![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Open post
Come here for musebox stuff, PSLs, or post-captcha meme continuation. Put the verse or PSL or whatever in the subject line plz.
Hit this up if you know me and have an idea. Hit me up if you don't know me, we've never interacted IC or OOC, and you have an idea. Hit this up for any and all reasons. I welcome everything.
Ashfae here, meet my OC.
She'd been living in the Bannorn and the Hinterlands for years, running without a real purpose or idea of what to do with herself. For the first while it hadn't mattered. She'd wanted to be alone for a while, away from Highever and the Collective and the feeling that she'd made a complete and utter fool of herself. Living outside was no real difficulty for her. There were always mice to hunt, scraps to steal, some branch or cave to sleep in, if you knew where to look and what to avoid, what skin to wear in what situation.
Then the Mage-Templar War started, and that had changed everything.
Then the Breach opened, and that had changed everything again.
Demons everywhere, towns abandoned, the Hinterlands and Bannorn overrun with rogue mages and rogue Templars alike, to say nothing of innocent refugees caught between them. She helped where she could, little things, bits of healing that drew no attention. Mostly to animals, curing this goat or that sheephound, and if the owners never knew, that was all right. She didn't need thanks. She didn't need anything.
Except...maybe she did, because she'd been wandering on her own for such a long time. She hadn't really let herself think about how lonely it was getting.
So she spent more time with the refugees, even in her own form. She did more rudimentary healing, herbalism. She'd never been much good at brewing potions, at precise measurements, but she could collect herbs for those who could. And if they never asked how it was that she could wander into dangerous territory on her own and emerge without a scratch, well, there were things she was sure they didn't tell her either. Everyone had secrets. But no one thought one small scrawny elf girl could do much harm. And they were right, she couldn't. Though she had her own secrets too.
Then the Inquisition came.
If Dar believed in the Chantry, she might've said they were Maker-sent. Most did. They started imposing a sort of order on things, providing supplies, healers, leaders, guards, civilisation. They welcomed anyone, Templar or mage. They fought the demons. They fought the Breach.
Dar wasn't a fighter. She was just one rat girl who wandered. Nobles and the Inquisition had nothing to do with her.
But she watched them all the same, especially the ones who had power. It was always a good idea to watch those with power. It was always a good idea to study carefully anything that might have the power to hurt you, so you'd know how best to run. She didn't think the Inquisition was dangerous, to her or anyone. But she'd spent her lifetime in hiding, and some habits didn't die easily.
And then dwarf who never did up his shirt had said something to the bald mage, the elf with eyes that looked like they'd seen into forever, and they'd both looked at the falcon in the tree. But the elf had seen her. Had gestured, an unmistakable invitation, made not to a bird but to a person.
She'd flown off, of course, deeply shaken. What had happened? Had she been acting too obviously un-birdlike? She wasn't a falcon even when she looked like one, she was still Dar, just Dar in a falcon shape.
She was as fascinated as she was frightened, and whenever either of the pair appeared in the Hinterlands, she watched them. Not as a falcon, not again. As a mabari, usually. No one ever minded having a mabari around, even a small, unpartnered one.
Today she was just herself, a young elf girl, with barefeet and a dirty face and an arm full of herbs, and she checked her steps as she approached the woman who'd asked her to fetch them, because the dwarf was standing there chatting with her. She'd never seen him do any harm with that giant crossbow on his back, except to the red Templars and those who'd attacked him first. But still. She approached warily, keeping her eyes on the ground.
o/
Of course it flew away, leaving them both curious, Varric more so than Solas, though also more given to kvetching about it. Solas could only say that he sensed some magics from it, possibly shapeshifting or a form of enthrallment. They were more cautious after that, now having to watch for the damn animals spying on them. Bloody sodding apostates.
Today he had little to worry about, though. He was speaking to a medicine woman while the Inquisitor was busy buying shit, and he was pleased as punch about getting some down time. The approaching elf girl was a surprise; there weren't many elves out here, and the humans were rarely happy to see any of them.
The woman turned a sharp eye on the elf girl, impatiently gesturing to an empty basket and snapping, "Took you long enough, girl! Bloody kni-" she glanced at Solas, walking towards them, and Lavellan, shopping a dozen yards away, and cut herself off. "-Vagrant child."
"Vagrant?" Varric remarked, giving the girl an almost-wink. "In my experience, vagrants are some of the best people you'll ever meet. Also, the craziest. One or the other."
He turned to the girl, immediately feeling a bit sorry for her for being stuck with this unpleasant woman. This must be why that healer in Redcliffe didn't want to come out to the crossroads- dealing with this shit.
"You got all those yourself? Must've had to go out pretty far to get that much."
Interesting. How did a little barefoot girl survive the chaos of the Hinterlands all by her lonesome?
\o She has a Highever accent, btw. And she's older than she looks/acts by a few years.
She just shrugged in response to the question, kneeling down to deposit her herbs in the empty basket, carefully picking up the ones that fell. She hadn't gone through all that effort to collect them just to let them be wasted. "Not all that far." A lie. "I'm good at noticing things." True.
She eyed Varric carefully, not nervous, but closely observant, and decided to be a little bold. She was too curious not to ask. "You're friends with that bald elf, aren't you? I'm sure I've seen you both here before. Who is he?"
"You're not here to ask about your betters!" The medicine woman hissed. Dar shrugged and picked up the empty basket, then held out a hand to the woman, obviously wanting her payment before she'd hand over the herbs. Grudgingly, the woman opened up a small coin purse and handed over a few coppers; Dar pocketed them and handed over the basket, still not unmoved by the woman's obvious hostility. "Now off with you. But mind you're back in two days with more!" the woman added abruptly, turning her attention back to Varric.
Dar's attention was back on Varric too, though it didn't seem like she'd get an answer to her question. Not just now, at least. Well, she could listen around. Someone would know. Someone always did.
no subject
"You know, that reminds me," he remarked loudly to Solas. "Wasn't the Inquisitor just saying the other day that this place needs a new apothecary?" He glanced at the woman, who was very much already the apothecary, with casual dismissal. "It's funny, I seem to remember meeting the nicest elven healer in Redcliffe who wanted the job. Maybe I should tell our fearless leader to take her up on it."
After letting that sink in a moment -- the dwarf, the elf he spoke to, the extremely elven Inquisitor leading all of this, and the more-than-implicit threat to run the woman out of a job -- he walked away from her and over to Dar.
"Excuse me, my dear, how rude of me. Here I am getting distracted, and completely forgot my manners in ignoring your question." He gave a little flourish. "Varric Tethras, at your service. And this dignified egg is Solas."
no subject
That was no problem. She had others.
Dar's eyes were twinkling merrily as the dwarf walked up to her, but then she went still as she saw the same bald elf she'd been asking about joining him. She hadn't noticed he was here! How had she missed him? She was usually more observant than that, and it wasn't as though he was easy to overlook. His dress was bland and unassuming aside from the ornate staff, but he was tall for an elf, and his bald head shone in the sunlight. That alone should have caught her attention. How had he avoided her like that?
She barely heard Varric's introduction, she was too busy staring at the other elf, who regarded her with a small, superior smile. Solas. It wasn't a name she'd ever heard before.
Well, there were lots of mages in the world. But he was strange.
She came back to herself with a little start. "Oh! Sorry. I'm Dar. Dar Prethan." She bowed her head, a servile sort of gesture used by many alienage elves when talking to people who were more high-class than they were, which was everyone. For most elves it was automatic, more a defense mechanism for a city elf than anything else, and that was true for Dar too--but it was also something she did to help people overlook her. Most people saw the head bob and the downturned, apparently humble gaze and then didn't see how she'd listen to them after she'd been dismissed from their notice. Most people only bothered to see what they expected to see.
Not Varric, apparently. And definitely not Solas, whose smile grew a little. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Dar Prethan. I've been most curious."
Dar went still again, her eyes darting from one of them to the other, tense as a creature poised for flight. Literal flight in her case, as Solas had clearly guessed. She couldn't think of anything to say.
no subject
Solas nodded at them both. "You are, I presume, the falcon from last week? Do not be alarmed, we have no reason to betray your secret."
"Huh." Varric looked her up and down with renewed interest. "So you're a shapeshifter, huh? And here I thought I was all full up on elfy hedge mages. Ah, well, the more the merrier, right?"
He extended a hand in greeting.
also I can't do Solas' voice for toffee.
A city elf who could read, and read well; something else that wasn't seen every day. And who could apparently afford books, or had gotten her hands on them some other way, despite her extremely obvious lack of coin. But that moment out of the way, she remembered the more important question. "But how did you recognize me? No one's ever been able to do that before. I've never even heard of anyone doing that."
Solas merely looked...smug, she'd call it. Confident, if she were describing it to someone else, but there was an underlying air of smugness. "I have a great deal of experience in observing unusual magics, and I have met shapeshifters before."
"You have?" she blurted again. This was the strangest conversation. "More than one?" She bit her lip. "Sorry. I can't help being curious, you see. I only ever met one. And most people are...nervous, about it."
And about mages in general, she didn't say. No one in the camp even knew she was one.