Stone and Sky Ch 6: No idea how colorful he said it was

[amhran_comhrac]

Title: Stone and Sky Chapter 6: No idea how colorful he said it was
Characters: Jowan/f!Brosca
Rating: T for now, eventual M/AO
Word Count: about 3000
Summary: You can't erase the crimes of your past, but you don't have to let them decide your future.
In this chapter: Things go from bad to worse in Redcliffe, because that's how Jowan rolls.

Art by the awesome fon-ronsenbutt on DeviantArt, who does the very best Jowan.

Ostagar

Although Sif had briefly entertained notions of an order composed entirely of reformed criminals and thugs, Alistair had smashed that hope. His offhand comment about Daveth would have made that more than clear alone. However, he also gave her a brief rundown of his own background, chattering away cheerfully as they went to find the final recruit. Alistair had, apparently been training to be some kind of religious warrior; a Templar, he called it. Sif hadn't the faintest idea what a Templar was, though, beyond seeing them at the tower full of mages.

"You were going to be a... Mage jailkeep?" she had asked, trying to show off the bits and pieces of surface life she had picked up.

"What?" he said, sounding horrified. "No! It... It's not a JAIL, first off. And there's s lot more to being a Templar than just guarding the tower."

Alistair sounded offended, so she apologized. "We don't have your chantry in Orzammar."

At that, he apologized. "Sorry, I knew you were new to the surface, I don't know why I expected you to know that."

"No, it's all right," Sif said quickly. "I need to learn this stuff. I live up here now, right?" She paused, shaking her head. "I guess I'm a surface dwarf now."

"Is that a bad thing?" he sounded genuinely curious. "I don't know much about Orzammar."

"Sort of?" she said. "It's pretty low. But really, not as low as I was before I left. Guess I can't complain."

"Well, you'll like being a Warden," he said. "And the worst part should be old hat to you." Sif looked up with confusion. "Well, you must have faced darkspawn before, being from Orzammar."

"Never fought darkspawn," she admitted as they looked around the camp. Flicking her eyes in his direction she smiled innocently. "City guards, mostly."

He flushed a deep red. It had, of course, been her goal. "Oh!" Alistair said, clearly surprised. "I suppose your background is more... colorful than Duncan let on in his letter."

"Dunno," she replied. "No idea how colorful he said it was in his letter to compare."

When they found the last recruit, a man who introduced himself as Ser Jory, he mused aloud about both dwarves and women being allowed into the Grey Wardens. "It isn't common," Alistair said, "but both are welcome, and have usually served with great distinction." She didn't know if that was true, or just something he said to make her feel better and make up for his earlier comments. In either case, though, it worked.

"Are you afraid to fight darkspawn?" she asked the man as they walked back to Duncan.

He looked nervous. "My mother used to tell us the darkspawn would come and drag away children who misbehaved. It's silly but… I can't get that out of my mind."

Sif chuckled at that. "I guess mothers everywhere like that one. But mine used to say she'd feed us to them if we were bad."

After a moment she realized Jory was trying to fall back. When she slowed her pace, allowing Alistair to walk further ahead, the taller man leaned over. "Has anyone told you about this joining ritual?" he whispered. "Alistair won't tell us anything."

"Only that it's dangerous," she admitted. "Daveth thinks we're going into the Wilds."

He looked disturbed by this. "I didn't expect more tests." Sif didn't reply. She heard he had won some kind of proving to get here. All she had done was get arrested.

Redcliffe

Jowan wanted to find himself shocked by the friendliness of the Arl of Redcliffe and his family. He had hoped they would welcome him with open arms and speak to him, if not as an equal, than as a person.

He realized, after several days there, that he had to stop putting his energy into ridiculous hopes and dreams. The Arl, fortunately, ignored him. The other servants and staff spoke of him in hushed and frightened tones, shying away in the halls and rushing to meals so no one would have to take a seat next to him.

The arlessa was perhaps the worst, though. She called him 'mage' and sneered openly at his approach. "Work quickly," she said. "I want my son to hide all traces of this curse as soon as possible. I will not live surrounded by magic!"

Jowan managed to keep his mouth shut at that, although the temptation to point out that he would be a mage for the rest of his life, regardless of how much money and power they threw at the problem, was near-overwhelming. He knew how utterly useless that would be. Useless at best, at worst it could end very badly for him.

Besides, he would do nearly anything to avoid listening to the arlessa speak. She had a voice that could shatter glass.

At least his student was pleasant enough. Jowan grew to enjoy spending time with the young boy, teaching him the simplest spells and methods to control his emotions and keep his magic in check. Conner was an eager student, cheerfully accepting his lessons, asking questions, and paying rapt attention. He wasn't just eager to please his mother: it seemed the boy had a genuine interest in learning.

It was, to his surprise, a pleasant life. Jowan had freedom to roam the estate and grounds, so he often woke early just to watch the sunrise outside. Reading outside, something he had dreamed of for many years looking through the tower windows, turned out to be an overrated fantasy. The wind was constantly trying to turn his pages at inopportune moments, bugs would crawl on him and the book and really, when it came down to it, dirt wasn't nearly as comfortable as a nice chair. It didn't stop him from reading outside whenever the weather was nice, but he was starting to admit that the reality didn't quite live up to expectations. Just as well, he thought one day, shifting so he could pull a rock out from under himself, I don't deserve to be comfortable.

It was easy to fall into the life of a tutor, blend in with the controlled chaos of a large estate. He could pretend he belonged. Indeed, he was enjoying being a teacher so much that it was easy to forget the real reason he had been sent to Redcliffe. It was only when his thoughts drifted back to Lily, as they often would, and he felt that rush of grief and shame as his memory of the last moments in the tower played out that Jowan remembered the reason for his reprieve.

The small glass vial, tucked away among his belongings, was still waiting for him. Loghain had told him to build up trust first, to let the Arl and Arlessa relax around him. He had figured out after the first week that even earning the trust granted to the lowest scullery made was unlikely given years with them, much less mere weeks.

He had to act.

It was simple enough. Jowan had been given use of the library for the academic portion of Conner's lessons. Every evening the Arl retired to his library where he enjoyed a drink and went through the day's paperwork. His schedule was like clockwork, all Jowan had to do was arrive early one morning.

The decanter sat on a sideboard. Uncapping it, the smell of liquor hit Jowan's face. A glance over his shoulder assured him that the room was still empty, the door still shut. With a sigh, he pulled a small glass vial from a pocket, quickly removing the cork.

Jowan moved his arm to empty the vial, pausing. Hand hovering over the decanter he closed his eyes, taking a breath. Opening his eyes once more, he emptied the vial.

The powder seemed to dissolve instantly, but Jowan picked up the decanter, swirling it, just to be safe.

"Done," he whispered.

Ostagar

So that's a darkspawn, Sif thought, suppressing a face. It seemed odd she would see one for the first time up here, but she didn't want to mention that out loud. Everyone seemed to assume she was some kind of dwarven darkspawn expert, and since Alistair saw no reason to correct them, neither did she.

"Monsterous," her fellow recruit, a knight, said. Everyone but Alistair seemed frozen in horror.

Pretend this is normal, Sif reminded herself. Hoping she looked like someone who fought darkspawn every weekend, she grinned with false bravado. "Come on," she shouted, "everything dies!"

Rushing forward, she began swinging. One blade caught a genlock across the throat, spraying her with black ichor. The other opened a hurlock's stomach, spilling his innards across the dirt.

That, it seems, was all it took to push her fellow recruits into action. Not wanting to be outdone by a woman, or perhaps shamed by a dwarf, both men rushed forward, hollering battle cries.

Their assignment seemed easy enough. Go into the woods, kill darkspawn, bring back some blood.

"Why blood?" she asked Alistair.

"It… it's part of the joining. Tradition," he said, looking like there was quite a bit more to the story.

"Yeaaah," she said, eyebrows raised. "It doesn't sound like you're hiding anything at all. Nope."

"Sorry," came the reply.

"Don't apologize, just tell me."

"I can't," he said. "Sorry. You'll find out soon enough, though."

"Creepy," Daveth commented.

"Admit it," Sif said, poking Alistair in the chest, "you guys are planning to knock us out and sell our teeth."

"Your…" he shook his head. "Is that even something people do?"

"Yep," she replied. "Happened all the time back home."

He started to say something, raising a hand and shaking his head before any words escaped. "Nevermind," Alistair said. "Let's just finish up out here. We have to get the treaties and head back before dark."

No one could find an argument with that. Duncan had told them to hunt down some long abandoned, long rotted fortress and find three bits of paper inside of it. How they would manage such a thing, she had no idea, but he seemed completely confident it would work.

"Yeah, I don't like the idea of hanging around out here after dark," Daveth observed, looking around.

Sif found she agreed completely. At first the surface had been easier to deal with at night, without that sun beating down, hurting her eyes and turning her skin a painful pink. It didn't take long for her to realize there was a reason surfacers picked the bright hours for their awake time, and the dark ones to bunker down. On the road south Duncan had mentioned bandits, out here Sif realized being mugged was the least of her worries.

Redcliffe

Jowan woke with a start, so disoriented he briefly forgot where he even was. Taking a few deep breaths to get his heart under control, he could make out the sound of screaming.

Oh, that can't be good, he mused, already stumbling around looking for something to put on. His first thought was of the darkspawn, that they had somehow found their way as far north as Redcliffe and were attacking.

The Arl had been unconscious for over two weeks now. It would be an unmitigated disaster if the darkspawn descended on the village with no one but the Arlessa in charge. Through castle gossip Jowan had heard the Arl's younger brother, Bann Teagen, was on his way. Several of the maids seemed almost inappropriately excited by this, giggling whenever the man's name came up.

He had not arrived yet, though. For now the castle was running itself, with the Arlessa rarely leaving her husband's side, spending her days holding his head up as she spooned small amounts of water and broth into his mouth. Jowan's stomach twisted with guilt whenever he happened to pass her in the hall, seeing her red-rimmed eyes and knowing he was the ultimate cause of the family's suffering. His daily lessons with Connor were even worse. His pupil's eyes were haunted, dark circles growing day by day. Lethargic and despondent, the boy would ask repeatedly why Jowan couldn't heal his father.

In truth, Jowan had tried. From the moment the Arl fell sick his guilt had been near-overwhelming. After a week of sleepless nights he did try, hoping to some way make up for the damage. It would mean forfeiting any aid from the Teyrn, but that was starting to seem more like justice. He hadn't earned anything resembling freedom or forgiveness when Loghain contacted him, and he certainly wouldn't deserve it now that it seemed murder would be added to his list of sins.

Slipping in to the bedroom when the night guard was asleep at his post, he tried a few healing spells. Spells for illness, spells for infection, spells for purification, even spells designed to draw out poisons. Nothing worked. Weather the Teyrn's powder was too potent for magic, or Jowan was simply too weak a mage, he didn't know. Really, in the end, it didn't matter which it was. Jowan couldn't undo the damage he had caused.

And now, it seems, the whole village would pay the price in the form of darkspawn.

A glance out the window told him that this was, perhaps, even worse.

A fog of magic, green and sinister, seemed to envelop the village. People seemed to be fighting in the streets. As he watched, a man was killed while he banged at the castle gates for entry. His attacker turned away with disinterest and, to Jowan's complete horror, the victim stood up to follow only a moment later, stomach still hanging open from the blow that killed him.

"Maker," Jowan gasped.

He could hear the Arlessa screaming in the halls. "Connor!" she shouted, "Something is wrong with Connor!"

Suddenly it all clicked into place.

Rushing into the hallway, he realized that someone else had made that connection as well. "You!" Arlessa Isolde screamed, pointing at him. "This is your fault. We were fine until you came here with your magic!" She gestured to a guard. Before Jowan could realize what was happening he saw a shield flash as it caught the light of a wall torch. After that, only darkness.

Ostagar

"What's that," she called after they had been wandering far too long.

"It… I think that may be it," Alistair agreed. "Maker, not much left of the place, is there?"

"Suppose that would only depend on how much there was to begin with," Daveth laughed. "Maybe they built it to look like a pile of rocks and trash?"

Sif chuckled with him. "They don't build them like they used to," she said, quoting a phrase the Artisan caste had always been fond of.

"True enough," Daveth agreed.

Stumbling through the ruins, eventually Jory came upon an old chest. "This could be it," he called. He sounded very hopeful. It was an improvement, he had sounded very afraid up until then. Of course, he didn't seem eager to actually touch the chest.

"Fine," Sif muttered, kicking it open. Not sure what a treaty could possibly look like, she glanced inside. "No treaties."

"What?" Alistair said, disbelief in his voice. "Are you sure?"

"Is this a treaty?" she asked, holding part of the chest's contents up.

"Those are leaves, Sif."

"This?"

"That's an acorn."

"This one, then?"

"Maker!" he jumped back when she tossed the final object at him. "That's a dead squirrel."

"All right," she said. "I didn't think any of those were treaties. Thanks for backing me up."

"You could have just said what was in there!" he said, still sounding horrified. "You didn't have to start tossing dead animals around."

"I didn't know what any of them were called," she pointed out. "Acorn. That's food, right?"

"Only if you're unlucky," Daveth said, sitting down against a fallen pillar. "So, what now, fearless leader?"

Alistair sighed, pushing his hair back although it hadn't actually moved. "I don't know," he admitted. "I guess we go back, tell Duncan we couldn't find them."

"Well, well," came a new voice. "What have we here?"

A very pretty woman, wearing very little clothing, was strolling into the ruins of the tower. Sif tensed to hear the woman call them thieves.

Up until that point she had been enjoying the thought that she would never be called a thief again.

"The Grey Wardens owned this tower!"

The woman scoffed. "'Tis a tower no longer!"

Well, she had a point there.

"I cannot believe we are doing this," Alistair said not long after, while the four of them stomped through puddles and over fallen logs, trying to keep up with the dark-haired woman.

"What?" Sif said. "Her mother has the treaties. We need the treaties."

"But she's a witch!" He shook his head. "We don't all have your dwarven resistance to magic!"

"Well, you're not dwarves," Sif replied. "Unlucky for you. Come on, mage-hunter. She's been helpful. Don't get your smalls in a twist."

Alistair sighed. "You don't find her a little… strange?"

Sif only laughed. "Ask me what I don't think is strange," she replied. "The list would be shorter!"