Chapter Text
Dear Anders,
I was so excited when I got your last letter. It has been so long since you have written that I was worried. I know you don't go into the Deep Roads as often as other wardens do, but I was worried all the same.
So how are you? Do you have any more wardens you are training to be healers, or is it still just the few you have been working with? Don't work too hard. I know how you can get, but I am sure that Fenris is taking care of you and making you eat.
Have I mentioned lately how wonderful I think it is that the two of you are together? Because if I haven't I'm doing so now. Isabela said that last time she saw the two of you a few months ago that you both seemed to be doing well. I know that Fenris had just gotten back from an expedition without you—I'm glad he's okay. She said she didn't see the two of you much since you were both "celebrating the end of your month long blight." I don't want to know what that means. That must have been hard to be parted for so long.
Not much new is going on with me. Cullen and I are still not married and it looks like that isn't going to change anytime soon. He's the Knight-Commander and I'm the Viscount. Politically, it wouldn't look good if we were married. It might seem like the templars have too much control over the Viscount and the power structure would be thrown off. After what happened over a year ago, no one wants to smell even a whiff of a templar in power—true or not. It's silly, since all of Kirkwall knows I had his son. But Maker forbid a woman not be beholden to her husband's whims. My feeble female brain can barely tolerate being Viscount. If I had a husband, who knows how he might sway me. Didn't you know that a piece of paper and words in front of the Maker just diminishes my mind?
Sorry, been a little rough lately.
Malcolm is doing well. He's been trying to sit up on his own now. I wish you and Fenris could see him. Can you imagine Fenris holding a baby? I confess, the thought makes me laugh whenever it crosses my mind.
So tell me the truth. Is Isabela sleeping with Nathaniel Howe? She has been very evasive about it—which is strange for her—but I keep getting the impression that's why she's always at Vigil's Keep. I can't imagine anything else keeping her landlocked for weeks at a time.
You might not have heard, but Merrill is in the Gallows now. There was nothing I or Cullen could do. I admit that it caused more than one fight between us. The templars are Cullen's life, and even though he had kept quiet about her, he still had to allow his men to take her when they came to him with news of her existence. I'm afraid for her. Cullen has not mentioned her dabbling in blood magic—which has lessened over the past year—but if she is caught while in the circle… I don't need to tell you what the consequences would be.
Aveline and Donnic are expecting their first child in the spring. I found out when Donnic came to me, begging me to get Aveline to listen to him. She wouldn't take time off from the guards. I pointed out to her that her armor wouldn't fit her forever and that if she didn't want to look like a fool in it, then she needed to stop for a while.
That got her attention.
Carver wanted me to give his regards to you and Fenris. I think he misses Fenris. Did you know they were hanging out behind our backs? Seems Carver use to go and drink with Fenris. I shudder when I think of the things they might have talked about. I guess it make sense. None of us talked to Carver when he joined the templars for a while. Fenris didn't have the same bias that you and I had.
Speaking of Carver—he's much better now. When he went off to find out why we were being attacked—Cullen and Carver put their foot down and I wasn't allowed to go—he came back changed. He wouldn't talk about what happened, and I had to find out from Aveline. I'm glad they were able to destroy that creature. So don't worry about me. I admit, your letter asking about it took me by surprise. I know, warden secrets. Blah, blah, blah…
Your last letter mentioned that Varania is still working with a prisoner of the wardens. I hope Fenris is all right with that. I know you can't explain much—again, warden secrets and all—but I hope that Fenris has at least talked with her.
You should be warned that Varric is making plans to visit soon. I think he's really going to see Sigrun. I know that they've been exchanging letters for a year now. I dearly wish I could meet her, and see the woman that has Varric Tethras tongue-tied. He admitted to me that he finds it easier to talk to her on paper. He does have a way with words. You wouldn't believe the stories he tells Malcolm of you and Fenris. One is about the Fade and the Black City.
I've gone on long enough, so I will just end with yet another entreaty for a visit. I cannot leave Kirkwall for many reasons, or you can be sure I would be on Isabela's next ship out, Malcom in tow.
Write back soon!
Love,
Marian
P.S. Tell Fenris that his handwriting has improved a lot. I believe that is due to you. If it is, then I am glad you've been working with him.
P.P.S I know that Fenris will hate it, but give him a hug and kiss for me.
Anders chuckled at the last line, and smiled as he folded Marian's letter, slipping it into his robes. He was seated at the dining hall for the lunch hour, and he went back to eating his meal of cold ham and cheese. Across from him, Velanna and Sigrun were talking in low whispers, their eyes on a piece of paper in Sigrun's hands. At one point, Sigrun blushed, the skin where she wasn't marked flushing on her face. Ah, letter from Varric. Anders grinned down at his meal. Varric had thankfully not taken Anders' words to heart when he had last been at the keep. For the past year, he had been writing to Sigrun, and if her blushes had anything to say about it, the dwarf was making good progress.
Well, good for him.
Not every romance had to have a rocky start-Anders took a bite of the pungent cheese and looked at Nate out of the corner of his eyes-unlike some. Everyone in the keep knew that Isabela and Nate were sleeping together. No one knew how it started, or how it happened, and Anders didn't want to know. Who was he kidding, he was dying to know. Because Nate, seriously? He eyed the man next to him. Well, he could see it. It wasn't as if Anders hadn't entertained the notion all those years ago. It was just he was so Nate.
Nate gave him a questioning look when he caught Anders staring at him. Anders smiled around a mouth full of food and the other man rolled his eyes. Nate could just be so blighted dour at times. Not that Anders should be the one to talk.
Even though Fenris had softened around Anders, he still was the same as ever. Every morning he went out to the practice yard and ran drills, breaking only for lunch before returning. He came to the dining hall after the supper bell smelling of sweat and steel. Not that Anders was complaining. If he had to pick a duo of scents that was quintessential Fenris, it would be them. He would rather that then the times when Fenris was sent to the Deep Roads. He hated it when that happened. He hated it so much that the first few times, he and Aedan had screaming matches about it. Anders had to stay at the keep. There was no getting around that. He was the best healer they had, and if he were killed in action, then Aedan would be left with his students, who were good, but not up to the commander's standards.
On one hand, Anders loved that he was thought so highly of. The wardens allowed his skills to develop in a way the circle never did. He had come to Kirkwall ill prepared for treating the masses the way he had. The Chantry frowned upon books on anatomy, citing the lure of blood magic if one knew too much.
That was bullshit.
It hampered healers all over Thedas. Anders was good, but if one didn't know where bone A socketed in bone B, then how were you suppose to save people? Aedan didn't care. He allowed Anders all the banned books he could get his grubby little apostate's hands on. On a one occasion, he'd let Anders dissect a corpse to illustrate to his students just exactly where things were.
Christopher had fainted.
So yeah, he understood. But that didn't mean he had to like it. Fenris was a seasoned warrior that had gone toe to toe with darkspawn before he became a warden. He took his obligations seriously and never did anything impulsively when on the battlefield. Outside of it was another matter. He and few of the older wardens had created quite the name for themselves in the keep. When Aedan needed someone to delve into the Deep Roads, they were the first ones he chose.
Fenris—in his own way—was making friends. Anders didn't think his lover realized it, and he wasn't about to tell him.
Speaking of Fenris… Anders polished off the last of his meal and licked the cold grease from his fingers. His eyes darted to the doorway and he sighed. Fenris usually met him for lunch, one of the few times in their day that they could see each other. But Aedan had called him into his office-which could only mean one thing.
Fenris was going back into the blighted Deep Roads, leaving Anders with only Pounce for company. Pounce was lovely and all, a perfect specimen of feline beauty, but Anders hated it when Fenris went. Anders could foresee long nights of sleeplessness worrying about the elf until he came back unscathed.
His mood-which had been high upon finishing Marian's letter-plummeted. He pushed his empty plate from him and made to stand, when he heard a commotion from the doorway.
"Fenris! Void take you, stop!" Every eye in the room turned towards the sound of Aedan shouting. Fenris came striding in, still clad in his armor from the practice yard. Aedan had commissioned him his own armor, built for the elf's special needs. A chain shirt draped past his thighs, the steel links black and dull, and a chest plate covered his breastbone. He had new gauntlets since losing his in the Fade. They were copies of his older ones, also stained black. In fact, from his pauldrons to the metal covering his knee high leather boots, everything was black except for the blue and silver tabard of the Grey Wardens. When the first snows had fallen in Ferelden, Fenris had given in and began wearing shoes-at least when he was in his armor. Any other time he still went shoeless, his bare feet padding on the stones of the keep.
His hair, which he had kept long after a week of Anders begging him, was tied back in a braid that went down his back. Time moved differently in the Fade. What had been only a moment for Fenris, had turned into a month in the waking world. Mortals were not allowed there for many reasons. But that moment for Fenris had also been a lot longer. Enough time had passed for his hair to grow down to his shoulders. The logistics of it—when Anders thought of it—were mind boggling. Time had no meaning in the Fade. What was time to those that were timeless?
Fenris' hard gaze moved over the room, alighting on the wardens there and dismissing them quickly. The skin around the bridge of his nose wrinkled as he scowled. When his eyes stopped on the far right of the room, the lines on his face deepened and he pointed. "You!"
Every eye in the room turned to where Fenris was pointing. Men at the table stood, some of them scrambling away from the elf's irate stare. Anders got to his feet when he saw who Fenris was pointing at. "Lov—"
Fenris snarled and charged Christopher, hopping over chairs and tables that got in his way with a grace that Anders would have admired if the circumstances had been different. Christopher had no chance to get away. He stood and almost tripped over his feet to escape the enraged elf when Fenris caught up to him. He fisted Christopher's robes in both of his hands, the soft material tearing under his grip.
"You'll pay for this." Fenris picked the young warden up and slammed him down on top of the table, the reverberation sending plates and tankards clattering to the floor. "If you think to be rid of me so easily, you should have just killed me. I told you before I would cut your hands off." The room was so quiet that his words echoed in the cavernous dining hall and could be heard by all. "Maybe I should just take your eyes. I could pluck them from your skull. Do you think that would stop your ability to write letters? Or should I take your tongue as well, and strip you of your ability to tell tales to those that have no business in hearing them?" As he reached the end of his sentence, his voice had gone deathly quiet and Christopher whimpered.
"Let him go." Aedan's command boomed in the room, and those that were still seated got to their feet in attention, their chairs scraping loudly on the stone floor. He strode over to Fernis, his face resolute. "Now."
"Shit." Anders made to go over to them, but Nate's hand on his arm stopped him.
"Don't. I can't allow you to get into it with Aedan in front of the men," he murmured. "You'll find out soon enough."
Anders jerked his arm in a fruitless attempt to break free. "What's happening?" The look that Nate gave him was full of pity and Anders felt his stomach bottom out. "Nate…"
"If I had taken his hands like I first wanted to, this wouldn't be happening," Fenris snapped over his shoulder, his eyes never leaving the warden in his grasp. "It's been a year, you said they were satisfied."
"I was wrong. I can't predict what they will do at any given time." Aedan shot Christopher a look that said he wasn't happy with him either. "Now let him go."
"No. If I am to be punished, let it be for something of my choosing." He lifted Christopher up and slammed his head back down on the table.
"You aren't being punished." The way Aedan said it, Anders could tell he had already been over this with Fenris. "Let him go and you and Anders can come to my office. Let me deal with Christopher. Do you really want your last days here to be in the dungeon, with the Architect for company?"
Fenris exhaled an irritated sigh through his nose. He slammed Christopher's head back once more and released his grip. He looked down at the healer. "This isn't over. You can't have him." Fenris backed away, his disdain for Christohper twisting his face.
"Can't do much about it." Christopher gave Fenris a sly grin. "You won't be here, will you?" This time it was Aedan who grabbed the young warden by the robes. He lifted him up and pushed him back, sending him stumbling to the ground.
"But I will be. You're supposed to be a warden. That comes with a trust to keep our secrets. You've violated that trust." He motioned with his hand and two wardens came to grab Christopher under his arms and lifted him to his feet. "Get him out of my sight. Take him down to the dungeons and put him near the Architect and his assistants. I want him to have a good hard look at what's at stake, and what happens when you betray my trust."
Anders read the letter in his hands for what must have been the tenth time. His brain couldn't process what was happening. After all this time, they had thought that Weisshaupt was satisfied with the edited report that Aedan had given of what had happened in the Deep Roads and Corypheus. He had told them everything, leaving out Fenris' involvement and Corypheus' ability to inhabit those with the taint. He'd said only that the creature was destroyed and the Architect was now in custody. That the custody also entailed his assistants- Varania included-and a laboratory was omitted. Weisshaupt didn't need to know that Aedan was allowing the Archiect to continue his work under the commander's watchful eye.
Varania was helping him because she had no other choice. She had become tainted during her imprisonment in the Deep Roads and only the Architect's intervention had saved her mind, the way he had saved Velanna's sister so many years ago. She had found-much to her surprise-that she liked the work. She was able to use her innate magical ability for something worthwhile, something no one else was attempting. She chafed at her isolation, but it was better than dead or a life as a ghoul.
Fenris paced Aedan's office, his arms folded and his fingers tapping a tempo on his bicep. Five steps, turn. Five steps, turn. Tap, tap, taptaptap. Tap, tap, taptaptap. Fenris hardly ever fidgeted anymore. It was a testament to how comfortable he had become with the wardens, and how agitated he was now.
"I can't believe he wrote to the First Warden," Anders said as he held up the letter. "Who does that? Who in their right mind would want to talk to Weisshaupt?" As Fenris fell into habitual restlessness, so did Anders with his jokes. "Sorry, Aedan, I mean, who would want to talk to them without being forced to. I'm surprised he took the time out to read it with all the manly posturing, the ruling of the Anderfels, and darkspawn killing-can't forget that proud Anderfels tradition- that they do over there."
"Well he did. And now Fenris has been called to Weisshaupt." Aedan's eyes tracked Fenris' progress around the room. "My command has been called into question. If I wasn't the Arl of Amaranthine, I think the bastard would strip me of my rank and send me on my Calling early. As it is, he can't remove me, but he can make it uncomfortable for a long while. This won't be forgotten easily."
"He told him everything. Everything!" Anders exclaimed. "I'm surprised he even believed Christopher."
Fenris stopped his pacing and rounded on Anders. "Do not speak his name."
The mage rolled his eyes. "And what am I suppose to refer to him as? That little shit? You need to be realistic."
"I need to be realistic? I am firmly set in reality right now." Fenris gestured wildly, and his voice rose. "Aedan has capitulated and is sending me to Weisshaupt-without you. In his infinite wisdom, he has decided that you cannot be spared." His eyes narrowed. "Need I remind you of what we said a year ago about Weisshaupt?"
Anders slowly lowered the letter in his hands, his eyes widening. "No," he whispered, "you don't." Sadness welled up inside him, threatening to choke him. Life with the wardens could be hard, but he and Fenris had made a home together here. If they ran, then they would both be hunted once more. Anders would return to the status of wanted apostate, the wardens and the circle would not let him be. Without having to look over his shoulder or second guessing everything he said for fear of giving himself away, Anders had forgotten what a heavy burden it could be. He could never live as openly as he did with the wardens.
And neither could Fenris.
With Danarius gone, Fenris no longer had to watch his back as much as he had. There was no anticipation of the knife in the dark—or at least, there hadn't been. But if the wardens were no longer a safe haven for Fenris, then it was no longer good enough for Anders.
"Don't even think about it," Aedan warned, deducing their meaning. "I am summoned to Weisshaupt as well. If I show up without you, then they will most certainly take Vigil's Keep away from me and give it to another. I've worked too hard to build what we have here to let that happen."
"If we've ran, then why would you be to blame?" Fenris shot back. "Let us go, Aedan."
As Aedan and Fenris bickered, Anders couldn't stop thinking about Aedan had said. What would it mean for the wardens of Ferelden if he was stripped of his command? A Ferelden without its hero to safeguard them is what it would mean. Another warden put in charge that would undo all of Aedan's work. No matter Anders' feeling about the Architect and his work, Aedan saw enough merit in it to not kill the darkspawn outright. In fact, the Architect thrived in his search for a way to end the blights and to free the wardens from their Calling. Look at what he'd already done for Varania. She should already be mad now and turned ghoul. Instead, she walked and talked with all of her mental facilities intact. There had to be some good in that. If another not of Aedan's choosing took over, all that would vanish. Anders didn't doubt that the Architect would be killed outright.
And what about the men? There would be chaos. Aedan was loved by the Ferelden wardens. He was the standard that they strove to achieve. He defeated an Archdemon and survived. He and another warden had gathered a nation together enough to stop a blight in a matter of a year. That was something Weisshaupt could not boast of. The Anderfels were a wasteland from the blights that had overridden it. Ferelden had come out of it relatively unscathed in comparison. The wardens of Ferelden loved their hero, if Weisshaupt took that away from them, there would be a revolt. The last one had destroyed the wardens of Ferelden. They had only just recovered, and had been ill equipped for the fifth blight as a consequence.
Something like that couldn't happen again—and Aedan knew it.
"You have to go, love," Anders said softly. "It's the only way. If Aedan is with you, then he won't let anything happen to you." He glanced at Aedan for reassurance and the man nodded.
"This is one of your ill timed jokes," Fenris scoffed. "After what was said between us, you would still wish me to go?"
It was times like this that Anders still wished he was the callow youth he once had been. That Anders had never worried about doing the right thing if it went against his wants and needs. That Anders had also not cared about the consequences of his action, and how it affected others. "I'm not joking."
"You would send me to the wolves!" Fenris shouted. "I will not walk out of there, mark my words. They will keep me or kill me."
Anders buried his face in his hands. Things had been so much easier with Justice. Stands like the one he was making could be all laid at the spirit's door. Anders didn't have to take so much responsibility for the hard choices in life. "Aedan will be there with you. He won't let that happen," he muttered into his hands. He squeezed his eyes shut to prevent tears from falling. Fenris hated it when he cried. Not because he saw it as a weakness, but because he didn't like to see Anders in pain. He wouldn't allow the elf to see him do it now, if Fenris would go, it had to be because Anders didn't guilt him into it. Fenris would never forgive him.
"If they do then I'll get you out of there myself," Aedan assured him. "It might not come to that. If we go, we can still salvage this. Christopher is one, lone warden. One who wants your lover and will say anything to get you out of Anders' life. If he won't take my word for it, then we'll leave and to the Void with Weisshaupt. I've played their game and become arl, and my best friend is the blighted King of Ferelden. He can't just tear all of my work down because I didn't share. He gave me some of my power so that he could see if a warden could rule the way they do in the Anderfels, he can't just take it back now."
But he could, and Anders saw the moment that Fenris realized it. His arms went lax at his sides and his eyes widened slightly. He had been with Fenris long enough now that he could read the intricacies of his emotions on his face. Anders could practically hear the gears turning in Fenris' head as the elf glanced around the room. Fenris' eyes noted the shields displayed on Aedan's wall emblazoned with the twin griffons of the wardens. He glanced at the never ending pile of paperwork on Aedan's desk. Lastly he looked at Aedan and the scars on the man's arms from his last foray into the Deep Roads, the ones he had earned trying to keep Anders alive.
Fenris let out a slow breath and scrubbed at his face, careful not to catch his skin with his gauntlets. "All right, on one condition." Aedan raised an eyebrow in question.
"Anders comes with us, or we both run."