Inquisition Ch. 01: Force is Feebleness

Blackwall put down his carving. "No, not a thing. My role and preferences keep me out of Warden strongholds, out of communication for the most part. I preferred it that way, until the Inquisition. Sounds like this contact might be worth it, if Leliana wants it. I wouldn't want her mad at me."

"Are you afraid of the Nightingale?" Trevelyan teased.

"Nouh," he said, making the word two syllables, like they do in the north of the Vimmark ranges. "But I'd like to avoid a knife to my kidneys, just the same," Blackwall answered with a wry grin.

"She can be a little bit scary, or so I've been told. Seriously, do you think we should refocus our energy on Ferelden again -- on Crestwood -- or should we stay the course on Orlais? Vivienne has finally gotten a hint of an invitation for the Inquisition to attend the peace talks, but now I'm not sure which way to turn," Trevelyan said.

Blackwall nodded. "What does Cullen say?"

"He says he's not enough of an expert on Orlesian politics to really comment, though he will say we've got enough troops and time to at least scout out Crestwood and find out why it's gone quiet before we leave for Orlais," Trevelyan answered. "I'm inclined to go in that direction, but Leliana is breathing down my neck about the Wardens, especially those in Ferelden. She wants to stick with this until we've found them all, I think."

"And Lady Josephine?" he asked.

"She thinks we should stay focused on Orlais altogether, now that the Hinterlands are under our total control and the Coast lands are quieter. The local nobility and the Blades of Hessarian are keeping the peace up there, for now. She argues that Ferelden is not the total mess that is Orlais and we should stay out of it. It's the sovereign's prerogative, she says."

"And what do you think? You're the Inquisitor now, and you're above being swayed by a pretty face. Why did you want to go with Cullen's idea?" Blackwall checked the curve of the rocker again, and then resumed carving without looking at her.

Trevelyan watched him draw the knife over the rounded wood before she answered. "Because of how he put it -- 'it makes the most of our resources without spreading us too thin'. Besides, if we investigate Crestwood, establish a foothold, and then head to the peace talks at Halamshiral, Leliana's people in Ferelden can continue to reconnoiter quietly while we are gone. Keep the Venatori guessing what we're up to and how much we know. That time that Dorian and I spent in the future gave us an important advantage. Right now it's our only advantage. We've got nothing for that damned dragon, or Archdemon, or whatever it was."

"Well, it seems you've made up your mind then. Make a quick foray into Crestwood while you're awaiting the formal invitation to the peace talks. Seems like good sense to me," he said with a nod.

"You give me no advice of your own?"

"Nah. I've seen you work. You follow your own judgment best - after you've had advice and a good think. I trust you. 'You are who you follow.' Someone told me that once; took me years to figure out what that meant."

"Powerful counsel. Who was this person to you?"

"He was nobody to me, only a true knight, a chevalier, and a powerful nobleman. He helped me win the Grand Tourney, disregarding his own interest in the prize because, as he said, I needed it more. Then he offered to take me on and train me. But despite his help, his kindness and honor, I turned him down flat, in my youth and stupidity," Blackwall said, a look of disgust on his face at his own behavior.

"Oh, Blackwall, we all make stupid decisions when we are young. If we didn't we'd have nothing to regret and nothing to remember in our dotage," she commiserated. "If you'd followed him, your life might be different, but..."

"Not necessarily better; I am aware. Jus' sometimes it's hard to keep that in mind." He stood and dry fit the rockers onto the ends of the griffon's legs, giving the piece a few wobbles while watching the rockers work. "Still, my choices have led here, to the Inquisition, and though I regret many things, I do not regret that."

"Good," she said. "Everything looks well in order here, and I want to grab some lunch before my meeting. Care to join me?"

Blackwall hesitated. "Uh, I've still got some work to do on the feathers, and I've got training this afternoon."

Trevelyan fingered the griffon's beak. "Josephine will be meeting me. You should come, too."

Blackwall frowned, but Trevelyan could read in his face he wanted to see Josie. "I can make it an order, if you'd like."

Blackwall cracked a grin and set down his tools for good. "Nouh. I'll come. Save the orders for Cullen."

***

Trevelyan left Josephine and Blackwall to their own conversation when she excused herself to attend the meeting with Varric's contact. They'd been quiet at lunch, but not silent. They clearly liked each other, but had little of common interest. Blackwall knew enough to ask a lot of questions, and Josie had been eager enough to answer them. Trevelyan silently wished them well.

As she crossed the upper courtyard, Cassandra called out, "Inquisitor!" and stormed toward her from her usual spot near the smithy.

Trevelyan changed directions, walking to meet the most storied woman of the Inquisition. Even at her most bellicose and least rational, Trevelyan admired Cassandra, she always had. When Cassandra was eighteen, songs about her saving the Divine Beatrix and becoming the Hero of Orlais were all anyone heard in the streets and pubs. Trevelyan's distant cousin had written an account of the events, and had gifted a copy to her on her fourteenth birthday. There in Cassandra's Song, Trevelyan had found a role-model, a woman of noble blood who had scorned the traditional role of women in Nevarra and become a warrior, a Seeker, a hero in her own right. While she had long ago learned that Philliam's writings were not to be trusted, she had had the privilege of learning the essential truth first hand. Cassandra Pentaghast was a force unto herself, and backed up convictions with actions, absolutely. Seeing her in full blaze was, as always, awe-inspiring.

Thankfully, Leliana had warned her that Cassandra might be very angry -- her actual words were 'Cassandra is going to kill him' - about whomever Varric's contact might be, so she knew she had to address this before things got more hostile.

"What is it Cassandra?" she asked calmly.

Cassandra pulled herself up tall, and took a conciliatory tone, "Have you met with Varric's friend yet, Inquisitor?"

"No, I was on my way just now. Why?"

"Because if it is who I think it is, I will wring that little bastard's neck," Cassandra spit out.

"Who do you think it is?" Trevelyan asked, more curious about this friend with each bald threat.

Cassandra gesticulated aggressively. "Someone Varric claimed he couldn't get in touch with, someone we needed. Someone Thedas desperately needed."

Trevelyan frowned; perhaps this was more than just a rivalry between her companions. "So if this is who you think it is, you see this as a betrayal to the Inquisition?"

"I will reserve that judgment until you have met with this friend. No need to have that podgy little rogue screaming 'persecution' or causing other trouble for the Inquisition again until I know for sure."

Trevelyan nodded. "Seems fair enough. I shall take that under advisement and let Varric know of your displeasure."

"Thank you, Inquisitor," Cassandra said with a bow, and headed into the smithy, no doubt to retrieve her sword and knock some recruits about with it..

Trevelyan sighed and walked up the stairs to the inside parapet near the mages tower slowly. She caught sight of her destination, and took in the easy camaraderie between the mage and Varric. Clearly, they knew each other very well. Well enough that Varric had hidden him from Cassandra but had brought him to her. She would have to think about that later. The mage was a fine looking man, slim but fit, with jaunty black hair and beard. He was maybe a little older than she was, and seemed to exude a contagious good humor. His energy seemed familiar, too, but she was sure she'd never met this mage.

Varric saw her approach and waved her over. "Inquisitor, this is Garrett Hawke, the Champion of Kirkwall."

"Varric! You're lucky Knight-Commander Meredith is already dead, or she'd probably kill you just for reminding anyone of that," he said as he held out his arm for her to clasp. "It's not a title I find useful anymore. Not like 'Inquisitor,' or anything."

Trevelyan clasped his arm and smiled. "You'd be surprised about that, I think. And in any case, the Inquisitor would be grateful for the help of the Champion of Kirkwall."

Garrett shushed her and looked around conspiratorially, "Better keep it down, with the whole Champion thing, Inquisitor, or the Lady Seeker might strike me dead before you get to question me."

Trevelyan couldn't help but laugh. "Very well. Please, call me Trevelyan then, and I shall call you Hawke."

Hawke grinned. "Well, Trevelyan, how can I help?"

"We need to know what you know about Corypheus. Everything -- anything. We have nothing other than what Varric has shared about him and his ties to the Grey Warden's. We'd like your perspective."

Hawke sighed and gave her a half-smile. "You have heard about what happened in Kirkwall? How it all ended? I couldn't keep my friends from fighting. I'm not sure my advice would be sage or sensible."

"Well now, Hawke, maybe I'm looking for a cautionary tale, a sort of what not to do."

Hawke looked at her strangely for a moment before booming out a laugh and looking at Varric. "I can see now why you've stayed, Varric. She's a treat!"

"What can I say, I've got to find out how this one ends," Varric answered.

"Or you'll just make up something more fitting." Hawke winked at Varric. "Just be sure to put in a good word for Curly, eh? He could do with a happy ending."

Varric shot him a look and gestured with his hands. "All in good time, Chuckles, all in good time. Nocturne here knows what she's doing."

Trevelyan took a deep breath, hoping her cheeks weren't getting too red. "Gentlemen, while this is all very amusing, and in a simpler time I might have enjoyed playing along to whatever little jests you both could get up to, the fate of the world is actually in the balance. Corypheus has already killed the Divine. And we know he has plans for the Empress and all of Thedas, so can we focus please?"

Both men sobered at her words. "Apologies, my lady," Hawke said.

"Sorry, Nocturne. Business first."

"So," Trevelyan said, "you fought Corypheus?"

"Yes, and I thought we'd killed him, too. Though with less flare than dropping a mountain on him. We used magic and weapons. I guess just the wrong ones. When we came upon Corypheus, he'd been imprisoned by the Grey Wardens but was somehow pitting them against each other, influencing some of them to do his bidding."

"It was like he could get in their heads and mess them about," Varric added.

"You say the Wardens have disappeared?" Garrett rubbed his beard. "They might have fallen under Corypheus' control, Maker forbid, like the ones in Kirkwall."

Trevelyan messaged her forehead. "So in addition to the Venatori, and the Red Templars, and a huge fucking dragon-thing, he might also have the Grey Wardens? Fan-fucking-tastic."

"Ah but wait, I have played Wicked Grace with Varric before, my lady. I have an ace up my sleeve - a friend in the Grey Wardens, fellow by the name of Stroud. He was already working with me when he stumbled on something that made him concerned about corruption in the Warden ranks. I haven't heard from him since he sent me that last communication, but he told me where he would be -- an old smuggler's cavern in Crestwood."

Varric nodded. "I'd call Corypheus a whole lot of corruption in the ranks."

"But if you two didn't know about the Elder Mage, what were you investigating?"

"Two years ago Meredith Stannard, the Knight-Commander of the Kirkwall Templars, went mad after being -- poisoned or influenced - by a sword made with a chunk of red lyrium. She's the one that provoked the final fall of the Circle at the Gallows. If it hadn't been for the dashing Knight-Captain Cullen, the entire garrison of Templars would have been lost or sullied by her madness, not to mention all of the mages, man, woman, and child, slaughtered in an Annulment of the Circle. Nearly all of the adult mages died in the fighting, but the children and most of the Unharrowed apprentices were saved. Cullen and I spent the next months trying to stabilize Kirkwall and move those young mages safely out of Kirkwall. But as news of the events in Kirkwall spread, almost all of the other Circles faced uprisings. Few Circles wanted anything to do with Kirkwall mages, and roving bands of mages were hardly the place for traumatized children."

Varric smoothed his hair and adjusted his ponytail. "Cullen had his hands full just trying to maintain order in the City. And as far as I knew, that chunk of lyrium was an anomaly. We'd pulled it out of some strange ruins years before. It was the only one of its kind, we thought." He continued to frown.

Garret continued. "I wanted to get to the bottom of the red lyrium. I needed something to explain the events beyond Ander's actions. He was a Warden, and an apostate in Kirkwall; he'd had nothing to do with the Kirkwall Circle. So I went to the Wardens to help me sort out this red lyrium and make sense of what happened. Their contacts among the dwarves and other races were most valuable."

Trevelyan walked to the parapet and leaned on it, looking out over the courtyard. "Corypheus had Templars with him at Haven. He'd corrupted them with red lyrium, enslaving them. Some were little more than monsters. And the Emprise, the Emprise," she left off, hanging her head.

Varric shifted uncomfortably, "We've had reports that red lyrium is growing out of the ground in the Emprise, like some kind of disease. And the Red Templars there are even more formidable than what we faced in Haven. It's like he's getting better at the corruption. But our information on the red lyrium -- where it comes from, how it works - is spotty at best."

"With luck, Stroud can give us some more information. Something to start on, at least," Garrett said.

"If Corypheus has gotten to the Wardens too, we might not be able to save them," Trevelyan's head slumped forward. "This could be so much worse than we thought. I don't even know what to tell Leliana and the other advisors." She kicked at the stone of the parapet.

"Whatever is going on, I want in, Inquisitor. I am in this until the end and beyond," Garrett said fiercely. "He's my responsibility now, my family's responsibility. I thought I'd killed him once; I won't make that mistake again. This time, I'll make sure he's gone forever."

"I am sure you will," Trevelyan said absently. Below them, in the yard, she'd watched the conversation between Cullen and Cassandra as they'd come out of the smithy. Cullen seemed confused and Cassandra angry. Cullen had looked up at the parapet and gaped, causing Cassandra to turn. Upon seeing her and the man behind her, Cassandra stormed towards them, only just escaping Cullen's last ditch grip to stop her from flying towards them.

"We will speak more later, Hawke. Right now, you better go hideout among the mages. Come, Varric," Trevelyan said, "Or we might find a Cassandra shaped hole in your chest. At least with Cullen there, we have half a chance of stopping her."

***

Trevelyan stood on her balcony in the cool moonlight and watched Cullen and Garrett interact with the soldiers just entering the new tavern; the Herald's Rest, she believed it was to be called. It was one of the things Trevelyan appreciated about Cullen, his habit of talking not only to his command staff, but to the rank and file as they went about their daily activities. He wasn't especially warm or friendly, just sincere in his interest. It reminded her of her mother and father.

Trevelyan had accompanied her parents as they made their rounds on the estates in Ostwick since she was a girl. They used to tell her how you could see a leader's quality from whom the leader talked to, which people got their attention. She had followed their example on her own estates, at her own court. Now that she was the Inquisitor, as well as the Herald of Andraste, she needed to do the same thing with her people, when she could.

Tired, she turned and went back into her quarters. She laid down on the bed, fully clothed. She would rest a minute before seeing to the after-action reports she owed her advisors. Cassandra and Cullen both thought it important to keep track of the work of the Inquisition. And she needed notes of her thoughts after the meeting with Garrett, and the argument between Cassandra and Varric - she closed her eyes. After a few minutes she gave up trying to sleep and wandered down into the Great Hall to talk to Varric. Debris still filled the length of the hall, but fires had been lit, scaffolding put up; work had begun on restoring order, now that they'd claimed more quarries and logging stands. Earlier in the day dwarves and humans had built the scaffolding together. Varric had helped with that a bit, easing the introductions among the various stone masons and praising the skills of both sides.

Varric just that day had taken up a spot at a table in front of the main fireplace, and seemed to be making it his perch, but he wasn't there. However, she did see a light coming from under the nearby doorway, the one that lead to the tower library and rookery. She entered silently and observed her elven mentor for a moment. She looked to his desk, covered in books and papers, and to the fresco supplies he had asked for and received just that day. He was lying on his couch, staring at the stone wall, preoccupied with his thoughts as he tapped a slim finger to his lower lip. It seemed a favorite gesture; Trevelyan did not yet know if it was conscious or not. It drew attention to one of his best features, his generous lips. Trevelyan had been distracted by it on more than one occasion, but she generally admitted that his elven beauty was hard to miss. Even his bald head seemed to add to his allure; in her experience, male elven mages didn't go bald until they were very powerful and very old indeed. It made her wonder how old he was, and what secrets he must be keeping from them all.

Finally she strode into the room saying, "My governess had a word for people like you -- distingue. Très distingue, she would have said."

He turned to her and raised an eyebrow.

"You are lucky. This phrase from my governess was high praise indeed. You seem always to be exactly where you mean to be, never flustered or caught off guard. So calm. Reassuringly confident. It must have taken you a long time to cultivate."

He gave her a short smile. "Not so much time as experience," he said. "Although time helps."

"I hope I am not disturbing you," she continued, noting he hadn't really answered her. "When I saw your light on I was hoping we could talk."

This time his smile went all the way to his cool blue eyes, and he stood. "You are full of surprises. Let's go somewhere more interesting. After you," he gestured to the door to the bridge, currently under construction, and Trevelyan followed him.

When they passed the threshold of the outside door, the night was so dark Trevelyan couldn't see. Gradually it brightened, and they walked through the village of Haven. Trevelyan felt a rush of emotions as she looked out at the deserted village. Sadness, joy, purpose, each flitted through her, bringing the start of tears. "How odd to be back here."

"It is familiar to us both; it's a good choice," Solas paused just ahead of her. "Haven will always be important to you."