extraordinarily convinced of her own rightness."
Eloni raised her eyebrows, staring at him as she brought the soup bowl to her lips.
"And just what are you saying with that look?" he asked.
"Oh nothing. She's just not the only know-it-all at Skyhold I can think of." She smiled. "I like the other one much better though. I suspect his arrogance is better justified."
"Well, I prefer not to speak on a subject unless I am actually knowledgable on it."
She nudged his hip with hers, smiling as he put an arm around her. "You're my favorite insufferable magical know-it-all, ma vhenan."
"And I will choose to take that as a compliment." He pecked her forehead.
They were quiet as Eloni finished eating her dinner. There was a buzzing at the back of her mind, like a person speaking at a distance so great that only an echo of their words could be heard. When she set the empty dishes back on the tray, Solas set his hand over hers, tangling their fingers together. "If you don't wish to ask Morrigan for help, allow me to. Face me."
Eloni scooted around so they were sitting cross-legged in front of each other.
"I'm going to teach you how to explore your own mind," he explained. "Close your eyes, calm your mind, try to hear your heartbeat."
She slowed her breathing, counting the breaths in her head.
"Now," Solas said after a while, "reach for your magic, just enough to touch the Fade without entering it. Do not sleep."
Eloni felt like she was sinking, swallowed up in the darkness behind her eyelids.
"Good," Solas said quietly. "Now touch the voices again. You should be able to understand them now."
The voices were still talking, babbling over one another, completely incomprehensible. "It's not working," she croaked.
She felt Solas's hands on her own. "Clear your thoughts, vhenan," he said. "Do not think, only listen. Do not try to understand them."
Eloni frowned, hugely tempted to open her eyes and glare. "So, to understand them, I have to not try to?"
"Your mind knows how to listen. You just have to allow it to."
She sighed and went back to counting her breaths. As she did, she began to feel her heart in her chest, the blood moving through her veins. Her thoughts became quiet, and a blue fog began to roll into the blackness of her empty mind, the same she had seen in the Well. You can hear us, a few voices said simultaneously, in perfect sync. You can understand us.
"Yes," she whispered. "I can." She didn't know who she was answering. "Help me face Corypheus. Tell me how to defeat him."
Voices spoke in rapid succession.
The dragon is not one of Tevinter's gods.
He is not what he appears to be.
Simply a dragon. Tainted. Corrupted.
Use the witch. Kill the dragon. Break the link.
Kill the creature.
Kill the would-be god.
Eloni opened her eyes and pushed the voices away, staring at Solas. "I know what to do," she whispered. One of things she had heard didn't seem to fit. He is not what he appears to be. All high dragons are female, after all. Had the voice been referring to Corypheus? If so, what did it mean?
Solas smiled, but there was a sadness there she couldn't understand. "That's good. I'm glad I could be of assistance."
"Does that mean it's time for our angry talk about my choosing to drink from the Well? I believe the opener you had was something like, 'What were you thinking?'" She shook her fist at him as she mimicked him.
He smiled wider. "No, I need time to build up to it now. But worry not, after you have spoken to your advisors, it will come. For now, I have finished the design of my latest fresco and plan to spend the rest of the day doing it."
"Can I watch?"
"Of course, vhenan." He helped her to her feet.
"I'll meet you down there after I drop these back in the kitchen," she said, picking up the tray.
"Take your time, vhenan. I won't be going anywhere." Something that felt like yet hovered awkwardly in the air between them. But before Eloni could ask him about it, he was already heading down the stairs and into the mural room. Shaking her head in bemusement, she followed after him, closing the bedroom door behind her.
--
Meeting with Solas before the waterfall, his removal of her vallaslin, his abrupt leaving. Meeting Mythal in the Fade, winning the allegiance of a dragon, the final battle with Corypheus. That last enigmatic conversation as Solas stood beside the shattered orb.
Eloni returned to Skyhold, battered, exhausted, and confused. The events and whirlwind of emotions of the last few days hung around her neck like chains. But the Breach was sealed, the world was safe for now. She knew she would be expected to celebrate.
The party was a nice idea, but being surrounded by shems (all praising their human prophet-god who got credit for Eloni's actions for some reason) was just a reminder of how much she had lost.
Leliana touched her arm, rubbing it gently. "I'm sorry, Inquisitor. My agents have found no sign of Solas. We will keep looking."
Eloni sighed, shook her head. If Solas didn't want to be found, he wasn't going to be found. "Thank you, Leliana. I think I'm going to turn in for the night."
"Of course, Inquisitor. Sweet dreams."
She pasted a smile on her face. "With Corypheus gone? You bet they will be."
But the rest of the night saw instead the fury of purpose. Blank journals were stacked and organized, an inkwell and a variety of quills were gathered, and the blankets were ripped from the bed, carried out onto the eastern balcony.
And Eloni wrapped herself up and sat, letting her thoughts go, focusing only on the voices, until she was able to sit and listen and write what she heard, recording stories and history lost to the ages.
She wouldn't be able to return to her clan. She was the shems' creature now, she knew that. But that didn't mean she couldn't still somehow fulfill her role as First and work to preserve their dwindling culture.
And when the sun rose on the new day, Eloni stopped and set her writing aside, rising to meet it. Her face was bare and her heart was shaken, but she was confident that, given time, she would find a way to bring this new knowledge to the Dalish, even if it meant compiling her notes into a book and writing each copy with her own hand.
--
Each day saw a return to that duty. She rose with the sun and meditated on the voices of the Vir'abelasan. Many told tales of the wars between the Creators and Forgotten Ones, though as servants of Mythal, the Mother was often the focus of their stories, to the point that Eloni—even giving them full benefit of the doubt—could hear their fanatic bias.
So after recording their stories, Eloni turned to research. She gathered as many books on Arlathan and Mythal and ancient elves as probably existed anywhere in Thedas. Dorian helped her raid the Skyhold libraries first, combing through the disorganized shelves, expressing their mutual amusement and anger at finding a book of dirty Tevinter poetry tucked away on the shelf dedicated to Chantry history, or at a thick tome of magical theory sitting between two copies of The Travels of a Chantry Scholar. She cleared the shelves in her quarters to make room for their discoveries.
Afterward, she sent messengers to Keepers all over the South and the Free Marches, asking to borrow or copy any texts they had. Not all were cooperative, of course, and without her vallaslin, Eloni could no longer go herself as the Lavellan clan's First, but with Josephine's connections to nobility who hoarded elven history like trinkets, Vivienne's connections to the various Circles, and the few Dalish who had joined the Inquisition's cause, she managed well enough.
Her shelf of research grew. Her notes turned to story drafts, and then to book drafts. Varric helped her get the words to cooperate when they escaped her, like slippery fish in a stream.
Other voices whispered of magic, techniques for improving her spells, what the magic of the Elvhenan had been like in the days before Tevinter's coming. These were more immediately useful to Eloni, with ways to consult and ally with spirits without allowing them into her body.
But that one voice, the out of place woman who had warned her that he was not as he appeared came again, and often, always insufferably vague, talking about "him" and "deceit", without ever giving her a name. All that was clear was she did not mean Corypheus.
Two weeks after the defeat of Corypheus and the subsequent explosion of activity at Skyhold, Leliana came up to Eloni's quarters with a report. "Inquisitor, I'm sorry to say my agents have still been unable to track down Solas. However, they did find something interesting." She held out the sheaf of paper.
Eloni got up from her meditation, setting her quill and notebook down, and stepped over the nest of blankets on the balcony to come and take them. If Leliana had come so early and in person, there was something important for Eloni to see.
Leliana had found Solas's village. At first, Eloni didn't see the urgency. When looking for someone, their home was a logical place to begin the search. But she read on.
"It's in ruins?" she asked in confusion. "Solas isn't young, but he isn't…" She frowned at the report, which described the ruins as ancient, clearly ages old. "Perhaps he lied?" she suggested. "Named an ancient village to give you an answer?"
"But if his intent was to mislead me, why not give me a village that still exists? And why this one?"
"Well if it still existed, then people would have to have met him at some point. An ancient village has no inhabitants you can interrogate."
"Perhaps you're right, Inquisitor." But Leliana frowned, running her thumb over the papers still in her hand. "But there is much we don't know about him, and there is also much that, in hindsight, is incredibly suspect."
"I don't want to hear about that," Eloni snapped. "I've received your report, Spymaster. Surely there are other things that require your attention."
Leliana bowed her head. "As you say, Inquisitor." She left without another word. Eloni crumpled up the report and threw it to the floor, steadying her breathing. Everything will be made clear, Solas had promised. But everything so far was clear as a stormy sky.
He lied, the voice murmured in her ear. He is not who he presented himself to be.
Eloni returned to her blankets outside and breathed in the sweet mountain air. "Please, hahren, tell me who you mean."
And finally, the voice obliged.
Desert gave way to scrub lands and then to the forest around Lake Celestine. Eloni had never traveled alone before, but she found after the non-stop crisis that was the Inquisition and all of its people, it was relaxing to be responsible to no one but herself.
Being back in a forest helped too. Her clan had never come this far south, of course, but she knew how to navigate, she knew many of the plants, she knew the smells. And not having the journey tainted by the jangling of metal armor and the stink of iron was indescribably pleasant. She felt more at home than she had in what seemed like years, though it had not even been two since she left her clan.
The leaves were turning tawny, fallen ones forming a carpet beneath her feet. She danced when the desire took her, whistled at passing birds. One fine morning, she sang a traveling song from her youth, her voice soft and clear. "The path we beat is the path that we walked to flee the Tevinter slums~ Now we fly on wheels and wings and hoofbeats are our drums~" She had to stop and laugh at the absurdity of singing about riding aravels while walking, but when she spotted a family of halla bounding through the trees nearby she grinned and continued on singing, looping back to the beginning when she finished.
For the first time in a long, long time, she felt alive.
At least until the forest began to thin out and be replaced by plains. The Dirth set her skin afire with sensation, like cobwebs, the press of the Veil omnipresent. With the end of the civil war, it was less uncomfortable than it once had been, but still Eloni wished the spirit had shown her a different place.
There was too much history in this land. And even with the Breach sealed, the thin Veil of the Dirth made it all too easy for rifts to form. She kept herself on high alert as she traveled, knowing that she couldn't fight a pack of demons alone.
A day after arriving in the Dirth, Eloni ran into a Dalish hunter. "Aneth ara," she said when she was close enough to be within earshot.
He turned. He was blond and his vallaslin were dedicated to June, a long delicate lattice of lines across his forehead and down his cheeks. He raised a hand in greeting, sliding a half-readied arrow back into his quiver. "Aneth ara," he returned. "Your accent… Are you from the Marches by chance?"
Eloni was surprised. "Yes. I don't normally hear it recognized this far south."
"My clan spent some time in the Marches, outside Kirkwall," he explained. "We had some contact with the locals there. What is your clan?"
Eloni paused. "I should not speak of it. They are mine no longer."
"I'm sorry," the hunter said. "May I ask why?"
Eloni shrugged, reaching back to touch the staff on her back. "Too much magic in the clan. I was not chosen as First. I left of my own volition." The story was common enough, and it was much better than the truth.
He nodded. "You may call me Fenarel, by the way," he said after a moment.
"I'm Eloni."
He nodded. "Eloni. May I ask why you have no vallaslin?"
She sighed, fighting back the urge to cover her bare face in shame. "Never got around to earning it," she said with a weak smile. "I would have dedicated it to Mythal though." The fact that her lost markings had been dedicated to the very god she was now bound to struck her as funny, in a sort of "fate is inevitable" kind of way.
He nodded again. "What brings you to the Dirth?"
Eloni turned her face skyward. "Chasing our history, I suppose. I wanted to see the land we lost, perhaps explore the magic perhaps still hiding in old ruins."
"A worthy goal, though perhaps a foolish thing to undertake alone." He was frowning, eyeing her arms like he was expecting to see blood magic scars. Seeing none, he looked away. "Forgive me. My clan has suffered much at the hands of a foolish mage chasing the past."
"I understand well how to defend my mind from demons. Worry not, Fenarel."
He nodded. "Shall I show you to some ruins?" he asked. "Travel goes faster with company."
She smiled, surprised at how warm the simple offer made her feel. "I would like that very much. Ma serannas."
Oh but she had missed the Dalish. The elf who joined them here from the plains, Loranil, was a good lad, happy to spend time with her at Skyhold when she asked, but he always treated her with a sort of awed deference that grew uncomfortable very quickly. With Fenarel, he didn't know she was "Inquisitor Lavellan" with strange, inexplicable powers, so he treated her like any other Dalish.
The company also made it easier to ignore the ghostly touch of the Veil on her skin as they walked. It made it easier to enjoy the warm sun on her face, the breeze in her hair, and the familiar grunts of the halla as they passed by.
"How did your clan end up in the Marches?" Eloni asked after some time. "It's a long way from here."
Fenarel frowned, his eyes focused out on the group of halla bounding by in the distance. "Originally, we spent time in Ferelden's forests. We traveled to the Marches to escape the Blight. After the First went crazy and killed our Keeper, those of us remaining decided to see the Dales. It seemed a good place to start over. The Ghilain clan has been kind enough to assist us."
"It gladdens me to see Dalish looking out for one another. I remember skirmishes when I was younger." She chuckled to herself. "Nothing like world-threatening cataclysms to bring people together, I suppose."
"That is the truth," Fenarel said, smiling. "Here is one of the ruins," he said, indicating the crumbling stone walls and steps they were approaching. "Would you like me to stay? I could show you where my clan is camped after you're finished."
But Eloni was distracted by the buzz of the Veil against her palm. It was so thin here, she felt like it would tear with the force of her breath. These ruins were familiar, but it had been a long enough journey that she didn't know if it was because she had seen them with the spirit of Purpose, or because she had been here when investigating Dirthamen's glyphs with the Inquisition.
"Hm?" she said, turning back to Fenarel. "Did you say something?"
"I asked if you wanted me to stay, so that I could show you to my clan's camp afterward," he said again, seemingly unperturbed by her distraction.
Eloni gave him a soft smile. "Thank you. But I think I will be here for quite a while. Return to your hunting, Fenarel. Perhaps I will come across your clan in time."
He nodded a little sadly. "Dareth shiral," he said, raising a hand.
"Dareth shiral," she said in return.
Fenarel wandered away and Eloni entered the ruins. She tasted magic as soon as she got down the stairs. It hit her like a crashing wave, setting her senses alight. She had become more sensitive to magic since drinking from the Vir'abelasan, but she suspected that she would have felt this surge of magical energy even before she had tasted those waters.
In the middle of empty ruins, a man slept in a cocoon of protective magic, more powerful than any magical barrier she had ever encountered. The voices of the well rose up in her mind, whispering about how ancient such magic was, how familiar to them.
This was the place from the spirit's vision.
She had found him.
Go to the eluvian, the voice urged. Allow us to show you.
So that night, when Eloni was sure the witch would be sleeping, she stole down to the garden and entered the small room where the eluvian was kept. "It is 'locked'," she said quietly. "How can I enter?"
Raise your hands, call upon your magic. The mirror is locked but almost every lock can be picked.
She followed the voice's instructions, feeling the eluvian's magic with her own, discovering where she could prick and prod until it opened with a flash of light, a soft blue glow beckoning her to enter.
The voice began to direct her through the black mirrors, the sky overhead too close, the world quiet but for her footsteps. The broken eluvians gaped at her like monsters' jaws, lingering in the corners of her eyes. The corrupted ones were worse. They hummed with a sick, broken song, the sound making Eloni's skin crawl to hear it.
Still your fear, da'len. So long as you do not touch them, they will not harm you, the voice assured her.
"Why do they sound like the red lyrium?" she asked.
Their corruption is the same, so of course they sing the same. They are not why you are here.
"Then why am I here?" she asked.
Patience, da'len. Pride will give you no answers, for he seeks to hide. Allow me to show you his secrets.
"Pride", in Elvish, solas. "Just what was he hiding from me, hahren?" Even as she asked, she found herself reluctant to hear the answer.
The voice only urged her on.
Soon, they stood before a grand eluvian, larger than any other to be found. It was locked, uncorrupted, the surface like burnished gold. Eloni could see her reflection, the lack of vallaslin still making her twitch in surprise. Touch it, the voice said. Feel what is within.
Eloni reached out and touched her hand to the eluvian. A rush of power surged through her, a cacophony of voices echoing in her ears, screaming for release.
She stumbled back, staring at the mirror in shock. "What is that?!"
They are those you call Creators.
And that was when the horrible truth began to slide into place.
He lay there, just out of reach despite how close he was, wrapped in a magical barrier so strong that Eloni could taste the magic on her tongue, and feel the pull of the Fade around it. No wonder the spirit of Purpose had been able to show her this place. The magic was strong here in the real world. In the Fade, it must have been a beacon.
She didn't need the voices' confirmation that her own magic wasn't going to be breaching that shield. Just what power had he been hiding from her? She thought of all the times she had panicked, seeing him go down under a bear's paw, or a templar's blade. Had it all been a lie?
She shook her head in an attempt to clear her mind. The only way she had was to approach him was in the Fade. She walked back up the stairs and found a good corner down the remnants of a hallway. With still strong walls solid on either side of her, she sat, pulling her own magic up around her. It shimmered red when she finished, tendrils of magic sliding over its surface like oil on water. It was but a pallid imitation of the one down in the courtyard, but it would hold.
The Veil in the Dirth was so thin that it was almost too easy to slip over into the Fade.
She brushed away the spirits trying to wrap her into a dream and looked around, picturing herself back into the ruin. It was no longer crumbling. Instead, the stone bricks were sharp-edged and new, painted with murals, and there was a roof overhead.
Wisps traveled along ancient walkways, oblivious to her presence. She followed one down the steps, took in the sight of the marketplace this had once been. Boats bobbed in the river outside, and stalls overflowing with goods lined the walls. But there were no people, save two.
In the middle of the stalls, there was an elf with long coils of dark hair pulled back from his face, secured with a strap decorated with a small animal skull. Some sort of bird, she thought, judging by the large, delicate eye sockets. He was in deep conversation with an old woman, dressed in what appeared to Eloni as some strange combination of Dalish and old Orlesian clothing. Perhaps the spirit was emulating someone who once lived in Halamshiral?
Quietly, Eloni walked down the stairs, straining her ears to listen as she approached unnoticed. But after she crossed some invisible threshold, the man turned and his appearance shifted drastically, to the Solas she had known. He fell silent.
She had thought her anger cooled in the time that had passed, but she felt it bubble up in her chest, burning her throat like fire. What did she look like, she wondered, here in this realm shaped by emotion?
The spirit he had been conversing with shuddered and fled.
"Inquisitor," Solas said.
"Fen'Harel," she spat. Bile filled her mouth and she swallowed it down. She laughed, heavy with regret, betrayal, and hurt. "It makes so much sense in hindsight. You wear a wolf's jaw around your neck for Creators' sake." She clenched her fists. "Was it funny?!" she yelled suddenly. "Did you have a good laugh at my stupid questions, at my clan's stupid ideas?! Did my love amuse you, harellan?!"
Solas sighed and shook his head. "I never lied to you, Inquisitor."
She laughed again. "That's just the sort of technicality people associate with the Dread Wolf, Solas. A lie by omission is a lie nonetheless." She sighed, her voice so thick with anger it came out as a snarl.
For a long moment, the two stared each other down, Solas saying nothing to defend or deny or explain. It left Eloni feeling unbalanced. She had been expecting a shouting match.
Curiosity tentatively reared its head. "Are you the same Fen'Harel who walked the roads of Arlathan, or are you like Flemeth, carrying the spirit inside you?" she asked.
"It is complicated," he said, shaking his head.
She crossed her arms, took a deep breath, shifted her weight to one side. "I have no plans for tonight."
"Would you listen to my story?" Solas challenged. "Or have you already decided what it is?"
Eloni hesitated. The voices were divided, some whispering Usurper, others whispering Defender.
All of the stories she had heard growing up of the Dread Wolf's trickery were all jumbled up with memories of the Solas she had come to know. The Solas who told her stories, met her in her dreams to explore the hidden depths of Skyhold's memories. The Solas who had yelled at Iron Bull over the abuses of the Ben-Hassrath, who had torn Dorian's arguments for slavery to shreds, forced him to face what little good his "guilt" did the elves of today. The Solas who had held her face and murmured how beautiful she was.
"I suppose the Dalish are wrong then, as you are so fond of reminding us. But just how wrong? Were you falsely accused, Fen'Harel? Was it Tevinter instead? Were the gods never real at all? Or maybe they all murdered each other in a fit of pique?"
"You did not answer my question, Inquisitor. I am willing to give you the truth as I understand it, if you are willing to listen."
"'The truth'," she spat. "Like you promised before, when you ruined one of our oldest traditions, removed the markings I earned, that I was proud to have? Your 'truth' leaves me cold."
Solas met her gaze calmly, as if resigned to this fight. "Say what you must, but it was you who made that choice, Inquisitor. I simply offered." He looked away. "But yes, I will tell you the truth, as well as I can."
"Why now and not before?"
He sighed, rubbing his face. "Before it… You would have been distracted by it. It wasn't relevant."
"You were afraid I would leave you."
"Wouldn't you be?"
It threw her off guard. Solas, admitting to vulnerability?
Damn her curiosity. She groaned and ran her fingers through her hair. "I would listen to what you have to say, Solas," she said at length.
He blinked, his mouth opening and closing for a moment before he smiled and shook his head. "I shouldn't be surprised," he mumbled, half to himself. "You've always sought the truth, at least as close as anyone can come to knowing it." He took a deep breath. "Walk with me," he said, gesturing out toward the river.
She did.
Years and years before, a young Eloni lay under a canopy of stars, tracing the shapes of gods with her finger. Her thoughts were busy, thinking over what Keeper Istimaethoriel had taught her that day, about wicked Fen'Harel, the Forgotten Ones, and the Creator gods.
Keeper Istimaethoriel had said the gods were not perfect beings. Like the People, they were flawed. They relied on one another to attain the perfection of godhood.
"But if no one is completely good," she murmured to herself, finishing the shape of Falon'Din above her, "Then can anyone be completely evil?" She got up and jogged to the edge of camp, where a statue of a wolf sat, facing away from the camp, out into the woods. "They say you were cast out of the camps as punishment, but you can't guard from within. Maybe you're protecting us from what lies outside." She stared out into the dark, her mind inventing monsters that lurked within it. "Maybe the Keeper is wrong. Maybe she can't see the truth because she doesn't want to, or because she's afraid to look for it."
She sat down beside the statue, looking back up at the sky. "If the Keeper chooses me as her First, I'll be better," she decided. "We're supposed to preserve history, but we should make sure it's the right history." She nodded to herself and sought out the stars of Fenrir.
She and Solas talked for a long time, or at least that was her impression—time in the Fade was a tricky thing.
When he finished his long tale, he sighed and rubbed his face. "So, Inquisitor, what do you think? Do I speak the truth? Or am I lying to you for my own sadistic amusement?"
She took his hand in hers, running her thumb over the back, avoiding his gaze. "I cannot say for sure."
He pulled his hand away, beginning to turn to leave.
She grabbed his arm to stop him. "But I know now that you want to help the People. All of them, even the Dalish."
"I do," he said. "More than anything."
"Then," she said, smiling, "I suggest you find yourself a liaison. Someone with, say, insider knowledge of modern elves." She raised her eyebrows.
A small smile raised the corner of his mouth. "A liaison? Not a terrible idea. What about Sera?"
Eloni laughed. It took her by surprise. How long had it been? "Creators, can you imagine Sera as an elven ambassador? I don't know who would be more upset, her or the elves."
"I think it would be roughly equivalent levels of animosity."
"So, if Sera is out, any other ideas?" Rocking back onto her heels, she gave him an expectant head tilt.
"If I didn't know better, Inquisitor, I would think you were offering your services."
"Well, I can't think of anyone better suited, personally." She touched her chest. "Not that I'm immodest."
"Oh, not at all. A woman who traveled through time, brought a human empire to its knees, walked bodily in the Fade as easily as breathing, defeated a near god… She is completely modest about her accomplishments." His smile widened as he spoke, the fondness in his eyes making Eloni's stomach hurt.
"You forgot how she caught the eye of an actual god. You know, when humans do that, they start religions about them." Her voice was light, near joking, but there was a question there, and they both knew it.
"Are you looking for shrines and statues and tributes, Inquisitor?" Solas asked.
Eloni pursed her lips in thought, her eyes traveling over his face, lingering on his lips. "Nothing so concrete, I think. Just a prayer in my name, maybe."
He looked away, off into the middle distance of the great plains. "Travel with Fen'Harel and I doubt your name would go anywhere good."
"It'd be fun to be in a curse too," she said. She shuffled closer to him. "'Dread Eloni take you' isn't particularly threatening though. I guess I'll need an animal." With confident movements, she wrapped her arm around his, catching his eye. "Unless you'd be willing to share? Wolves don't do well alone, after all. Maybe that's part of the reason you just can't seem to do anything right."
He laughed sharply. "You certainly don't pull your punches, Inquisitor."
"Eloni," she corrected. She rested her head against his.
"Eloni," he repeated softly. After a moment, he pulled away again. Eloni inwardly groaned. "I must ask. Is this really what you want? You may just end up a villain right alongside me."
With squared shoulders and a steady gaze, she said, "I'm willing to take that chance."
He smiled. "Then, ma vhenan, I suggest we wake up."
--
Eloni's eyes flicked open and she dispelled her barrier, jogging back to the empty hall where she'd seen Solas's. He was reabsorbing the magic as she came down the stairs, the power glowing in his eyes as it returned to him.
When he finished, he smiled at her. She ran the rest of the way and slammed into his chest, grinning at his surprised grunt at the impact.
"The Dread Wolf needs to do some push-ups," she teased.
"The Herald of Andraste needs to stop talking already," he teased back, then pressed his lips to hers. Once, twice, thrice…
When they broke apart to breathe, Eloni giggled to herself.
"What's so amusing?" he asked.
"I was thinking about your hair from before," she said, giggling again, before giving him a wicked grin. "I was imagining what it'd be like to just get a fistful of it, you know?"
"Oh? You mean like this?" He brushed his hand over her cheek and around to the back of her head, where he grabbed her hair in a fist, guiding her back to his mouth, sucking on her lower lip before he pulled away to smirk at her.
"I think so," she said, sliding her own hands down his back and over his ass. "You should do it again one more time, just to be sure."
He did, then murmured against her lips. "I thought this was supposed to be a working relationship."
"I don't know about you, but I'm working very hard right now." She squeezed his ass, grinding their hips together. "Besides, we should cement our partnership."
"Is that what modern elves are calling it these days? I'm so glad I have you here to teach me such things."
She slid her hands up under his tunic to get at the laces of his pants. "I'm a giver, it's what I do."
"And who am I refuse such generosity?"
--
Eloni made a mental note that grass was preferable to stone for consummating partnerships, but also that Solas was decent at healing magic, so it wasn't all bad.
It was simple enough to get a message off to the Inquisition that they needed to find a new Inquisitor, and that she was happy to close rifts for them as needed. She would need to return to Skyhold at some point to fetch her books and notes, but for now, she was content to let it rest for a little while longer. After all, she got the feeling she was going to be learning quite a bit more about ancient elves in the coming months.
As she bid the messenger goodbye, Eloni looked up at the sky overhead and smiled to herself. For once, there were no responsibilities hanging over her head, no Keeper telling her what to do, no advisors pushing her this way and that, no world-shattering crises demanding her attention. The great expanse of possibility before her was exhilarating and terrifying all at once.
"Ready to go, vhenan?" Solas asked, taking her hand.
"Lead the way."