Blood Wound Next Chapter

[miri1984]

Title: Better than no life at all..
Words: 1600
Characters: Alim, Anders, Varel
Summary: Alim wants to find out what the Crows know, and he knows the best way to do it.
Title Art by: cave_fatuam 

As Alim came into the dungeons the Crow looked up from where he was sitting, relaxed, calm. Alim considered him for a long moment, then crossed his arms over his chest. He didn't look like much. Scruffy, unshaven and blond, with dirty brown eyes and the build of a natural archer. Nondescript. Easy to overlook.

His appearance made Alim suspect he was more than just your average Crow. They recruited for beauty, Zev had said. They needed people who could lower the defenses of their targets, seduce them, place them in a position that was vulnerable. This one… well, unless he scrubbed up very well, he would have a hard time lowering anyone's anything. Or raising it for that matter. So, either he was dumb muscle, or, like Ignacio in Denerim had been, something more.

There was a light of intelligence in his eyes that made Alim think the latter.

"I'll be blunt with you," he said. "You have information that I need. If you give it to me, I'll recruit you into the wardens. You'll be safe from the Crows until the day you die." Or you'll die.

"I have no desire to become a warden," the man said softly. "I have heard it is not an easy life."

Alim cocked an eyebrow. "Better than no life at all."

"True."

"So."

The man's lip curled. "What is it you want to know?"

"Who hired you?"

"Bann Esmerelle," he said, shrugging. "She wishes you gone."

Alim nodded. It was no surprise to him that the woman wanted him dead. He suspected even if he'd been human, or non-magical, the woman would have found a reason to detest him. Rendon's woman, through and through and a right bitch at that.

But that wasn't the information he itched to know.

"Zevran Aranai," he said then. "Where is he?"

The man flinched. Alim cocked an eyebrow. "Now. Why would that question be less difficult to answer than the one before?"

"If you make me a warden I'll be protected from the Crows. They won't come after me here, or where ever you choose to send me. If I… give you information about… him… I will be hunted the rest of my days."

"Why?"

The Crow shook his head. "Zevran offended people he should not have offended."

"Do they have him?"

The man's lips pressed tight and he shook his head.

Alim narrowed his eyes and sucked at his teeth, then then motioned to Varel and the two cell guards. "Leave us for a moment, would you?"

"Ser, he's dangerous. You should not be alone with him," Varel said.

Alim cocked an eyebrow at the man. "I can handle one Crow, Seneschal," he said, smiling.

"I… ah, yes. As you say, Commander." The man jerked his head and left the room, flanked by the guards. Alim watched them leave, then turned slowly and regarded the crouched figure in the cell.

"You don't like mages, do you?" he said finally. The man frowned.

"What gives you that impression?"

He smirked a little. "It's a reasonable assumption to make," he said. "Most people are uncomfortable around my kind. But with you it's different. I saw how you flinched when Anders healed you on the way back. You're leaning away from me now, even though there are bars between us."

"What as this got to do with anything?"

"Why are you afraid of us?" The Crow remained silent, watching him with wide eyes. Alim started unclasping the buckles on his left glove. "I can understand the fear of the unknown. But when it gets down to it, it isn't ordinary mages that you fear, is it? It's the possibility, the potential, that any mage you meet could be something so much worse."

The Crow licked his lips, watching Alim's hands. Alim tugged each finger out of the glove, slowly, deliberately, ignoring the surge of triumph he could feel scratching at his mind as he did so.

"What are you doing?"

Alim didn't answer, but pulled the glove off and considered the scar on his palm. "It's easy enough to torture a person," he said. "But I know for a fact that Crows are trained to resist torture. Zevran told me what the training entails. So much imagination, your order has. Such a long tradition of hurting and killing and control."

Alim tugged his dagger free from his belt, turning his palm towards the bars so that the Crow could clearly see the scar. The indrawn hiss of fear and the scrabble of the man's boots on the floor of the cell was loud in the darkness. "The thing about blood magic," Alim said, "is that you don't need to be close to someone to control their actions. And the better thing? The blood you use doesn't have to be your own…"

"You…" the man was gasping now, "you wouldn't. You're the Hero of Ferelden. Maker's breath… you were the advisor to the king… You…"

"I'm a grey warden," Alim said. "We use any means necessary." He brought the tip of his dagger to his palm, not piercing the skin, but denting it, right in the centre of the scar.

"I… Oh holy maker… I don't know much. Please. Please don't…"

"Start talking."

"He… he was captured. In Rialto. But he escaped. We don't know where he went after that. I swear… by all that is holy, I'm not high in the Crows I don't know…"

"Who is pursuing him?"

"Nuncio. They gave the task to Nuncio. He's got contacts… in the Free Marches, all across the southern coast."

"Where can I find Nuncio?"

"He… is based in Starkhaven."

Alim lifted the knife from his palm and sheathed it, slowly, moving with difficulty, and started pulling his glove back over his hand, ignoring the thrashing in his head. He could be lying, you will never be certain unless you use the spell why do you trust him….. "Well done."

The Crow licked his lips again. "Are you going to kill me now?" he said.

"No. I said I would recruit you and I meant it." Alim went to the door and called Varel back in. "Have Anders prepare the joining ritual," he said. Varel raised an eyebrow, but nodded.

"You can't be serious," the Crow said. "You're a blood mage. I can't… I won't work… this is insane how can the wardens permit…"

"The wardens have never forbidden blood magic," Alim said as he unlocked the cell. "And I am afraid you have no choice in this, ser Crow. What is your name?"

"…ah… Albert, my name is Albert…"

"Well, Albert, from this moment forth, you're a grey warden."

"You can't make me…"

Alim waved his hand and paralyzed the Crow, then ordered the two guards to carry him up to the throne room. "Be thankful I used regular magic to do that," he said as the Crow passed. "There are far more painful ways to immobilize you."

Alim made his way up past Anders' workroom, to find the mage busy preparing the joining potion. The lyrium they'd scrounged from the deep roads was in various stages of refinement, and the room smelled of elfroot, darkspawn blood and magic. The kitten was sitting on the benchtop a few feet away from where Anders was mixing and measuring, batting a knitted doll back and forth between tiny paws and occasionally mewling in delight.

"Is that safe?" Alim said as he came in. Anders, looked at the kitten and gave a half smile.

"They're smarter than you think," he said. "They know what's toxic and what isn't," he reached over and chucked the kitten under the chin, smiling fondly. "You're a clever boy, aren't you Pounce? Yes you are."

"What's he eating?"

"Oh that? Uh… it's a doll. A Templar doll. I knitted it."

"What, this morning?"

Anders looked sheepish. "No. When I was on watch in the Blackmarsh. I used to make them when I was on the run. Passed the time when I was sitting in the back of carts or hiding out in warehouses. Wiggums used to eat them whenever I got dragged back. I loved watching him decapitate them and pull all the stuffing out." Alim gave him a look. Anders shurgged. "Simple pleasures, you understand, Commander." He sniffed at the chalice in his hand and made a face. "This is almost ready."

"Good."

"Are you really sure you want to recruit him?"

"No, but if the worst comes to the worst I can just ship him to Weisshaupt. And I did give him my word."

"Why not just execute him?"

Alim made a face. "I have my reasons."

"Suit yourself. Just… I'm getting uncomfortable with the ratio of assassins to not-assassins, if you know what I mean."

"Nathaniel wasn't an assassin for hire. He just wanted to kill me."

"Somehow this fails to reassure me," Anders grinned, then pulled on some dragonskin gloves and moved to the bucket of raw lyrium reaching in gingerly to remove a pinch and bring it to the joining chalice. He sprinkled it in then carefully wiped the gloves with a rag which he then burned, removing the gloves and hanging them back on their hook on the wall.

"Given the amount of lyrium we chug in battle, it seems a bit stupid to be so careful about it when we're preparing potions," Alim said. Anders pursed his lips.

"Yeah, well, if we weren't interacting so closely with non-mages all the time it wouldn't be an issue. But I'd hate to get lyrium in someone's…. eye and uh… blind them by accident because I forgot to wash my hands." He glanced at the cat, a warm smile spreading on his face. "And there's Pounce to consider of course."

"Pounce?"

"Ser Pounce-A-Lot," Anders said.

Alim laughed. "Like the tiger you used to draw in all the spirit healing books?"

Anders grinned and nodded. "They never did find a way to dissolve that ink I made. You can thank Finn for the recipe. He'd be horrified if he knew what I used it for."

Alim smiled, thinking of the nervous mage who had been one of Anders' closest friends. "Come on," he said, feeling surprisingly full of purpose. Rialto, he thought. He would have left me a sign. And if I can't find him there, there's always Nuncio. "Let's go poison a Crow."