[video]

[songofvalor]

[ A FEW MINUTES AFTER THIS THREAD. Leliana's voice is shaky and her accent heavier than usual, too much anger bubbling inside her. ]

Anders! Where are you, you fiend?

I can't believe I thought you were a good man. You were one of Elissa's friends, for Andraste's sake! To find out this out from someone else while you walk around like you didn't... you didn't...

The blood of Kirkwall's grand cleric is in your hands. Grand Cleric Elthina! How could you murder one of the holiest people in Thedas!? What have you to gain!?

[ ANDERS BRO GET YOUR ASS IN HERE BEFORE SHE HUNTS YOU DOWN HERSELF ]

[ ooc: I am so sorry for spamming! Important development that can't be delayed and stuff. ]

Comments

[birdhousesoul]

You presume too much. You have no idea what I've done for the sake of my cause. What I've given up, or whom.

Don't presume that because you'd place a lover above a friend, I'd do the same.

[True, Hawke had never been his lover. Not his Hawke. But he'd loved Hawke more than anything, anyone, he'd ever known or met. Anders would have followed that man to the ends of the earth, and sometimes it seemed he did -- the Vimmark Mountains should surely qualify as something like an end. Some boundary better left uncrossed.

And he chose Justice over Hawke. His friend over the man he loved. He used Hawke ruthlessly for Justice's cause.

And he'd do the same again. If he had to.

Not that he can tell Cousland this. Not that it's any of her blighted business. But oh, the gall of it, to be told he'd choose a lover above all -- the bitterness of knowing how wrong she is -- Anders had to say something, as vague as it is, and as ineffective.]

If you acknowledge that you don't know the first bloody thing about the mages' plight, that spending time with a couple of mages here and there under completely extraordinary circumstances does not in any way qualify you to judge what we suffer, and that the mere fact that you've known that handful of mages doesn't make them more important than the countless mages you've never known -- then good. That's all I can ask of you, or hope for, rather.

Mages must speak, and act, and fight, for themselves. Without a fight, there'll be no freedom. There is no way around that necessity. We have every right to take action against our oppressors. That includes Grand Clerics like Elthina as surely as it does Templars like Rylock.

[ladyspitfire]

[Elissa, for the first time in months, flushes with rage.]

Then don't presume the same of me.

[The ritual comes to mind, knowing that she will never have Alistair as she wishes she could. She's watched her friends leave her, one by one, each one returning to a life of their own making. But not her. Every time she's done something for another, tried to put them above the good of Thedas, nothing has come out right.

Anders is a perfect reminder of that very fact.]

Why do you think I don't take up your cause? I don't know the tortures you've experienced nor do I know of anything beyond what I've seen and been told. It would be presumptuous and downright disrespectful of me to do anything else. I can no sooner understand your plight than you can understand my views.

[Elissa has been privileged in so many ways and ruined in so many others, but even she knows her life is far from pitiful, far from the horrors Anders has hinted at. And she'll never think otherwise.]

[birdhousesoul]

You're questioning the justice of the action I've taken.

You have no right to question it.

[ladyspitfire]

Considering our positions, Anders, I have every right to question them.

[She's a Warden, protector of Thedas, and being the Hero of the Blight has only put her in a position to openly monitor the goings-on of the politics and the world order. Nothing less would be expected of her.]

My opinion doesn't matter, nor should it. I can't stop you nor can I change what's already happened. Be glad of that fact. [But maybe things can still be fixed.] And if Justice has a problem with me, then he can speak to me himself.

[birdhousesoul]

You have no right at all. You have not lived our pain.

[ladyspitfire]

Look around you, Anders. Even your fellow mages judge what you have done.

[birdhousesoul]

You could not keep safe the one mage you tried to save.

Let the mages speak for themselves. You have no voice in this. Hero of Ferelden. This goes beyond Ferelden. And you were never the mages' hero. Only mine, once.

[ladyspitfire]

[Her blood immediately goes cold at the accusation, though it's true in every way. She couldn't save him. The reminder has never made her feel more helpless and distraught, though her face doesn't show it. Instead, her expression is entirely blank, even her gaze hardening so she won't break now that she's come so far.]

I never was a hero. I am only a Warden. I have no borders.

[Her voice never wavers, though it softens, as if speaking anything else will snap her threadbare control over herself.]

I did fail you. And for that, no apology will ever be enough. But I am sorry.