Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
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It was just the two of them. Manfred ambled far behind after receiving strict instructions to remain out of harm's way. And none of the others had expressed any particular keenness to venture into the dead-filled depths of the Necropolis again. Emmrich had been forced to take the lead to the Vault. Rook trailed behind him, thumbing her way through a thin tome as she walked, muttering to herself about a certain incantation being in the book.
Somewhere.
‘They really should put indexes in the back of these things,’ she groused, pausing under a wall brazier of veilfire and began flicking through the pages with increased speed.
Emmrich had only caught a glimpse of the book when she first pulled it from the small shoulder bag she brought. But in the greenish light he could see it was ancient; the fabric cover was worn at the corners, the spine abused with thin cracks webbing up the length of the book and any indication as to the title of the book appeared lost to time.
‘Ah-ha,’ she exclaimed, opening the book fully.
Emmrich walked back to Rook. She was looking at a page with a twelve line evocation centrally positioned on the page. Notes in Rook’s elegant scrawl covered what had once been the blank margins around the printed words. He blanched at the sight, only realising that he’d made a sound when Rook looked at him.
‘I take it you disapprove?’ She asked, closing the book slightly to meet his gaze.
‘If it is your own property, it's yours to do as you wish,’ he replied mildly, but she was shaking her head. ‘This is an ancient practice,’ remarking on the spell.
‘I know,’ Rook agreed, reopening the book again. ‘But I noticed the candles when we fought our way through the vault the second time around, and I figured…’ She jabbed at the page. ‘The alterations should allow the spell to awaken the wards quicker than the original casting.’
‘Isn’t there mimetic value in following the original invocations?’ Emmrich enquired.
‘If that were the case, we’d still be casting in Elvish,’ she remarked, folding over the page then closing the book around her finger. He frowned at her and a frustrated growl rumbled from her throat. ‘Academics.’ She made it sound like an insult. ‘When you have something like the door upstairs and you don’t know what’s behind it, then yes, perfect mimesis is the ideal solution. But the vast majority of the time? No. Altering the spells, be it through the wording or even the casting gestures can strengthen wards considerably, improving their durability and even allowing for extra protections to be added. Also time saving if whatever is trying to kill you is bearing down on you.’
She smiled at him. A bright, dazzling expression while tucking the book into a large pouch that asked him to trust her. He did. She’d more than proven her necromantic abilities and instincts during their last excursions in the Necropolis. She moved around him, the usual brush of her perfume wrapping around him, encouraging him to follow. She paused at the end of the corridor and peered around the corner to observe the walking dead.
‘There are a lot of them,’ she remarked solemnly, turning back to him and pushing a lock of hair from her eyes. ‘What’s causing it though?’
‘Solas’ ritual has had a far reaching impact on the Fade,’ Emmrich replied, matching her solemnity. ‘Spirits are still aflurry with activity following the gods' escape. Our inability to tend to the dead here make them perfect hosts for hostile entities to reach this world.’
Clearing their way through was an easy feat, a harmonised pattern of attack developing between them. Emmrich found himself being able to read her movement as she danced her way through battle stances and shield throws to cut a path through the vault. Around it all she also kept track of his attacks, timing her most devastating moves with his recovery rates as though she could visualise the mana within him. While she focused on her martial skills, he did begin to see hints of her more powerful abilities. A club to her abdomen was answered with a draining spell tugged at the lifeforce of the attacker. The spell reduced the cadaver to ash, healing Rook’s injury before it began to cause her any pain.
At the far set of candles, Rook unshouldered her pack and carefully lowered it to with a soft clink. She withdrew a thurible and what appeared to be a premixed cleanser, a bottle of clarified water and small lumps of charcoal.
‘At the end of each stanza,’ she said once she got the charcoal burning with conjured veilfire, ‘if you’d be so kind as to repeat that line and light both sets of candles at the same time, I’d be grateful.’
Soon, the thurible’s smoke changed colour to a pinkish hue, the smell of frankincense, calendula and cedar wrapped around them and Rook got to her feet, shouldering the pack and they made their way back up along the chamber. They walked at a solemn pace. Emmrich kept his actions precise, cautious that any change in the spell could have an unintended impact on the room, but stanza by stanza the etheric murk lifted.
‘Admit it,’ Rook said once they reached the entrance again. ‘You thought it was going to cause some sort of cataclysmic explosion and let a massive pride spirit through?’
‘Nothing quite so dramatic,’ Emmrich replied as he turned to admire their handiwork. ‘I was concerned it wouldn’t work as well as you hoped.’
She held the thurible up, still emitting the cleansing smoke. ‘What do you think this was for? It wasn’t like I could test the incantation before we arrived, mainly on the count of not being able to find it. This was the back up.’
‘Then you made the adaptions -’
‘Years ago,’ she finished for him, opening the thurible and dampening the charcoal with magic. ‘Found something similar in a crypt during the Rift Crisis, I’d like to say in the lower levels but it’s probably moved somewhere else. The original was actually pretty ineffective so I adapted it, and used the new spell.’ She got to her feet and admired her handiwork. ‘Should take a day or so to settle the chamber then we can go through to the next room. Any idea what’s back there?’
‘I have some idea,’ Emmrich replied.
They returned in companionable silence to the belfry chamber, but on their approach, a raised voice alerted them to commotion. Beside him, Rook went pale as she slowed to a halt. Even the colour appeared to drain from her eyes leaving a swirl of grey mist around her pupil.
‘Rook?’
‘The Commander.’
He didn’t need to hear anymore. Reaching over he grabbed her hand, the pressure of his fingers prompting her to look him in the eyes. Fear swam in her expression, her hand developing a small quake and for a moment he was dumbfounded as to what he could say to her. But then she curled her fingers around his, blowing out a steadying breath.
‘I’m going to have to face him at some point,’ she said.
‘And I’m right with you,’ Emmrich assured her. ‘With any luck, if needed, my word will carry weight, given I outrank the Commander in the hierarchy of the order.’
‘What?’
‘Academic schools outrank military corps,’ Emmrich explained gently. ‘I was prompted to refamiliarise myself with our charter after you told me why you left, should you require an intercession during any of our visits.’
Rook frowned. ‘I’m not going to hide behind you.’
‘I don’t expect you to, I’m more than sure you don’t need me to step in on your behalf, but if you do, say the word,’ Emmrich told her. ‘Shall we?’
She took a moment to compose herself, taking a deep breath then blowing it out slowly and letting go of his hand. He let her get a few steps ahead of her before he followed, his hands behind his back.
Her entrance into the belfry caused silence to fall.
Commander Lucien van Markham would have been an imposing, stocky figure were he not two inches shorter than Emmrich. He did, however, tower over Myrna, and to her credit, she was having none of the posturing occurring before her. Hands on her hips, she met the commander's cold, icy glare with swirling dislike. Rook moved closer to the fray, her steps getting surer as she reached the centre of the room.
While Emmrich could not see her expression, he could tell by the hardline he could just make out from the jut in her jaw, that she had schooled her face into an expression that would brook no argument. The same one she had used in the Minrathous with Neve the day before.
Van Markham had not come alone. In a four-by-four formation behind him, sixteen senior Reapers stood in their famous Pillar of the Departed armour like imposing sarcophagi waiting to strike. The Commander wore his ceremonial robes as if he had rushed here from another engagement. When she stood ten feet away from the gathering, Rook drew up to her full height, slammed one foot down with a metallic clang and saluted with her right fist over her heart.
‘Arrest her,’ Van Markham ordered, pointing in the direction of Rook.
‘You will do no such thing,’ Myrna shot back immediately. ‘The matter is long since out of your hands, Commander.’
The retinue had not moved. As Keeper of the Seals, Myrna far outranked any member of the Reapers. She outranked Emmrich. Van Markham turned his head to look at Rook with utter disgust around his thin mouth. He’d been an attractive man in his youth, with pale blue eyes and dark blonde hair, but all that had gone to seed now. Deep furrows marked his forehead and his hairline had retreated so far back he had grown the hair at the back of his head long enough to comb it forward.
‘Out of my hands?’ Markham bellowed, turning back to Myrna. ‘This woman,’ he spat the word, showering Myrna with a thin film of spittle, ‘disobeyed multiple direct orders and destroyed three generations of Van Markham reliquary. It is a matter for the Reapers.’
‘Casual Destruction of the Dead,’ said Myrna, delicately patting her face down with a handkerchief she had withdrawn from her sleeve, ‘is a matter for the High Council to consider. Not the court marital chambers. You overstretched. Were you keen to discipline Watcher Ingellvar’s refusal to stand down, you would have charged her with insubordination or dereliction of duty at the time. As you did no such thing, one might go as far as to say your actions carried a certain air of personal retribution.’
Markham’s eyes bulged at the accusation to such a degree that Emmrich was certain he was about to suffer a fit of apoplexy. The flickering vessel twitching above his eye certainly suggested it was possible. He looked poised to shout again, but he seemed to realise his audience had grown and he was significantly outnumbered by figures of higher authority. Particularly now that VORGOTH had arrived.
‘THE GRAND COUNCIL HAS ABSOLVED WATCHER INGELLVAR OF ANY CHARGE REGARDING HER CONDUCT,’ they announced, its voice more something felt within than heard.
‘Of course they have,’ Van Markham declared with seething sarcasm. ‘Just as they absolved her the last time she insulted my family’s honour.’
‘Insulted your honour?’ Rook cut through the conversation. Higher than usual pitch Emmrich was used to, her voice rang against the towering walls, bouncing off the still bell above them. ‘Your nephew is the one who insulted your honour through his conduct. Or do you believe that women are to become nothing more than leibeigene upon taking nuptial vows?’
It was as if the bell above Emmrich had tolled at the small fact. Rook had pulled herself to her full height, not as tall as Van Markham, but enough that she could look him straight in the eye. There was a twitch to her gauntlet covered fingers, flexing them as if she wanted to punch him. Emmrich had a burning desire to wrap the man in spirit cords to make the job easier for her.
Again, Van Markham sputtered but finally sensing he was on the wrong side of the argument, or at least outnumbered enough that it wasn’t worth his while to continue trying to make the argument, he turned. A flick of his wrist ordered his retinue to part so he could leave with some dignity intact. The march was loud, stone and metal clanging together as the sixteen soldiers followed their commander under the scrutiny of the assorted witnesses. Skeletal assistants closed the doors behind them leaving Emmrich free to return his attention back to Rook. VORGOTH had his gloved hand on Rook’s shoulder, its hooded head inclined down towards her, in a gesture that could be considered sympathetic, perhaps even fatherly in nature.
‘The man remains an insufferable fool,’ Myrna announced. ‘Ah, Professor, a pleasure to see you, though I had little doubt you were too far away.’
‘Indeed, we were seeing to the cleansing of the Vault of the Beloved,’ he informed his colleague walking to join the group. ‘Rook has masterful skill within her wardweaving abilities. It must be quite a blow to the Reapers to not be able to call on her aid.’
‘AND YOUR TRAVELS? ARE THEY BEARING FRUIT?’ VORGOTH asked.
‘Quiet so,’ replied Emmrich. ‘It will make for quite the presentation should we fulfil our mission.’
‘That should make for a pleasant diversion,’ Myrna said, then turned to VORGOTH. ‘We will need to arrange for further sanctification of the vault before they can return to their full use. Professor, if your work here is not done, there is a matter of concern we would discuss with you, regarding the Basalt Hypogeum.‘
--//-*-\\--
His office, his academic bastion, was surprisingly empty. Emmrich knew he had removed a large amount of his collection to the Lighthouse but as he’d done so in a manner that resulted in him returning when he had needed something extra he hadn’t fully noticed just how much he’d decamped. The room reminded him of his first days as a Professor fifteen years earlier when he had been presented with this empty room for his use. Associate Lecturers shared offices and it had been a nightmare as his companion had no concept of tidiness. He sat in the chair, having given up hope of finding the journal he’d been looking for, knowing it would likely be back at the Lighthouse.
The loss of the Basate Hypogeum was more than concerning, having coincided with the recent Venatori incursions. He had known their intentions had been to siphon energy from the Necropolis but the removal of a whole room. That seemed inconceivable. Myrna had shown him, and Rook, the gaping hole left behind, a bottomless chasm with swirling mists. Reshuffles were normal, but the Necropolis always put itself back together in a way that left no gaps. A strange nothingness hung in the air with a howl to the winds that sounded like mourning.
New seals were in the process of being enchanted so it could not happen again but it would still be some time until they were back in place. There was a tap at the door, followed by Rook entering as if they were back at the Lighthouse. VORGOTH had extended an invitation of luncheon to her after the tour. She no longer wore her armour, which Manfred had brought here an hour earlier, adorned in yet another floor length velvet coat, this time of midnight blue with fleck of silver threading at the hems and through the buttons.
‘Find what you were looking for?’ She asked, glancing around the office with interest before frowning. ‘Have you moved it all to the Lighthouse?’
‘In my bid to have as much knowledge at my fingertips,’ he said, rather sheepishly, ‘yes.’
Rook chuckled. ‘I should really ask Myrna for some of my belongings for the Lighthouse. Leaving didn’t really allow me much in the way of creature comforts.’ She picked up a dusty canopic jar. ‘Anyone famous?’
‘Found at the Charnal Bridge before the Nightmare Fog descended,’ he replied.
‘It’s still there?’ She asked, putting the jar down carefully. ‘We should really get someone to banish that thing.’
‘Multiple attempts have been made,’ he replied, tracking Rook as she moved around the room, assailed by a strange sense that she simply belonged here just as much as she did in his study within the Lighthouse.
Rook ignored the chairs and perched on his desk, mere meters from where he sat. She rapped her nails across the surface of the desk. ‘I feel as if I owe you further thanks even if in this case, it was hypothetical. You'd have had my back with Van Markham, had he not already been crossing his swords with Myrna.’
‘He’s a fool,’ Emmrich replied. ‘Always been more concerned with his own standing. A poor attribute for a member of the Watch, but a common one amongst the lesser nobility.’
‘He’s so far down their line of ascension, I don’t think we can even call him lesser nobility,’ said Rook quietly. ‘But I fear Myrna is right, his umbrage with me is a personal matter over his jilted nephew. It is not an argument that can be won by hitting him over the head with the founding charter, or any of the subsequent amendments.’ She huffed out a soft laugh that brimmed with sadness. ‘I might never be able to return if I have to watch my back for him.’
‘It would appear crossing you means crossing VORGOTH,’ he observed lightly. ‘There are very few who would openly do that. VORGOTH’s fury is not to be taken lightly.’
‘And yet, the annals show there is always one,’ she said. ‘Someone who thinks their transgressions will go unnoticed by their near omniscient observations.’ She sighed. ‘What’s next in terms of reaching the Greater Spirits?’
The change of subject caught him off guard for a moment. The reminder of VORGOTH’s reach churning with thoughts of desire he had for the woman before him. He had witnessed VORGOTH’s terrify powers when dispensing justice and yet, it did not dampen his desire for her. That he’d be willing to cross VORGOTH‘s wrath to have her was testimony within itself.
‘I believe the Memorial Gardens lie beyond the Vault of the Beloved,’ Emmrich finally replied, regaining his senses. ‘We’ll need to perform the Sacred Rites of Remembrance to reaffirm our pledge to the dead so we may consult the Greater Spirits. I’d be honoured if you’d join me.’
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
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Rook’s gasp was audible before Emmrich emerged from the mirror. They arrived in the remains of a once comfortable room. The outer wall had been blasted inwards leaving them exposed to the elements. Rook had already reached the gaping hole, hand on the remaining wall as if she needed it to hold her up, gazing over the drop to an even lower part of the city. The breeze caught the tails of her leather coat. She began studying the jagged damage, fingers ghosting over the crumbling brickwork and rubbing the dust between her fingers. Neve stood in a stony silence beside the mirror; she’d warned them the Shadow Dragon’s hideout had been raided, but Emmrich would have struggled to conjure this level of devastation. In the room beyond was evidence of a fight, scorch marks on the floor and what appeared to be blood splatter across the wall he could see.
‘This wasn’t the dragon,’ Rook said, putting a loose piece of the wall free. ‘This was a magic explosion,’ she continued, throwing an accusatory look at Neve. ‘Doesn’t smell dissimilar to gaatlok.’
‘You think the Venatori were going to just let us sit on their doorstep?’ Neve demanded.
‘No, but -’ Rook struggled. ‘Mierda,’ she breathed out, toeing the rubble on the floor. ‘It’s why you came back, isn’t it? There’s no one left, is there?’
Neve’s expression narrowed into suspicion at the expletive usually used by Lucanis. Rook was oblivious as she continued kicking the rubble at her feet. She was saved from a remark about the adopted language from either of them by the sound of something being pushed over in the next room. Emmrich had already learnt to ensure his stave was easy to pull free but he still wasn’t as quick as Rook and Neve. Both women moved as fast as lightning, drawing their weapons and moving into position. In the face of potential danger, the animosity between them temporarily evaporated. They both pressed themselves to the wall either side of the archway into the next room. Emmrich moved towards the intact walls, angling himself to reduce his own visibility but maintain as much advantage as he could.
He felt the shift in the Fade; the materialisation of an individual, then a downward reeling as Neve cast her Slow Time spell. She had manipulated the casting to free Rook from the effects. The Reaper was a blur, swinging out her shield, smashing it into their ambusher with a sickening crack of bone against metal. Rook then vanished in a flick of brown leather while blood and teeth sprayed out of the Venatori’s mouth, the world speeding up as the spell wound down. Rook was already on her follow up, crystal shards jutting out of warrior’s chest. Emmrich took his cue, his summoning reaching out to touch the magical shards, blowing their attempted assailant apart in a second gruesome shower of blood and bodily matter.
Neve had her attention on him, that appraising look she had given him the first time they met, a calculating swirl behind her gaze. ‘You two work well together,’ she remarked mildly.
‘I’d argue it was a team effort,’ Emmrich replied. ‘Your control of that Time Stop was outstanding. To transfer the confluence of energy to another person so that they are moving in step with reality takes an extraordinary amount of power.’
He found himself caught in the incredulous gaze of both women. Rook leant against the door frame, eyebrows raised with her ‘this will be good’ expression settling into place. While Neve’s lips became a thin line, a slight flare in her nostrils and a minute shift as her knuckles whitened from clutching her stave.
‘Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?’ Neve asked, her voice dropping to a dangerous cadance, taking a small step forward.
He held his hands up as a gesture of supplication. ‘Merely remarking on the amount of power and control such a feat takes.’
She turned, her expression remained as cold as her magic, before turning her displeased frown on Rook. She leant away as Neve stalked past her almost as if Neve now emanated cold from her very body. Rook remained in place against the door frame as Neve’s footsteps faded away and looked at him when silence fell, her face slightly pinched as if she’d actually been harmed.
‘Probably best not to insinuate she’s a Blood Mage,’ Rook said sardonically, pushing away from the wall. ‘And Varric thoroughly vetted her back when we hired her.’
‘I made no such implication,’ Emmrich replied in defense. ‘There are a number of ways to access the level of power required for such an endeavour. That you both jumped to the suggestion of Blood -’
She was laughing, shaking her head, eyes sparkling with cold humour. ‘Oh, Emmrich, how is it any different to the rest of the team thinking you’re an evil death mage?’
‘They think what?’
He felt a little faint at the thought, but Rook was looking at him with a shocked expression, her lips parting in a ‘oh’ before she clapped a hand over her mouth.
‘They don’t,’ she said hastily between her fingers
Emmrich tilted his chin towards her, eyeing her sharply with a raised eyebrow. She looked away, cheeks colouring with embarrassment.
‘Lucanis may have said that when you first arrived,’ she eventually admitted under his scrutiny. ‘But he doesn’t think that now,’ she added quickly.
‘And what does he think now?’
‘Just death mage,’ she said with a nonchalant shrug but still managing to look repentant.
‘Rook -’ he began, but Neve calling back to ask if they were coming cut him short.
Rook managed to duck around him as she called back to Neve, leaving him with little choice to follow her. She moved at a spritely pace towards the stairs but his longer strides allowed him to catch up to her.
‘It’s remarkable really,’ he said mildly, following her down the steps. ‘We’re both Necromancers, yet I am the one to endure being known as ‘death mage’.’
‘Lucanis is-’ she started, turning to look at him but stopped, almost skidding as she came to a stand still when her attention was diverted to a wide but dried pool of blood.
Emmrich had to pull himself up short to prevent himself from walking right into Rook. From the angle he was at to her, he could see the colour drain from her face, and a slow, painful swallow. He caught a faint tremble in her hand as she lifted it to cover her mouth. The Fade hung heavily around them, the veil thin from a particularly brutal murder. Emmrich could feel the residual horror pressing at him. Rook carefully stepped around the blood, tiptoeing around the devastation of the ransacked shop before heading outside.
He’d begun to follow when he heard her cry out for a second time. This time it was a shrill sob that he wouldn’t have thought possible from her. The sight beyond was enough to draw him up short. The deceased hung from gallows constructed directly in front of them. A public declaration of war against the Shadow Dragons. Around the square, stretching down the street in either direction, more bodies hung from smaller gallows, the Venatori stringing up their victims in any space available. Emmrich reached out and placed his hand on her upper arm, squeezing gently. Her hand reaching up, lacing their fingers together and returning the gesture, her head tilting so her cheek rested against his thumb.
He remained close to her for the rest of the journey to the Cobbled Swan. While he felt his own churning horror at the sight before him, Rook had faced the possibility of this being her fate and she walked with a hard stare and clenched jaw. The rancid stench of rotting corpses filled the air. They’d been like this for weeks acting as a deterrent against further dissent. Such a thing would not be allowed anywhere in Nevarra; no Mortalitasi, regardless of Order, would stand for such desecration.
It certainly put the cremation he had witnessed in Amaranthine into some perspective. While he still considered it barbarous, at least it had been done with care; the body lovingly wrapped and carefully carried to the pyre. The singing, a chorus of sadness that had risen with the flames, had been a moving sight but for the act it accompanied.
‘Are you alright?’ Neve asked, once they had caught up to her in a nearby market square. ‘I thought necromancers weren’t overly concerned with the dead?’ Neve further enquired, a saccharine nonchalance to her tone as she flicked a hand in the direction of more hanging deceased.
‘It is one thing,’ said Rook, her tone laced with anger but measured, ‘to work with the dead, but this is just needless, wanton destruction of life.’ She stepped up to Neve so she could drop her voice to a near whisper. ‘You know what I am. What Necromancy is. So, was this your punishment for me? Force me to endure hundreds of scattered corpses when I have already dreamt this every night since?’
Neve had the decency to look abashed, looking away from Rook, who was no longer a friend, but their leader. The quiet authority within her a lingering vestige of the woman who had been a Lieutenant of the Watch, holding a position of command.
‘Rook, I-‘
‘I am sorry for what happened here, and I know you think I made the wrong call,’ Rook cut her off sharply. ‘But you’re one of the smartest people I know, and under that pain and anger, you know there was no right call here. The people of Treviso would not have deserved this fate either.’ She clicked her tongue. ‘So, are we done?’
She didn’t wait for an answer, striding across the market square with her hand resting on her sword hilt leaving Emmrich with a tugging desire to find out what she had been like when confined to the ranks of the Watch. That she had struck out during the War of the Banners suggested she had bristled against the authority pressed down on her. In her pursuit of a solution to the gods, she had become nebulous, touching several parts of Thedas at once.
‘So, the Mourn Watch chucked her out?’ Neve asked, her dark eyes on him.
‘I believe it was a request that she leave before removing her permanently,’ Emmrich replied. ‘I didn’t mean to imply you are a Blood Mage, but the raw power needed to do that usually surpasses the natural reserve of even the most powerful mages.’
Neve chuckled, a proper amused laugh with a smile to match. ‘What can I say? I’m that good.’
Surprisingly, she fell into step with him now they were forced to follow Rook, who was only distinguishable by her lilac bun bobbing through the crowd.
‘It’s best not to linger,’ Neve said. ‘Last thing you want is to be pickpocketed.’
The possibility had occurred to him before leaving the Lighthouse. Harding mentioned it over breakfast before they left, and he had swiftly placed a hex on his valuables that would mark the thief and place them into a nightmare until the item returned to him. It was a particularly vicious working, not one he’d usually consider using, but no one would be harmed if they didn’t attempt to steal from him.
They reached the tavern as Rook sat down with Harding and two women he had not yet met, but it was easy to deduce their identities. Neve pointed out Lady Morrigan; she had a regal bearing to her with arresting amber eyes and draped in red robes with a golden necklace that held an emerald in its centre setting. Ellana Lavellan sat beside Morrigan speaking to Harding with a warm smile.
Neve handed him a drink, a tankard filled with foaming ale while she held a delicate goblet. He took a tentative sniff, noting sweet floral hints and decided it was worth the risk while following Neve. She led him to a table that placed them both in Rook’s eyeline before she turned to him.
‘So, another member of the Mourn Watch,’ she said, crossing her legs and leaning in to drop her voice. ‘Did you know Rook before all this started?’
‘I knew of her,’ Emmrich confirmed carefully. ‘The Reapers, however, often conduct their own duties within The Necropolis. My own experiences with them have been limited, even as a senior member of the order. It was Bellara who had actually reached out, several weeks earlier.’
‘You’re the Professor she contacted about -’ she clicked her fingers.
‘The reverberative oscillations within the Lighthouse, and its dimensional peculiarities, amongst other things,’ he finished for her. ‘Yes.’
Neve chuckled fondly. ‘She always has a lot of questions, but we’d have never got to The Crossroads without her. Have you managed to answer her question?’
‘About the Lighthouse? I have a working theory,’ he said mildly, not wishing to give anything away. ‘A few more tests across the next few weeks should be able to confirm it one way or another.’
She appeared to catch his caution because she turned her attention to the table where Rook sat. ‘Tell me,’ she said, after watching them for a few minutes, ‘what do you know of The Inquisitor? What stories reached your Necropolis?’
‘Much of what we learnt came after the crisis had largely been resolved,’ Emmrich replied thoughtfully, reflecting back on the tumultuous year that had occurred a decade earlier. ‘The Necropolis itself was in turmoil when it happened. Within the confines of the wards, the Veil is deliberately thin to allow for the free movement of the spirits. It left us susceptible to Rifts opening across the city. But the Inquisitor was of little interest when it became known that Vestalous Pentaghast’s niece was among those who founded the Inquisition upon Justinia’s death, and of course, then became Divine.’ He took a sip of the ale, humming with pleasure at the sweet undernotes. ‘Some more, disillusioned members of the order and other some other sects among the Mortalitasi were hopeful that the elevation of a Pentaghast to the Sunburst Throne would pave the way for more Nevarran influence to doctrine, but Lady Cassandra has never been a supporter of the Necromantic arts. Much to her uncle’s enduring disappointment.’
‘Sounds as if you knew her?’
‘Lady Cassandra?’ He huffed out a small laugh. If only Neve realised what a ridiculous notion that would have been. ‘I was a lowly apprentice and novice, far below the notice of anyone associated to one of the Prelates of the Necropolis by the time she left.’
‘But you know her uncle now?’
Emmrich lifted his eyebrow at her. ‘Ms. Gallus, are you attempting to extract information from me?’
Neve spread her hands wide, mirroring his earlier gesture of supplication back in the devastated hideout. ‘The Inquisitor, according to sources I have, was romantically involved with Solas,’ she said, leaning in, her voice dropping. ‘If there is a lead to getting more information about her before Rook commits to any formal alliance, all the better for us. She could be biding her time, waiting for the moment to rejoin Solas through Rook.’
‘Solas was also responsible for the opening of the Veil in the first place,’ Emmrich countered. ‘Something she fought to close.’
Neve’s dark gaze was back on the Inquisitor. ‘Love,’ she said, with the weight of experience, ‘is an emotion of irrationality, that can make us change our whole world view just to be with the person of our desire.’
Emmrich tried to keep his attention on Neve, but it snagged to Rook as she took an object offered to her by the Inquisitor. He watched her take it, slender and blue, and as Rook held it up he realised he was an idol of some sort. Harding was frowning then asked a question but their voices were so low, and the overall ambiance of the tavern loud enough, that he had not been able to hear a word of the exchange. He took another sip of the ale, allowing the malty warmth to rest his mind.
‘You speak as if you have some experience in the matter,’ he said, returning to the topic of conversation with Neve.
‘Not personally,’ she replied, also returning to the conversation. ‘But more than enough cases have gone sideways because of it.’
The meeting wrapped up. As she passed them, Lady Morrigan bowed her head in greeting to Neve while holding the Inquisitor in conversation. Behind them, Rook and Harding followed, joining their table. Rook sat opposite him and this close, he could feel remnants of the Fade radiating off the relic she held. He watched her run her thumbs up the length of it, her lips pulled into a frown and her attention on it only breaking when Neve asked her what it was.
‘She says her team found it at the ritual site,’ said Rook, looking over the table at her and handing it over. ‘And it has some connection to Solas. They think it could resonate with something in the Lighthouse.’
‘It feels like the ritual dagger,’ said Neve, casting a concerned glance at Harding. She shifted further back in her seat when Neve returned it back to Rook. ‘We should be careful, there’s no guarantee that what it resonates with won’t bring us harm. Why would such an item reveal itself to the Inquisitor? Why didn’t we find it?’
Rook stowed the item away in one of her pockets. ‘We hardly mounted an extensive search of the site after the dagger did, whatever it did, to Lace.’ Her gaze flicked from Harding to him. ‘Have you been able to discover anything about the dagger?’
‘While it appears to have a multitude of uses,’ Emmrich replied. ‘It is difficult to discern the full extent on the basis that it was forged by no process known to any living being but Solas. Unweaving the magic infused within it is proving difficult even in the Fade. I have been considering that the enchantments within the Necropolis could help as well as consulting some of the Greater Spirits that reside within.’
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
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The opening to the chapter is, essentially, depicting the circumstances depicted in the Codex entry A Distressing Sight.
-- --
The excursion with Harding, reaching the northern shores of Ferelden and the once glittering jewel of Amaranthine, should have been the perfect escape. It was a simple day trip, suggested when Harding had found Emmrich examining the Vi’Revas in the Lighthouse’s lower chamber. She wanted supplies, comforts from home despite being from further to the south, near Redcliffe. It was evident as soon as they joined the throng towards the city gates that desperation permeated through everything. Whispers of a new Blight tainted every conversation, but Emmrich could hardly begrudge them their fear. Amaranthine had fared poorly during the previous Blight; from Arl Rendon Howe’s treachery to Queen Elissa Theirin’s desperate push to save the city at the end the Aramathine Conflict, it appeared as though the city was fated to fall only to be rescued by the smallest whisper of grace. While the city had been rebuilt, and the physical wounds had healed, the devastating era was in the living memory of most of the population.
The city was unlike any of the others across Ferelden, Harding explained. ‘The Queen had a lot of the older buildings removed in the rebuild when she was Warden-Commander. She imported a lot of the stone from dwarven mines and outposts associated with Orzammar because it was stronger. It probably saved the city when the rifts opened,’ she continued, pausing outside a building that contained the city council’s meeting chambers and assize courts.
White stone stood gleaming above a still bustling market; although if Emmrich had learnt anything from Lucanis’ regular visits to Treviso, it would take the entire annihilation of the city to stop a market.
‘My da worked on this building,’ said Harding softly. ‘I always like coming to look at it.’
‘He’s no longer with us?’ Emmrich asked, catching the wistfulness of her tone.
Harding shook her head. ‘A few years ago now. He was older than ma, and she just woke up to him gone. But he built amazing things. He oversaw the repairs to Redcliffe’s gatehouse after the Venatori occupation during the Mage-Templar War.’ She smiled. There was warmth but unguarded sadness in the expression as she turned away.
‘They never truly leave us,’ he said, following her. ‘He must have been very proud of you?’
She huffed a soft chuckle. ‘Constantly moaned I didn’t come home often enough, but there was always too much to see. Too much to do. When the world gets opened up to you like it did for me, you just want to keep going.’ She fell quiet for a moment, looking at her hands. ‘But yeah, he was proud of me.’
Emmrich was beginning to see the value in that philosophy. Just two days ago, he’d been standing in the searing heat of Rivain, surrounded by flora and fauna he had only read about but never dreamt he’d see. Now, he was in the famously rugged coastlands of northern Ferelden, listening to a newly found colleague give him a brief history lesson of a much storied city through the lens of her father’s contributions to the rebuilding efforts. In a further two days' time, he might find himself in Treviso or Arlathan Forest with more aspects of the world to discover.
Their path brought them to a Chantry, a building carefully incorporating old styles and new design. Ferelden Chantry’s were famous for their humble sized buildings compared to the towering houses of worship across the rest of Thedas. Within the Necropolis, the Chantry of the Eternal Vigil towered up by ten stories, with white towers topped with spires and flying buttresses holding it up, dominating the view in every area of that level of the complex. The Eternal Vigil itself constantly echoed from its halls, audible all though the upper chamber, and could even be heard in the city above on a quiet day. The song of life and death spoke of the central tenets of Nevarran belief about the path all must take to find oneself at the side of the Maker. The song never ended thanks to a ceaseless cycle of choralist singing in shifts; not unlike the unending singing of the Chant of Light in Val Royeaux’s Grand Cathedral.
‘It was badly damaged in that final battle of that conflict,’ said Harding. ‘But it has some really old stained glass frescos, apparently, so it was saved.’
‘This is the reputed site of Andraste revealing the Chant of Light, is it not?’ Emmrich asked. ‘That is what Brother Bedine writes in his travelogue.’
‘So they say,’ replied Harding.
‘Are we permitted access to look?’
‘The doors aren’t locked,’ she replied with a shrug.
While she entered with him, Harding sat down in one of the pews, head bowed and eyes closed in contemplation. Around him, the soft singing of the Canticle of Threnodies filled the eaves and he paused for a moment to contemplate the Andrastian interpretation on the creation of the Fade. He’d always been uncertain about the story, more so now that he had seen the Black City in such close proximity. Its towers had more in common with the Elven ruins he had seen than any human design dating back to a similar era.
Emmrich continued his journey to the chancel, where Bedine had described a wheel window that shone beams of light down onto a mosaic of Andraste’s first teaching. The overcast day dimmed the spectacle Bedine had written off, but at least the ancient work had been saved despite the damage that had been clearly wrought in this part of the Chantry. He crouched to get a better look, the careful workmanship evident in the laying of each tiny tile, creating the face of Andraste within the larger fresco of her first teaching. True to Bedine’s explanation, it was not the usual presentation of Andraste hinting at an origin older than the Chantry’s traditional depiction. He glanced up while reaching into a pocket for the notebook he carried when he saw a tall fire, red flames licking up towards the grey sky. He walked towards the window, pausing when he had a clear look beyond.
He knew, of course, the mainstream practice beyond Nevarra was to burn the remains of their dead. Mere days had passed since he’d discussed the matter with Harding after expressing her fear of Manfred. It had been something he’d been able to put to the back of his mind long ago. He’d assumed he would not leave Nevarra long enough to witness such a spectacle. Besides, Lichdom meant he could release himself from the worry of what would become of his remains. He would still be within his body; flesh cast aside for gleaming bone and a never ending pulse of magic thrumming through his being.
Unless he died here, or some other location far from the Necropolis. He needed to be alive for the very first part of the ritual otherwise his soul would be lost to the Fade.
Outside a body, tightly wrapped in a shroud, was brought forth on the shoulders of eight men while cold nausea wrapped around Emmrich. He looked to his right, half expecting to find Rook beside him, her steely eyes on the ritual, watching with the quiet dignity befitting a member of the Mourn Watch when observing any funerary practice. Dignity he was struggling to maintain.
‘Perhaps we should go, Professor?’ Harding suggested from his left.
Back in the sanctuary of his laboratory within the Lighthouse, Emmrich sat with his pen poised over his personal journal, not even noting the drip straining the page. The paralytic fear of what his fate would be should his life end outside the carefully crafted plans he had set out for himself froze him in place. It was enough to reconsider this venture; he could return to the Necropolis and consult from the safety of his lectern.
And yet, there was a spiralling laugh. And a twist of orange and lilac. Besides, he wasn't sure that he could endure the look of disappointment Rook would surely give him were he to announce he was decamping to Nevarra. She had already anchored some part of him here, a friendship and bond, something not felt in years, building between them outside of his growing desires for her.
He needed to move. A walk to clear his head of the conflicting thoughts. He had barely closed his door when Bellara’s voice rang up from the library.
‘It feels like we’re at war,’ she said, her voice uncharacteristically solemn. ‘Lots of little wars.’
Moving closer to the mezzanine’s balustrade, Emmrich looked down to see Rook pacing with her arms crossed over her chest. Silence had fallen over the assembled team. Only the brush of her velvet coat was audible until she spun. She dropped her arms with a sigh of frustration.
‘I don’t think our allies amount to being able to fight a war, especially lots of little ones,’ Rook concluded, pausing beside her chair and placing her hand on the backrest revealing a cream skirt indicating that she had not left the Lighthouse through the day.
‘No,’ Davrin agreed. ‘You need an army to fight a war, and they’ve got two.’
‘So, how do we fight back?’ Bellara asked, looking down, fear crossing her face.
Rook clicked her tongue, pushing a lock of hair over her shoulder. ‘Just because they don’t amount to an army, doesn’t mean we can’t look to them for help. The Veiljumpers,’ she said looking at Bellara, ‘after D’Meta’s Crossing, Strife must have some desire to push back?’ Bellara nodded. ‘And the Crows,’ she continued, turning to Lucanis, ‘driving back that dragon must have earnt us something?’
Lucanis nodded. ‘You impressed Viago. Not an easy feat, especially for someone outside the Crows.’
‘The incursion into the Necropolis is not going to be left unanswered either,’ Rook continued, glancing up in Emmrich’s direction, revealing she had been aware of his presence despite not commenting on it. He nodded slowly. ‘We have the Mourn Watch at our side, so what else?’
‘This note was waiting for me when I got back,’ Harding said, holding up some folded parchment. ‘Lady Morrigan has requested a meeting at the Cobbled Swan in Minrathous.’
Rook pushed away from her chair to resume her pacing, a slight stiffness still present in her movement. ‘Has she found some trace of the gods?’
He headed down the steps to join the conversation as Harding informed the group that Morrigan wasn’t a frequent visitor to crowded Taverns in the middle of besieged cities.
‘I’ve also had word from Antoine and Evka in the Hossberg Wetlands,’ said Davrin. ‘Antoine says there is something strange is happening with the Blight there. Sounds an awful lot like what you described in D’Meta.’
Rook held up her hands to pause the stream of information coming at her and walked to the table in the middle of the room. ‘Let me get this straight a moment,’ she said, pushing the books aside and opening what appeared to be her personal journal to a blank double page. She picked up one of the lead pens often left there. ‘We have the Veil Jumpers, and D’Meta’s Crossing,’ Her hand slid across the page leaving an elegant scrawl of words in its place. ‘Then the Crows, a dragon, the Antaam and whoever their human traitor is. The Watch, thanks to the Venatori.’ A pattern emerged with the addition of the Necropolis at the bottom left, she was placing the words geographically. ‘Morrigan in Minrathous’ she continued, speaking more to herself than the group, ‘and Wardens in the Wetlands with weird Blight on their hands.’ She looked up at Davrin. ‘The First Warden wasn’t all that impressed when we last met, wanted to arrest me actually, so will he be there?’
Davrin laughed. ‘I don’t keep track of his movements,’ he said, ‘but the First Warden is a political mover. It’s Warden-Commander Janos you need to be wary of, get on his wrong side and there’s no chance to get the Wardens on board. Even if the First Warden is more involved than he might normally be, he can’t stop you from asking a few questions. Evka and Antoine know you're keen to help, and if we get out there fast enough, your involvement might not even get back to him.’
‘Ghilan’nain has lain low since we hurt her dragon,’ she said, straightening to address the whole group. ‘And Elgar’nan has yet to show himself, but where they go, the Blight spreads. So, it’s a lead and there are no better people than the Wardens to track the Blight.’ She tapped her pen against her thigh. ‘The Wardens and Morrigan seem like our best leads on finding the gods, but the others may have leads on how they plan to act,’ she concluded after a moment.
‘Are they really gods?’ Taash asked, speaking up for the first time since Emmrich arrived. ‘Or just really powerful, ancient mages? It isn’t clear?’
As she spoke, the door opened and Emmrich looked around. By his count they were all there.
‘They’re gods,’ drawled the dark haired woman with a Tevinter accent. ‘Or the closest thing to them.’
The oldest members of the group, the ones there from the start all shifted. Lucanis straightened to attention with her name a soft utterance he breathed out while Rook spun around in a flurry of velvet. Bellara squeaked as Neve Gallus strode to the table, every other step a metallic clink from her prosthesis. Rook watched with narrowed expression, eyes steely as she tracked the newcomer come to a halt beside Bellara. The two women briefly clasped hands in greeting and delight stirred in the elf’s eyes.
‘You’re back,’ said Rook, the words lingering between a statement and a question.
‘Yeah, I am,’ she replied, a touch of frost in her voice and eyes when she turned her attention to Rook.
Rook nodded curtly. ‘Then, a couple of new people have joined since you’ve been gone.’ She pointed in Emmrich’s direction first. ‘This is Professor Emmrich Volkarin. He’s our Fade expert, and a fellow Watcher - ‘
‘Charmed,’ he interjected, with a slight bow in her direction as she cast an appraising glance over him.
‘- and Taash, our dragon hunter.’
At the introduction, Neve looked away, turning her attention to the Qunari. Neve looked Taash up and down, another appraising look and a downturned expression on her face as she turned the information over before her shoulders dropped.
‘Minrathous could have used you,’ she said sadly.
‘What’s going on? In Minrathous?’ Rook’s voice was softer than usual.
Neve clasped her hands together and fixed Rook with a daunting stare. ‘What isn’t? Look, you made an impossible call without enough information, and you did what you thought was right. I get it. It’s the corner the gods put us in.’ She looked away from Rook to the floor. ‘It just might take some time to shake off.’
Rook nodded her head, expression saddened and resigned. Emmrich was aware of the decision she’d been forced to make before seeking him out in the Necropolis. No one, bar for some remarks of gratitude from Lucanis, had spoken of the terrible decision that had left the Tevinter capital overrun by the Venatori.
‘But you’re back right?’ Asked Bellara, turning to fully look at Neve, reaching for her hand again.
‘Yeah, Bel, I’m back,’ she reassured her friend, taking Bellara’s hand in both of hers.
‘With everything that’s happened in Minrathous, Rook, I’ve got even more reason to go after the gods,’ Neve replied, not exactly warmly but with less frost than she had begun with. ‘If anyone has a shot at this, it’s the people here. I’m still on the job. Count on it.’
A hopeful smile lifted Rook’s face, warmth kindling in her eyes. ‘Then let's follow up on some of these leads.’
‘I’ll let Morrigan know we’re ready to meet,’ said Harding.
‘And, Antoine and Evka are holed up in a village called Lavendel,’ said Davrin. ‘Can your mirror get us there?’
‘Bel?’ Rook inclined her head towards the Veil Jumper.
‘We’ll have to go out into The Crossroads, the Heights, but if Harding can help we should be able to skirt any lingering Darkspawn, if they’re back’
Rook frowned. Emmrich had deduced early on that the Heights were considered the most dangerous part of The Crossroads, habitually infested with darkspawn. Harding nodded.
‘Right, you should all rest, the fight might come sooner than we expect,’ said Rook.
The dismissal in her voice was clear. Bellara linked arms with Neve while Lucanis darted around the group to catch them up, falling in step before reaching the door. Harding had already begun speaking with Davrin to discuss seeking out which mirror would get them as close to the Warden’s location as possible, while Taash approached Rook.
‘Hey, there’s a situation out in Rivain that could use your attention,’ she said. ‘Might help get the Lords on side.’
Rook bent to the table, pen on the paper in the approximate location of Rivain in relation to the rest of the notes, humming in encouragement to continue.
‘Isabella has been getting supplies out to Treviso for months, she‘s got a lot of Crow ties, but the contact has gone missing in the coastlands near to where we tracked the Vinsomer,’ Taash explained.
‘So, tracking down what happened to the contact, and finding the supplies?’
‘Might help with the Crows as well?’
‘Extra collateral with anyone will help,’ agreed Rook, setting down her pen. ‘Are you settling in okay?’
Taash blinked, then her eyes flicked towards Emmrich, a crinkle forming between her eyebrows prompting Rook to look over her shoulder. His fellow Watcher raised her eyebrows then turned back, Taash’s expression schooled back into place.
‘I’m fine,’ she replied. ‘It’s not what I’m used to, but I can get home easily enough when I need to.’
‘Anything you need, just ask.’
Taash nodded her head in thanks then followed the others. Dreamlight briefly flooded the room before enclosing Emmrich and Rook in the usual cool darkness of the library. She half turned in his direction, tilting her head towards him.
‘I’ve been meaning to thank you,’ she said, her fingers absently twisting through a lock of hair. ‘For healing me the other night, but I feel you may have been avoiding me?’
‘No.’ The lie tasted like ash. ‘There is a lot to catalogue.’ True. ’Harding and I also visited Ferelden after she found me examining the mirror downstairs. Amaranthine, in fact.’ Also true. ‘She said I couldn’t just visit Orlais, and not Ferelden.’
Rook chuckled. ‘They are patriotic people,’ she said. ‘You’ll be more travelled than me once this is all over. I’ve not been to Ferelden either.’
She looked at him, that steely indomitability swirling in her eyes, pinning him in place. Again. The sensation settled heavily in his chest, banishing any desire to leave her side. Her fingers had ceased their fiddling, but she chewed on her lip as if she wanted to say something but couldn’t capture the words. He was in no better situation, mind blissfully blank under her attention.
Then she sucked in a deep breath, looking away, down at the map she had sketched with her notes. ‘Well, thank you.’
As with the others, the note of dismissal was clear. With a bow he left her to the quiet fortress of her thoughts. But when she didn’t arrive for dinner, he fixed her a plate with a goblet of wine, which he set down before her in the library. She’d been staring off into the middle distance, and she startled when the plate clinked on the table top. She blinked, shaking out her thoughts.
‘She’s never going to forgive me,’ Rook said quietly as he took his usual seat opposite her. ‘Neve, that is.’
He remained quiet for a moment, focusing on the haphazard collection of chairs and green sofa that had become a regular meeting spot, desperately not looking as she moved her hair over her shoulder, exposing her neck and sharp line of her jaw.
‘If that were true,’ he replied, keeping his voice as soft as hers, ‘I doubt she would have come back.’
Rook swallowed, dragging his attention back to her neck. ‘I don’t really know her well enough to say,’ she admitted. ‘I thought she was going to rain down all her icy fury on me when we finally reached Minrathous. But she just looked tired. Broken. I did that.’
‘You didn’t send those dragons,’ he told her gently, watching her take a gulp of wine. ‘And if what I’ve been told is true, which I suspect it is, you saved hundreds of innocent lives in a city that had no defences.’
‘The people of Minrathous were undefended,’ said Rook, settling the goblet down. ‘Even without the Venatori having a stranglehold on the city, the Magisterium would never have used their defences to help the people who actually need it. They’d have driven the dragon off the upper city,’ she continued with a flick of her hand, ‘left the lower city to burn, and still called it a victory.’ She tapped the table with her index finger, her nail rapping loudly off the polished wood. ‘I could have stopped that happening.’
‘At the expense of what you did save,’ Emmrich countered gently. ‘War produces casualties, you know that. Would you rather Lucanis’ wrath? Potentially further fuelled by Spite?’
She sighed. ‘No.’
After taking another sip of wine, she began moving the food around her plate. He winced at the scrap of metal against the porcelain. Noticing the gesture, she put the fork down and rested her arm on the table beside the plate.
‘Sorry,’ she whispered. ‘And thank you.’
‘For what?’
‘This,’ she said with an encompassing wave of her hand. ‘The food. The talk.’ She leant back in her chair, fixing him with that anchoring gaze he wanted to drown in. ‘You know the others are going to gossip if you start bringing me food whenever I don’t show up for dinner.’
Emmrich couldn’t help but meet her gaze. ‘Let them,’ he replied, flicking his wrist in dismissal.
Rook’s lips pressed together then lifted into a smile that tightened his whole body.
-- --
The Canticle of Threnodies is the sixth book/song to the Chant of Light, they are considered dirges and laments that recount the creation of the world and the fall of man. Threnodies 8:3 appears on screen in the opening of Dragon Age: Origins
The Chantry of the Eternal Vigil, and the Eternal Vigil, are made up elements for this fic, but it's derived from Cassandra Pentaghast's experiences when she grew up within The Grand Necropolis following the execution of her parents. For Cassandra, this constant singing was something she grew to hate, along with The Grand Necropolis. In some criticism of Dragon Age:The Veilguard was the criticism that this element of Necropolis life didn't feature, but The Grand Necropolis is meant to be massive, bigger than Egypt's City of the Dead. It stood to reason that both Cassandra's experience and what we have in-game could exist together.
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
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The Rivaini climate was far hotter than Emmrich had been expecting and he fully understood Rook’s grouse on the subject over breakfast. Before him were a number of flora specimens to appraise but after the unexpected encounter with the Antaam, Emmrich had little energy for anything other than taking the well earned break while they waited for their newest recruit. Rook had taken off her breastplate, a thin sheen of sweat glossing her face, leant over a boulder, stretching her back.
Harding was the only one who looked remotely comfortable.
He supposed that the Inquisition’s former lead scout was experienced in dealing with harsh climates on either end of the scale. Not that the glorious weather beating down on them could be called harsh. Just hot. Hotter than Nevarra.
‘Had you ever left Nevarra before you joined us, Professor?’ Harding asked, handing him a waterskin.
He took it gratefully, ignoring the use of his academic title. He’d decided the better way to encourage the team’s acceptance was to allow them all to call him what they felt comfortable with.
‘I’ve rarely left the Necropolis,’ he explained, ‘but I have been to Orlais. That was decades ago, however, and not far over the border. Not enough to notice the difference in any case.’
‘I wouldn’t let an Orlesian hear you say that,’ Harding chuckled.
‘I’ve not been to Orlais,’ Rook mused, turning her head to look at them. ‘Why haven’t we been to Orlais, Harding?’
‘Because Solas had already left by the time we bumped into you,’ said Harding, taking back the waterskien. ‘Besides, Empress Celene was pretty pissed with us on the way out, so best not to go back and poke that dragon.’
‘I know you keep saying you don’t, but you really do know everyone,’ said Rook. ‘The Empress of Orlais,’ she started, holding a finger up, ‘the King and Queen of Ferelden, Magister Pavus, the White Divine, the Inquisitor, Lady Morrigan.’
‘Bar for Ellana, Cassandra and Dorian, I don’t know them, know them,’ countered Harding, ‘and besides I’ve never actually met the Empress, that was all Varric.’
‘Figures,’ said Rook, before she turned her attention to Emmrich. ‘See, she likes to play it down, but Harding had mingled with the high and mighty of Southern Thedas. Closest I’ve got was an arranged betrothal to the fourth son, of the fourth son of the forty-third irgend etwas Baron Van Markham,’ Rook lamented. ‘As a senior necromancer, Emmrich, you must have met some of the great and good of Nevarra? Or at least embalmed them.’
‘Rook,’ he admonished, but his thoughts snagged on the small tidbit of information she had just revealed. Harding’s lack of response was also telling.
‘Ignore her,’ laughed Harding. ‘She likes to tease her friends.’
‘Bit rich coming from Miss ‘anything-you-talk-about-beginning-with-N-makes-you-sound-fancy’,’ Rook bickered back.
Harding shook her head, but there was little doubt as to the fondness the pair felt for each other. Rook had turned her face back to the sun, and drawn one leg up so her knee was close to her chest, holding it in place as she stretched the muscles there.
‘You know, I can’t tell if she actually expects you to answer that or not,’ Harding mused after a moment. ‘Is it normal for members of the Mourn Watch to be interested in who each other embalms? What is embalming?’
Emmrich felt a surge of sympathy for the dwarf. Her eyes were so curious but their last conversation around the practices of the Mourn Watch and the dead had not gone well. Rook was now holding her other leg to her chest, while turning her head away from them both, but he could easily imagine her biting down on her lip as she suppressed laughter.
‘Some Watchers like to gossip about the new inhabitants of the Necropolis,’ Emmrich eventually replied, mustering all the dignity his position afforded him. ‘But it isn’t encouraged. As for embalmment, it is one of the many practices we use to care for our dead.’
Harding gave a nervous chuckle, holding up her hand to indicate she didn’t want to know more but Emmrich’s attention was back on Rook. She was facing the sun again. Tension had clustered around her lips and eyes, her skin paler than it had been moments earlier. Sweat had beaded above her brow.
‘I thought you said you hadn’t been hit,’ Emmrich said, his tone more accusing than he intended, moving towards Rook to examine her more closely.
Rook opened her eyes, and gingerly pushed herself off the boulder. His words had prompted Harding to look concerned then began digging through her pack.
‘I wasn’t,’ she said, pressing her hand to her ribs, wincing slightly. ‘I twisted badly getting out of Taash’s way. She was charging in my direction, and for a moment, I thought she was Antaam. When I realised, well,’ she shrugged, wincing even more, bending over slightly. ‘I didn’t think she’d want a face full of my shield.’
‘Hardly the best way to make a good impression on our new associate,’ Emmrich agreed as Harding fished out a healing potion.
‘Last one of this batch,’ she said, offering it to Rook.
The Reaper took it gratefully, unstoppering it and gulping it down, holding back a grimace at the flavour. A bit of colour returned to her cheeks and she smiled at Harding as she handed back the empty flask. Emmrich watched her for a moment, realisation dawning; Rook could have healed herself on the battlefield. Alongside their renowned understanding of hexspells and wardweaves, Reapers could draw on the life forces of their enemies, weakening them while converting that power into a personal source of healing. She hadn’t done it. He remembered her telling him that the others forgot she was a Necromancer. He felt a strange, softness curl around him for their leader. That she would rather allow her team to see her as normal, or at least non threatening, than use magic to heal herself was quite remarkable, if foolish. She quirked her lips up in a gentle expression as if she understood the direction of his thoughts.
Heavy footsteps heralded the return of Taash, a bag carelessly slung over her shoulder. Rook schooled her expression to one of welcome.
‘Ready?’ She asked, bending down to pick up her chest piece and shield, wincing even more as she moved.
Emmrich beat her to it, picking up the heavy breast plate and leather strap attached to her shield. ‘Allow me.’
Her eyebrows flicked as he shouldered her shield. ‘Be my guest.’
--//-*-\\--
It had been years since Emmrich had last pulled Hubers Fundamentals of Healing from a bookcase. It was considered first year reading due to its broad look at anatomy, how to mix basic healing potions and simple spells for rejuvenation. He’d not had a need of it for years because he had not found himself facing a living patient since his twenties. However, he couldn’t just stitch the damage together in the same way he would a cadaver. Living tissue needed a different sort of care.
He would need to establish which of the muscles Rook had damaged although based on where she had been pressing her hand and the slight change in her gait, Emmrich would have diagnosed it as the latissimus dorsi being strained. At worst, the serratus posterior. Either way, Harding’s potion would hardly be enough to stave off the pain for long. Nor was it capable of the accelerated healing needed to get Rook back on her feet.
Beside him, Manfred ground the herbs Emmrich had instructed him to work with while the reagent simmered under a low flame. Glancing in the mortar, Manfred was close to finished so he put the book aside and pulled a small bottle from one of the many drawers under the desk. He held it to the light, a slightly viscous liquid curled towards the stopper. He wrapped his hand around it to warm the bottle then after a moment unscrewed it to extract a couple of drops to add to the reagent. With his gloved hand, he picked up the bottle at its neck and swirled it until it took on a pink hue with a swirl of smoke.
‘The herbs, Manfred,’ he instructed as he placed a funnel in the bottle neck.
He tipped the mixture in, swirling it again, channeling some magic with a twist of his fingers until the mixture glowed a silvery grey akin to Rook’s eyes. Emmrich placed it back on the stand to heat it back through while dismissing Manfred. His assistant had found his own fascination with the Lighthouse, and so long as he stuck to the main building, Emmrich allowed him to explore when he had no need of him.
When the mixture reached a bubble Emmrich began to tidy away, placing his books back and using cleansing spells to clean his equipment. A faint pop alerted him to the potion being ready. With additional care, he decanted the contents through a straining cloth, carefully mixing more healing evocation as the liquid dripped through into the new container.
While it was a potion best drunk warm, he paused for a moment to scrub his fingers and nails clean so it could cool enough to be drinkable.
He’d never visited Rook’s rooms before but he hadn’t failed to notice the corridor was next to his own. The rest of the Lighthouse was quiet. While Taash had taken the room beside the other side of the staircase, Harding had taken it upon herself to introduce the Qunari to the rest of the team in the kitchen. Not that Emmrich particularly cared if anyone saw him go to Rook’s rooms; she certainly visited him often enough.
She was expecting him, having suggested she rest while he produced this potion so he took the liberty of knocking then pushing the door open without waiting for a reply stepping into a cool, low lit room. She was led across her couch on her stomach, head cushioned by her folded arms with a breathing pattern that suggested she could be close to sleep. He stepped in and closed the door, eyes wandering over her domain, becoming captivated by the aquarium.
Occupying what should have been the outside wall, it seemed to stretch on, impossible but for the fact they were in the Fade. The Lighthouse was truly a marvel.
‘Pretty amazing, isn’t it,’ said Rook, alerting him to the fact that he had managed to cross the room without thought. ‘I don’t know how it works - if it’s projected or like Harding’s planets, and sort of semi there.’
Emmrich turned, her eyes looked silvery in the swirlingblue light of her room.
‘I made you that tonic,’ he said, holding it up because he needed to remember why he was there. ‘If I could examine your back as well? A healing spell should help it along nicely.’
Rook blinked, still for a moment then nodded her head. He placed her tonic on the table close to her head then knelt beside her.
‘I’ll have to lift your shirt,’ he said, hand hovering over the hem.
She responded with a small wiggle, freeing an arm to lift her shirt, revealing her back all the way up to the midpoint. Unlike her hands, and her face, Rook’s back was marred with a raised lightning flower scar. Dark skin rose in ridges from a point of origin hidden by her trousers and continued under the hem of her raised shirt in the direction of her right shoulder. Emmrich’s fingers flexed involuntarily. Then he placed his bare hand down close to her spine where there was evidence of bruising. He pressed down with his thumb to feel the lines of muscle below her skin. Rook blew out a soft, painen whimper. He flattened his hand across the injury, attempting to ignore the way his fingers fit between each of her ribs. Trying to ignore how warm her skin was. How soft, despite the ridges of scaring. He focused on channeling a silent healing spell through himself into her. Calling on Spirits of Faith and Compassion to lend him, and by extension, her, their aid. The magic spread from his fingers in a warm blue glow. Tension drained from Rook’s body and the next soft breath contained a note of relief. A soft smile lifted on her face.
‘You should still take the tonic,’ he told her, lifting his hand away and sliding her shirt back into place, trying to move at a normal pace caught between wanting to linger in the moment and escaping it. ‘How did you get that scarring?’
Rook rolled over, turning enough to reach the tonic and knocked it back. ‘Pride demon,’ she said, ‘when we were trying to get to Solas’ ritual.’
She returned to her stomach as he got to his feet. Still fighting the urge to gaze at her, Emmrich turned his attention to the aquarium, grateful at having somewhere else to look. But he could still feel her gaze on him as if some inexplicable thread of the Fade connected them; the residual energy of the healing spell.
‘You want to study it, don’t you?’ She asked, yawning as she spoke. ‘Be my guest.’
He turned to answer her, but her eyes were closed, breathing even and he wondered if he had dreamt her words. Emmrich watched her for a moment, the trust she had just extended to him swirling a warm rush in his chest. He wondered what it would be to explore the expanse of her back; tracing the scars with his fingertips; following delicate ridges of her spine with his lips and mapping the valleys between her ribs where his fingers had effortlessly rested moments before. Would she sigh in contentment under his ministrations? Or something else entirely. Something needy?
He was too old for such things. Now anyway. And he had a path forged that could not afford to include an unexpected dalliance. Particularly if that dalliance still had potential ties to a former intended. Rook had not elaborated on the outcome of her betrothal, although the lack of a ring indicated it had not resulted in marriage. Not yet, at least.
And still, he could not keep his eyes off her.
Emmrich closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose with a steadying breath, reminding himself of how close he was to the end of his life’s work. His grand finale in touching distance. When he opened them again, his eyes landed on a patchwork blanket that he couldn’t entirely be certain was there before. After shaking it out, he draped it over her, his last sight of her snuggling into folds of fabric with another soft smile on her lips.
--
Author Notes:
Translations -
irgend etwas - Something or other (also, anything)
From the earliest stirrings of canon about Nevarra, the indication was that this was a Germanic coded culture, and as I was writing the segment where I added this, I felt it would work quiet well if Rook actually did drop into Nevarran, in the same way Lucanis drops into Antivan. Luckily, English is a Germanic Language as well, and the flow of the sentence ended up being better for using German in this context.
-- --
A note on Reaper's being able to heal themselves - in-game, at lvl 20 you get 'Spirit Storm', the Reaper ultimate ability that applies 'Siphon' to enemies, which converts their damage into healing. Rook not using the spell at this point in the fic is a little nod to the fact that I'm rarely at lvl 20 when I hit this point in the game, but it's also playing to the theme wherein Rook has admitted that the rest of the team seem to forget she's a Necromancer, and in this chapter, it becomes ragingly apparent to Emmrich that she has not been using her most powerful magics in front of the team because it would scare them. Within the DA universe, Necromancy is a strange one, because it's one-part spirit mage, one-part blood mage and one-part death mage, and shake until combined. From my PoV, 'Spirit Storm' and anything else that using siphoning effects is the proper terrifying Necromancy that Thedosians should be afraid of, not Emmrich raising corpses and channeling the spirits.
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
-- --
The rest of the day passed in frosty company. Rook maintained a deadly focus on the hunt for the Venatori through the Necropolis before she led them back to the Lighthouse as evening fell. Even Spite had remained silent until Rook was striding away from them to her rooms.
‘What did. You do?’ Spite demanded without taking over Lucanis.
Emmrich frowned. ‘I made a suggestion that I failed to consider would upset her,’ he explained to the spirit. ‘I will apologise to her.’
He was contemplating that apology, what form it would take, when a soft knock broke his train of thought. The door cracked open enough for Rook to slip in. She never waited to be invited in, yet Emmrich found he didn’t mind. She wasn’t loud or bombastic about her arrival unlike Davrin or even Bellara, and she brought a quiet warmth in the later hours of the day.
She clicked the door shut before she turned to look at him. She’d bathed since their return, her face scrubbed clean of the cosmetics she wore each day while her hair fell in long, slightly damp lilac waves down to her waist. In her long velvet housecoat, clasped over a full length sleeping chemise, Rook looked strangely vulnerable.
‘I feel as though I at least owe you an explanation,’ she said once she had taken a few steps into the room.
Emmrich opened his mouth but Rook held her hand up.
‘They wanted me dead,’ Rook said quietly. ‘Not just the Captains and Commanders but some of my peers. The court martial panel was clear; if I was found guilty I’d be sentenced to death due to the high ranking nature of the undead.’
Her steely eyes met his. Indomitable reserve swirled in her gaze, anchoring him in his seat.
Casual Destruction of the Dead rarely resulted in a death sentence, but it wasn’t unprecedented. That last person to receive a guilty verdict had been banished from the Watch and the Necropolis. Most received prison sentences. Emmrich swallowed, the gesture surprisingly painful at the thought of Rook being taken to the public gallows in Nevarra Square, stripped to a simple smock and left displayed until her remains moved to a charnel pit. A punishment in death as in life.
‘I’d tried to reason with them, Van Markham and Pentaghast,’ she continued, moving towards the fire in a quiet rustle of velvet over the flagstone floor. She was fidgeting with her fingers, gaze on the flames now. ‘Neither would hear it as they continued their march towards a small village outside the city. When the order came to retreat, I simply refused. Half the platoon stayed because innocent, living people needed our protection. Markham and Pentaghast already had their chances, hundreds of years earlier, what right did they have to snuff out all those lives?’
‘A Watcher’s first duty is to the living,’ Emmrich intoned quietly. ‘It is our central tenet.’
Rook nodded, turning to look at him. ‘Unless your commander and peers happens to be one of the sprawling scions of either the Van Markhams or Pentaghasts.’
In the flickering firelight, Rook had regained her strength, eyes alight with steely fire, as if she had siphoned the heat and converted it to fortitude.
She was beautiful. As ethereal as the depths of the Fade.
‘You are not the first to put down the noble undead,’ said Emmrich solemnly. ‘You will not be the last.’
‘That’s a comfort,’ she said with a half laugh.
‘I am truly sorry for having suggested you put yourself in that position,’ Emmrich told her quietly.
Rook shook her head. ‘You couldn’t have known. And I shouldn’t have behaved like it was an entirely unreasonable suggestion.’ She clicked her tongue then pressed her hands together. ‘I should go and get some rest. Never know when Harding’s contact will come through. And I’ll reach out to the Commanders about the Venatori. I know a wardweave that’ll sting if they cross the Necropolis threshold now I have some of their foci crystals.’
‘Then I shall bid you goodnight,’ Emmrich said as she turned, leaving as quietly as she arrived.
His gaze lingered on the door, a delicate floral scent left in her wake; lilac and something citrus, orange from Rivain, perhaps. A curious hiss from above drew his attention out of his musings. Above him, Manfred was on the upper floor. They’d been calibrating the Fade telescope so Emmrich could begin getting the metaphysical bearing of the Lighthouse. He had left Manfred to finish while he wrote up his findings for the day. From there, he would begin to map their surroundings.
The hint of orange still lingered in the room when he mounted the stairs up to the balcony.
‘You’ll need to start that reagent while I do this,’ Emmrich directed Manfred.
Manfred hissed again, an inquisitive uplift that prompted a smile to quirk on Emmrich’s lip.
‘Yes,’ he replied to Manfred’s suggestion about Rook. ‘She is.’
--//-*-\\--
Lace Harding stood in the laboratory with a suspicious look on her face as she watched Manfred work. Emmrich had asked for samples of the plants in her conservatory after she had off-handedly remarked they had grown after she merely thought about them. She had brought a wide selection and he had placed them on his desk for further study. Along with an increasing number of curiosities that piqued his attention every time he left his rooms.
‘You’ve nothing to be afraid of,’ Emmrich said quietly. ‘I know that your usual experiences with the undead are not particularly pleasant but Manfred was created with the care and attention befitting the dead.’
She visibly shuddered. ‘What if he turns on us?’
Manfred hissed, not a particularly helpful response given the topic of conversation. While Emmrich knew Manfred was expressing that he would never turn on them, Harding had no way of inferring that. She took a small step back and if she’d had her bow, she’d be drawing an arrow.
‘Manfred is occupied enough that he wouldn’t have the time to turn on anyone,’ Emmrich replied. ‘It is rare for benign spirits to turn to malevolent purposes when correctly cared for.’
‘And burning the bodies prevents it outright,’ Harding argued, still watchful.
Although he attempted to disguise it, Emmrich made a disgusted noise in the back of his throat. Harding opened her mouth a little, putting her hands on her hips and stared up at him.
‘I don’t get why you think cremation is so bad,’ she declared. ‘Everyone outside Nevarra does it.’
‘All those fine vessels,’ Emmrich lamented. ‘Fine mansions reduced to ashes! How would Manfred’s wisp have fared if I hadn’t given it a body?’
‘Where’d his body come from anyway?’
Rook’s curious lilt cut through the conversation. She walked into the room with a bemused expression on her face, her gaze flicking between the three of them before settling on Emmrich, a mischievous quirk to her lips. In contrast to the previous evening, she looked her battle ready self. Hair up, cosmetics perfectly applied and wearing her travelling leathers, bar for the long coat he had first met her in.
‘Oh, there was no single donor,’ he explained. ‘His arms were recovered from a charnal pit. The ribs were a gift from a dear friend and Manfred’s wisp picked out his own skull - that was quite a day!’
Harding had managed to go even paler. ‘People can do that? Donate their bodies?’
‘Quite common in Nevarra, particularly amongst Watchers,’ replied Rook. ‘A way to give back once we’re gone. My current wishes are to be brought back to train new Reaper initiates. Although if Commander Lucien Van Markham gets his way, my remains will be digging out latrines for my afterlife.’
‘I’ll be sure to let everyone know,’ Harding replied, doing her best to look nonplussed, ‘should you die before we put a stop to the Gods. Which is likely.’
‘Thanks,’ Rook replied, drawing the word out. ‘Nice to know exactly where you rate my leadership skills.’ Harding spluttered to start answering but Rook held up a hand. ‘Oh no, no, all out in the open now, Scout Harding,’ before laughing.
Emmrich shook his head with a chuckle, and both women turned their attention back to him.
‘Why is Manfred so lively? Uncommonly so,’ Rook asked.
‘As you know, Spirits of Curiosity are voracious learners,’ Emmrich explained. ‘And with such an exciting venture before us, well, it’s been my pleasure to guide him through the many new experiences we’re having.’
‘I thought he just made you tea,’ put in Harding. ‘And helped you move boxes from the Necropolis to here.’
He frowned at Harding, before turning his attention back to Rook. ‘I encountered him as a wisp in the Necropolis years ago. A simple spirit but so curious and he refused to leave my side.’
‘So, you did what any sane person would do and built a skeleton for him to live in, from spare parts?’ Harding asked dubiously, but with a gentle hint of teasing.
Beside him, Rook bit down on her lower lip turning away a little with her head down. A sign she found this deeply amusing.
‘It’s really not all that uncommon back home,’ Rook managed once she had regained a bit of composure. ‘There are plenty of things I’ve seen since leaving the Necropolis that I find frankly astonishing.’
Harding’s scrutinising gaze was now on Rook. ‘You know,’ she said slowly, ‘every time you talk about something to do with Nevarra, or the Necropolis, or Necromancy, or anything beginning with ‘N’ you sound way fancier.’
Rook turned so she was fully facing Harding again, eyebrow raised with her hands settling on her hips. ‘I do no such-‘ then caught herself. ‘No, I don’t,’ she finished with a much softer inflection.
But Harding was already laughing. ‘Thanks, Professor,’ she said between breaths, her eyes on Rook. ‘This was really enlightening.’
She left the chamber, her laughter echoing back to them. Emmrich shook his head while Rook continued to watch after Harding with a narrowed expression. He noted that the lilac and orange scent from the previous evening still clung to her.
‘I actually came by to speak to her,’ said Rook, turning back to look at him. ‘Bellara mentioned seeing her come in. She has a lead on a dragon hunter in Rivain.’ Her gaze landed on him and he straightened having realised he’d leant so close to her their eyes met at an angle that negated their height difference. Her eyes remained on him, tracking upwards and holding him. ‘I was also going to ask if you’d accompany us. Getting to Rivain means visiting one of the other islands within The Crossroads. You’ll see what I mean about them not being as safe as the city near the Nevarran mirror.’
‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘Delighted to.’
She smiled and nodded, turning slowly to follow Harding out the door. Her hand hovered over the door handle and she looked back at him over her shoulder.
‘Why make Manfred out of multiple parts?’ She asked. ‘There are plenty of whole donations.’
‘As you know, the corpse does colour the actions of a wisp once it is drawn into a body,’ said Emmrich. ‘But if one uses different sources then it lessens the whole, allowing the spirit to flourish without interference from a single host.’
‘I suppose it gives insight into a possible answer to the eternal question,’ mused Rook.
‘Whether the spirit puppets the body or if some shade of the departed return when we raise them?’ He turned his attention away from Rook to look at Manfred. He’d never considered the question before. Not in that light anyway. ‘What do you think?’
Rook turned back into the room, taking several steps back so she leant with her hip against his mortuary table. She too was studying Manfred as though a whole new school of thought had come to her.
‘I think that if you had to build a whole new body to preserve the purity of a spirit,’ she said slowly, ‘then it could suggest that some essence of the departed return when we reanimate the dead. The ethics of conducting the experiments to prove that could get dicey though.’
Emmrich hummed thoughtfully. ‘Even then, it would likely be difficult to prove those lingering glimpses might be grace.’
--//-*-\\--
Lucanis was already in the kitchen when Emmrich arrived in the morning. It wasn’t an unusual sight as the resident assassin had decided to set himself up as the team’s personal chef when he was not needed at Rook’s side. A decision that seemed just as curious as the means by which he and Spite were forced together. Ordinarily, Emmrich would have cautioned accepting food from someone trained to kill with the reputed efficiency of the Demon of Vyrantium.
‘Eggs on toast, with fried mushrooms and grilled tomatoes,’ Lucanis said in cheery greeting, pulling a plate from the oven. ‘Rook mentioned she had asked you to join her today.’
‘You do this for everyone?’ Emmrich asked, as Lucanis put the plate down.
‘It helps to be busy,’ Lucanis said mildly, returning to the stove where he was overseeing a pot of bubbling porridge. ‘Besides, when I first arrived, I had to wonder how the four of them hadn’t starved, or caught scurvy. Seems just as important work keeping us all fed and alive as it does working out how we’re going to hit back at the gods.’
Emmrich dug into his meal, the food cooked to perfection, while Lucanis continued filling the table, placing down pots of coffee and tea, slices of toast with a bowl of curled pats of butter. The door opened, and the soft clink of metal on stone accompanied Rook and Harding’s entrance.
‘I just don’t see why we couldn’t find someone in say, Ferelden, where it wouldn’t be so hot,’ Rook was bemoaning as she took her usual seat at the head of the table beside the stove. ‘Ferelden Frostback. Frost as in cold. I’m going to bake in Rivain.’
‘Then go in your leathers.’
Rook was already half clad in her armour; metal greaves covered her legs and the padded robes worn under her breastplate floated about her.
‘We’re helping someone hunt a dragon,’ she said emphatically. ‘I spent half of last night imbuing my armour with every elemental protective ward I could think of because we don’t know what sort of dragon it’ll be. The leathers, while pretty and lightweight, will not cut it.’
Lucanis returned with plates for both women.
‘You don’t have to do this,’ Rook said, her own plate mirroring Emmrich’s while Harding’s was piled high with sausages and bacon. ‘I’d have been happy with toast and fruit.’
‘And I have said before, it is no trouble,’ Lucanis replied, returning to filling the table, adding the pot of porridge along with bowls of fruit.
Rook shook her head, leaning forward to grab the pot of coffee. Lucanis finally sat down, picking up a bowl and filling it with porridge. The door banged open for a second time, and Bellara walked through, preoccupied looking up at the eaves, turning in a wide circle while still moving towards the table.
‘You guys haven’t seen a crystal have you,’ she asked, sitting down between Harding and Emmrich. ‘It’s escaped from my room.’
‘It wasn’t Spite,’ said Lucanis.
‘I’ll check Manfred hasn’t taken anything,’ said Emmrich.
‘Oh, no, I don’t think anyone’s taken it,’ Bellara said brightly. ‘It’s grown legs.’
Silence fell across the whole table, all eyes on Bellara. Emmrich raised his eyebrow at the young elf, as she took in everyone’s attention.
‘It shouldn’t harm anyone,’ she said, the chirp to her voice undimmed despite the attention.
‘Why am I not reassured?’ asked Rook, before putting her filled fork in her mouth, a dribble of egg yolk landing on her lower lip. Her tongue darted out to lick the morsel away. ‘Have you checked in with Davrin?’ She asked after swallowing her food. ‘It may have probably not hurt him.’
‘Oh, he’s probably just sleeping in now he’s finished that big bed he was making,’ Bellara said, picking up a slice of toast and again oblivious to the attention on her.
‘Big bed?’ Prompted Rook lowering her fork back to the plate with a soft clink. ‘Are you intimately acquainted with this bed?’
‘He showed me last night,’ Bellara said, ‘when I dropped by with some gingerwort truffles after I’d been back in the forest. What?’ She asked when she realised the attention was back on her for this new reason. Her lips parted in a soft ‘oh’ with realisation. ‘He’s not really my sort. And he’s busy with Assan. And monster hunting. And he’s not really interested in the things I am.’ She nibbled on her toast. ‘And I don’t think he likes me much, either.’
‘He doesn’t seem all that keen on any of us,’ Lucanis said, before turning to Rook, pulling the attention away from Bellara. ‘So how does our resident monster killer end up with a big bed and all I’ve got is a small crib and a table.’
‘Because you’ve inexplicably decided to make the pantry your bedroom,’ said Rook, pointing at the door behind Emmrich with a flourishing flick of her hand.
‘As I have previously said -‘
‘At least you’re close to the coffee,’ the three women chorused at him.
Unorthodox Introductions - III: The Spitefilled Assassin
Rating: Mature - Canon Typical Violence and Sex
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
-- --
‘These doors are powerfully warded,’ Emmrich announced, frowning as he manipulated the magical eddies around the door the wisps had displaced themselves from. ‘But someone passed through them recently.’
‘The Hand of Glory?’ Rook asked, glancing up from where she was studying a shimmering representation of ward over empty wisp receptacles.
Emmrich nodded. ‘Or by some other malevolent force.’
‘Is it wise then? To return the wisps and open the door?’ Lucanis asked as Rook wove a spell that warped around the receptacle then created a thin trail across the room.
‘The wisps act as the final layer of protection to the room, but also the means to unlock it. Very specific wording has to be used on each wisp to achieve that,’ said Emmrich as Rook got to her feet.
‘And you know that wording?’ Rook asked.
‘I will simply ask,’ Emmrich replied, as he followed the trail from Rook’s spell.
‘You can talk to Wisps?’ Lucanis asked.
Emmrich was aware he wasn’t talking to him but to Rook, who remained silent. A cursory glance over his shoulder allowed him to observe the slight shift in Rook’s shoulder for a shrug. He had already observed that her communication with wisps caught glimpses of intention, as was normal for a Watcher, but little more.
Rook followed him, watching quietly as he spoke with the wisps before assisting with returning them to their receptacles for recovery. Each time he spoke the unlocking charm, Emmrich noticed Rook watched the ward’s weave as it changed, head tilted to the side with her lips pressed together in contemplation.
‘I’m trying to see if the weave gives any indication as to what is actually behind the door,’ Rook explained when she caught him watching. ‘The bulwark of weave is relatively modern, but the shifting inscriptions are positively archaic.’
‘So, something ancient?’ Lucanis asked.
Rook shrugged before leaning in closer to the shimmering representation of the ward she had conjured. ‘There can be a lot of power in old invocations when the emphasis is on how something is said rather than what. Of course, it could be ancient and the wardweaves were renewed where possible before this portion of the Necropolis was lost.’
‘I do not feel reassured,’ Lucanis ground out.
‘I can probably guarantee that what’s behind there isn’t as bad as the Elven Gods,’ Rook remarked sardonically. ‘Let’s see what the last wisp tells us.’
‘I wish I’d stayed up in the library with Audric,’ Lucanis muttered mutinously, referring to the offer the Library attendant had extended him in a bid to find out if there was anything within the Necropolis’ archive about spirit possession in non-mages.
‘We’ll go hunting for the Venatori in the side chambers after,’ she replied brightly, patting Lucanis’ arm in a comforting gesture before she turned her attention back to Emmrich. ‘Let’s get this finished.’
As the door finally opened, Rook took point, the magic imbued in her shield charging as she whispered the invocations that gave it the ability to bounce off enemies and return to her. In the dim light, Emmrich could see dead bodies on the floor below them. Judging by the smell, they were relatively recent deaths. But something stilled the air around them suggesting they were not alone. Beside him, he could tell that Rook had the same feeling. She had taken a defensive stance. Even with her full set armour on, she moved with catlike elegance, eyes alight in the faint green glow of the magic she was still weaving around her; wards for added protection that she extended to him and Lucanis.
The spirits had barely manifested before Rook launched her first attack, turning in an elegant spin more akin to a dancer than fighter but for the roar of effort as she threw her shield. Emmrich had found himself watching her train on a number of occasions in that last week. She moved with a liquid fluidity that suggested her technique was finely honed and not just the result of her Reaper training.
She threw out her crystal blades after returning her shield back into the fray with a spin that maintained the momentum of her attack. Emmrich followed up with a ghostly, skeleton summoning that reached out to the deadly crystals. The spirit exploded in a burst of necrotic energy and the summon turned its gaze on a second spirit, exacting a smaller but no less devastating attack. At the same time, Lucanis brought his blades downward into the equivalent of the shoulder blades of a spinning envy spirit as Spite hissed loudly. Rook brought her shield down on the spinning entity before turning, pointing her sword’s ruby and jade pommel at the remaining spirit and using a wardweave to prevent a flanking attack.
As the spirit bounced off the ward, Emmrich responded with a vine of necrotic tendrils, wrapping themselves around the spirit and dragging it further away.
‘Thanks, Emmrich,’ Rook managed above the din, slamming her blade into envy, hollering an evocation as she twisted so she held the sword correctly.
Envy died on her word and blade. Rook stumbled back, having to stopp herself from falling over the remains of a Venatori foot solider. Straightening she looked over the remains of their battlefield, eyes lingering on the dead bodies.
‘They certainly got more than they bargained for,’ she muttered.
Emmrich moved towards the door at the far end, pausing when he was level with Rook as she sheathed her sword.
‘Any ideas?’ She asked.
He’d never seen this chamber or the door before but Emmrich knew he had only really seen the merest fraction of the ever growing Necropolis. He shook his head, but he could sense something ancient beyond the wards.
‘Perhaps there is something on these bastards that could indicate what they were hoping to find down here,’ Lucanis suggested.
‘There was a note on one of the bodies we found in the upper chamber making note to something powerful enough to sway the whole Necropolis,’ mused Rook, pulling free a note from a pouch on her belt and looking over it. ‘But I was assuming it would be something further down.’
She stepped around Emmrich as she folded it away again. Beside him, she held out her hand, palm forward. ‘Nochdaidh na h-uile.’
It was an old spell, and not one Emmrich heard often used because it was unspecific in its request. He wouldn’t have ever suggested one of his student’s use it, but Rook turned her hand, manipulating the currents of the Fade around them. Then he saw it; a dark stillness that suddenly rushed them.
He and Rook were blown off their feet, hurtled backwards while Lucanis stumbled, protected by being further away.
‘Get back,’ a voice growled from the door as he pushed himself up.
Rook had already managed to get to her feet in a swift acrobatic motion that started with her rolling onto her back. Her sword already drawn and shield up.
‘Are you Venatori? Other sniffing rats? What form have you all?’ The voice continued. ‘This vault's riches are mine. I tore them from the dead, and with me they will remain.’
‘Make it. Stop,’ Spite hissed through Lucanis before the assassin wrestled back control. ‘Has to be a demon.’
Emmrich brushed off his robes. ‘And a powerful one, to have been kept behind such ancient locks instead of simply banished.’
Rook frowned, her eyes on the tombscript sigils above the door. ‘These are holding, but for how long is anyone’s guess.’ She looked at Emmrich. ‘This door isn’t particularly old. Certainly wasn’t built for specifically holding back an ancient powerful, malevolent spirit.’
‘Just because that door isn’t,’ Emmrich pointed out ‘doesn’t mean there isn’t an older one behind it that arrived at this location in an earlier reshuffle.’
‘Right,’ conceded Rook, dropping her shield arm a little but not fully slipping out of her defensive stance. ‘Fair point. Why don’t we see what these guys knew? Lucanis?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said quietly. ‘Spite is urging us to leave.’
‘We can’t just leave without understanding what could be back there - lives,’ said Rook emphatically, ‘and unlives are at risk if that thing gets free. The Necropolis itself could be in danger, depending on what it is.’
‘Rook is sadly correct on that front,’ Emmrich agreed. ‘Let’s search these bodies.’
He found the note on a particularly mutilated corpse. Lucanis pondered aloud on what had happened down here but the answer was painfully obvious; whatever lay behind the door influenced the Venatori one by one, wearing down their mental defences with its whisperings until they destroyed themselves.
‘This says that there are magical loci projecting into the upper world,’ he informed the other two. ‘Demons spawn on the locations and once all three are killed, the door will become unsealed. But until we kill what is within, those demons will continue to manifest.’
Again Rook was frowning. She’d sheathed her sword but still held her shield.
‘Loci wards are incredibly difficult spells to weave,’ she said, walking towards the door then lifting onto her tiptoes to try and get a better look at sigils. ‘These weren’t done in a hurry.’
Emmrich knew how they worked but his own studies had rarely brought him into contact with them. Not only were they difficult, locus spells were also unreliable if they were not properly maintained. Judging by the note in his hand, that had been the case here if the spirit beyond was capable of projecting itself at the spells’ anchor point.
‘So,’ Rook continued, no longer on her tiptoes. ‘We’ve got a two massively intricate wardweaves, possibly more beyond, that take a lot of work to break, holding back a spirit that managed to convince a dozen Venatori to mutilate themselves, and each other, and has reversed the flow of a loci wardweave to project demons across the world.’ Her gaze levelled on Emmrich. ‘Surely something like this would be in the annals?’
‘While no one can profess to know about every entity within the Necropolis,’ Emmrich replied, straightening to his full height. ‘This does strike me as something senior members of the order should be aware of. If only to check that all the safeguards remain effective.’
‘Well, those ones were,’ Rook said, pointing at the open doors to the Belfry. ‘But these haven’t been touched since they were first inscribed.’
‘So, what do we do about it?’ Lucanis asked.
Rook crossed her arms over her chest, tapping her foot with her lips pressed in a thin line. ‘We could try and track down the locus points, destroy the demons and then whatever is behind that door or we could seal it back up and hope it never escapes.’
‘Neither of those seem to be a particularly attractive solution,’ said Emmrich solemnly. ‘Not without knowing what it is in the first place.’
Rook bristled as if there was censure in his words. Her gaze became hard, steel grey solidifying over the blue.
‘We should speak to Myrna and VORGOTH,’ she decided, ‘once we’ve cleared the rest of the Venatori from the surrounding chambers.’
She stalked off towards the entrance to the Belfry. Rook still held her shield and while her arms were covered in metal and robes, Emmrich had the distinct impression her biceps were likely bulging from the way her fingers clenched over the handle. Lucanis was eyeing her appreciatively and their eyes met for a brief moment before Lucanis looked away with colour high on his cheeks. Emmrich understood the appeal; Rook was intelligent and beautiful, commanding a presence that was difficult to look away from.
‘As a spirit mage,’ Lucanis ventured as they returned to the Belfry Chamber, ‘are you able to sense Spite the same way you sense wisps?’
‘Yes,’ he replied, grateful a line of conversation had started to pull him from his musings on Rook. ‘And I’m sorry that you two came together in such unjust circumstances.’
‘Unjust? I was pulled. Dragged. Forced.’
Emmrich nodded, listening to the spirit, its own voice different to what he sounded like when he took over Lucanis with a pulling undertow of sadness. ‘You have my sympathies.’
Lucanis paused, staring at him. Rook had also come to a halt turning enough to observe them over her shoulder.
‘You can hear Spite? Even when he doesn’t take me over?’ Lucanis asked with surprised incredulity.
‘This close? Yes,’ he replied simply.
Lucanis turned to Rook. ‘Can you?’
She shook her head, lifting her shield. ‘Shield slinger, remember. I’d have to cast a spell to do that as my attunement to the Fade is slightlydifferent to that of a Spirit Caller.’
Emmrich frowned at her use of the derogatory term for Reapers. It was used by those who considered themselves pure mages. Before he could remark on her language, she turned and continued into the side chamber that spiralled around the Belfry to the upper levels. A barrier had been erected and Rook looked at it with a sardonic kink to her eyebrow.
‘You’d think they’d have stayed away after the last clear out,’ Rook mused. ‘Or that they’d have at least thought twice about returning.’
‘They did,’ said Lucanis sardonically. ‘It’s why it took them ten days to return instead of a mere five. You gave them pause. And you will do so again.’
‘It would be preferable if we didn’t need to give them pause,’ Emmrich said. ‘Outright preventing them from entering the Necropolis would be preferable.’
Rook hummed in agreement.
‘Perhaps you could speak to some of the captains?’ Emmrich suggested.
She spun around, her expression dark and incredulous. ‘And give them an opportunity to arrest me so they can finish their court martial? No thank you.’ She spat the last words out before smashing the crystal holding up the barrier, marching towards their new enemies.
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
-- --
The Eluvian in the middle of the main hall glowed with magic that Emmrich never thought he would live to see. The surface shimmered, and beyond was a land mass with floating masses visible in the distance like cheap fantasy landscapes of The Fade that cold be procured at any market. It was humbling to see the reality.
Rook glanced up at him. ‘This really is something,’ she said. ’Nothing any of us have ever read or dreamt could even begin to prepare us for what is really through there.’ Her hand reached up, touched the glass then passed right through it.
‘Come on,’ Bellara encouraged, and he followed Rook through the mirror.
The air left Emmrich’s lungs, replaced by something lighter that coursed through his veins, renewing his vigour. Around them, four mirrors towered over them, their surfaces shimmered as the one they had passed through. Buildings hung suspended in the air, some twisting lazily and to his left was the twinkling of gold atop a spire of - .
‘Well, Professor?’
Rook was a little way ahead of him, watching him over her shoulder.
‘This that The Black City?’ He asked jerking his head in the direction of the city like structure and golden spire. ‘So close,’ he mummered when Rook nodded her head.
’No wonder Bellara had so many questions,’ he said as she emerged through the mirror behind him. ‘Where are we exactly?’
‘This is part of the Crossroads,’ explained Rook.
‘I thought they were closed off after the Inquisition foiled the Qunari plot at the Exalted Council,’ said Emmrich, moving to follow Rook as she started to walk towards an archway.
‘The guardian here, The Caretaker, says this place is not exactly the same place as that,’ explained Rook. ‘Perhaps that is something else you might be able to help us understand. Come on, there’s more to see, lots more. At present, this is the safest part of the bar for Beacon Island. Spirits started to return after we cleared Venatori and Guardians from the area. They even have a shop.’
Rook stepped aside to reveal a plaza full of spirits; everything from wisps to entities having taken various mortal forms congregating around stalls and caravans.
‘Extraordinary,’ he managed, pausing beside her, head turning bearly able to take it all in.
‘Are you Rook?’
The voice pulled him from his speechless thoughts to look at the woman in question. She had already began walking towards the Grey Warden hailing her. Rook walked with her back straight, one hand resting over her sword’s pommel. She stood in profile to him, the Fade’s dreamlight accentuating her face in a way the gloom of the Necropolis had not. He had already noted she was beautiful; sharp, defined jaw with high cheekbones. The facial tattoo favoured by the Mourn Watch Reapers only served to highlight the regality of her bearing.
‘How was passage through the Heights?’ She asked the Warden.
‘Nothing we couldn’t handle and worth it for the decreased travel time,’ replied the Warden. ‘But how do we get to Minrathous. These are the supplies Davrin requested via Evka.’
He listened as Rook directed the caravan leader to one of the other mirrors they had just passed.
‘And our contact is Neve Gallus?’
Rook nodded. ‘You’ll likely find her at the Cobbled Swan. And...’ She bowed her head for a moment before meeting the Grey Warden’s eyes. ‘If there is anything you can do for Ashur - please help him.’
The Warden’s expression turned grave as she nodded. The two women shook hands and Rook returned to him and Bellara, her gaze sombre, corners of her lips downturned for the first time since they had met.
‘Do you think they can help him?’ Bellara asked once Rook was back with them.
Rook shrugged. ‘I think it’s more a case of whether he’ll let them help him. Davrin said any cure would be a high price to pay.’ She blew out a sigh before she turned back to Emmrich. A smile fixed in place that didn’t quite reach her eyes. ‘Shall we finish the tour? Then you can best decide how to help us?’
--//-*-\\--
The Lighthouse was a marvel to behold. Once he had seen it on their approach to Beacon Island, Emmrich made his decision that the work required would be best undertaken from within Rook’s base of operation rather than remaining in the Necropolis and using the Eluvian network to reach them. Besides, it had been a long time since he had left the Necropolis and stepping out into the bright light of the outer world had warmed him.
Keeping track of everything worth studying was proving to be difficult. He had ended up dividing his thoughts across multiple journals to keep it all indexed for future reference. His growing curiosity resulted in multiple trips back to the Necropolis with Manfred in tow to gather more books and equipment. It would have been helpful to have additional skeletal servants to assist with moving items from his apartment, office and teaching lab to the Lighthouse but he had swiftly come to the conclusion that Rook’s assembled associates would not be comfortable with such a display.
They had been polite in their introductions but he had not missed the cautious whispers. Necromancy, Rook reminded him one evening when she offered to help with unpacking his books, was viewed with the same fear as blood magic.
‘We’re facing things far worse than the most dangerous Necromancers can conjure,’ she said, sipping a glass of wine as she watched him work perched on his desk. ‘They’ll come around.’
‘They don’t fear you,’ Emmrich remarked, struggling to keep the frustration out of his voice.
‘I think they forget I’m a Necromancer; hex-spells and wardweaves that destroy the undead and banish maligned spirits back to The Fade probably seem like acceptable magic whereas animating corpses and speaking to the dead does not.’ Then her face lit up with an expression of mischievousness that made her look years younger. ‘Besides, I don’t have a skeleton assistant following me around.’
‘They can’t surely be afraid of Manfred?’
Rook laughed at the incredulity in his voice, her lips curving up and eyes bright with amusement. ‘Maker, no,’ she exclaimed. ‘But outside Nevarra, the risen dead is not a good thing.’
‘I shall bear that in mind,’ he replied soberly as she scooted of the desk, setting the goblet aside and looking at the shelf he had been populating.
‘Do you have Ebner’s Index memorised?’ She asked with a curious lilt, referring to the tombscript system used to classify bodies of work by topic.
‘Not as such,’ he said, watching her straighten, eyebrow raised as she raked her fingers through her wavy lilac hair to tuck it behind her ears so it fell down her back. ‘Although, that does remind me,’ he continued when she picked up her goblet again. ‘Myrna sought me out today, some spirits within the Belfry were displaced in the commotion caused by the Venatori and asked if we might be willing to assist in drawing them back to their rightful place.’
Rook took a thoughtful sip of wine. ‘Harding still hasn’t had any luck on the dragon hunter front, so why not?’
‘There may also be stray Venatori within the chambers surrounding the Belfry.’
‘Then it’s a good job we have an expert in killing Venatori on hand.’
--//-*-\\--
‘He might be able to advise, Lucanis, if you just ask.’
Rook’s voice rang out through the library as Emmrich approached from his study. He emerged on the mezzanine to see the Rook and Lucanis across the table from one another. True to her previous decision, Rook had abandoned her leather travel wear for her Mourn Watch issue armour; interwoven chain, metal plate and robes were draped over her willowy frame giving her an ethereal appearance that resembled the Greater Spirits of the Necropolis. It was not a set of armour Emmrich often saw in use around the Necropolis but Rook embraced the appearance.
Across from her, Lucanis paced. Emmrich had detected the spirit residing within him the moment they had met. It cried out from within Lucanis for release, thrashing against the Crow’s mental defences.
‘He’s a Necromancer -‘
‘I’m a Necromancer,’ Rook emphasised harshly.
‘You don’t raise skeleton’s from the dead and turn them into manservants,‘ Lucanis countered.
‘Just because I haven’t got one, doesn’t mean I lack the capacity to make one,’ Rook pointed out.
‘Then why can’t you help me with Spite?’ Lucanis demanded, coming to a halt in his pacing and spinning to look at Rook.
‘Because it requires more than bashing you with a shield,’ replied Rook harshly. ‘Although, you seem to need some sense knocking into you, so perhaps it will be a start.’ She heaved in a frustrated breath before closing her eyes and pinching the bridge of her nose. ‘You need to communicate with Spite. Emmrich can help you with that. All I can do is kill you and end you both.’
‘Do not. Kill,’ screeched Spite, lunging forward with Lucanis’s body, stepping up onto the table and jumping down.
Rook dodged the attack, spinning out of reach in a spiralling flow of purple and green fabric, pulling her sword free. ‘Settle down,’ she commanded when she had some distance between them, pointing the jewelled pommel at Lucanis. ‘It is not my intention to kill either of you.’
‘Sorry,’ Lucanis now back in control, ‘he is -‘
‘Getting stronger,’ said Rook, completing the sentence, sheathing her sword with a fluid movement. ‘Speak to Emmrich,’ she finished with an order.
Lucanis opened his mouth to speak again, but closed it, shaking his head while turning on his heel. He took the stairs down to the Vi’Revas while Rook blew out a breath, her shoulders dropping before she looked up. Their eyes met and her lips quirked upwards ina dismal smile for a brief moment.
‘You’ll help him?’ She asked. ‘When he’s ready?’
Emmrich replied with a slow nod.
‘Then we’re ready when you are.’
--//-*-\\--
Rook paused the moment they emerged onto Beacon Island, the singing resonance of the dagger filled the air and Emmrich watched Rook pull a dagger from her belt. She held it up to the light, studying it for a moment. From its colour, Emmrich was able to deduce that a large quantity of Lyrium was used for it and its construction, with a circular pommel was more suited to ritual use than battle. He could detect the vibrations through the eddies of the fade, resonating with something nearby and he followed Rook’s attention to an ornately constructed golden tree that stood in the plaza below. She stowed the blade back in her belt and moved down the steps at a jogging pace. Lucanis followed a moment after, catching up to her while Emmrich moved at a slower pace, scrying the eddies around them as voices seemed to echo over them.
‘So it’s the present we’re hearing,’ she said, reaching out to the tree and touching it.
‘And what if they can hear us?’ Lucanis demanded.
Rook stepped back. ‘I don’t think they can,’ she said slowly. ‘I’ve heard voices from here before and assumed they were echos from the past.’ She put her hands on her hips and looked at the floor. ‘Solas wouldn’t have risked his operations by creating something like this if they could hear us. Wonder how it works?’
‘Bellara and I could take a look at it to see if we can find any indication as to how it might work,’ Emmrich suggested.
‘Yes,’ said Rook. ‘If only to put our minds at rest. Come on.’
She stepped away from the tree and headed towards the pier that took them to the Converged City. The journey was quiet, an uncomfortable silence wrapped around the three companions leaving Emmrich glad when they were able to disembark.
‘So, you’re a Mortalitasi?’
Emmrich turned his gaze on Lucanis. The umber eyes of a dread assassin, a famed mage killer, bore into him. ‘Mortalitasi is a general term,’ he explained, turning a ring on his finger. ‘I belong to the Mourn Watch.’
‘The difference?’ Lucanis enquired mildly.
‘Well, you are a Crow, but I presume not all Crows belong to House Dellamorte,’ replied Emmrich to which Lucanis nodded. ‘The Mourn Watch is an elite circle of Mortalitasi Mages with the ultimate authority over The Grand Necropolis and Funerary Dead, as well as other duties outside the Necropolis.’
‘But you’re still a Necromancer?’ Lucanis pushed.
‘Yes, certainly.’
‘And Rook is a Necromancer, too, but a different type of Necromancer?’
‘Indeed,’ replied Emmrich. ‘Rook is a Reaper, while I am a Spirit Caller. There are a number of specialisations within our ranks.’
The assassin hummed thoughtfully but didn’t continue his questioning as they reached the mirror to the Necropolis. Rook stood before it, hands on hips, gazing intently.
‘They’ve moved it from the Upper Mortuary Halls to The Shrouded Halls,’ Rook announced.
‘Myrna and VORGOTH are leading the efforts to cleanse the chambers we discovered when unchaining the Sunken Star,’ Emmrich explained. ‘I should have mentioned it to you.’
‘At least we don’t have to worry about getting stuck in the lifts,’ she remarked, stepping through into the cool world beyond.
Unorthodox Introductions - I: The Whisperer & The Reaper
Rating: Mature - Canon Typical Violence and Sex
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin (Neve Gallus x Lucanis Dellamort | Lace Harding x Taash)
(A03 Chapter Index) | (Tumblr Chapter Index)
-- --
Casual destruction of the dead.
That was the accusation levelled at Lieutenant Yaryna Ingellvar following the War of the Banners. A serious allegation for any member of the Mourn Watch to face. It was not an accusation made without a reasonable degree of evidence that the loss of the undead was borne from a deeper disregard for life and unlife. Emmrich stole a glance at his unexpected companion, attempting to discern from her appearance alone whether Ingellvar, or Rook as she introduced herself, could be capable of such a crime. She had asked him for a moment before ringing the bell, and he watched as she traced necromantic sigils across the boss of her shield, green light shimmering then being absorbed into the mental face .
‘I really should know better than even leave the Lighthouse without armour,’ Rook remarked to Bellara, picking the shield up and turning her attention back to him. ‘What can we expect down there?’
‘Once I start the spell, it will draw attention from any remaining spirits of despair,’ he explained. ‘You’ll need to hold them off while I work - it will take a few minutes for the bell to the gain the momentum it needs for the spell to work.’
‘What does that mean?’ Bellara asked.
‘That it’s going to get cold,’ replied Rook, ‘dependant on how many spirits are left. This might even get more dicey than that ogre.’ She lifted her shield, contemplating it for a moment. ‘Haven’t got the resources for an additional hex-weave, so remember when I use the blade spell, shoot your charged arrows at them to cause an explosion.’ Her attention returned back to Emmrich. ‘Ready when you are.’
He walked to the centre point under the bell while the two women took up defensive positions, Rook slightly ahead of him and Bellara behind. He called the Fade to his fingertips, directing the spell through sweeping movements, channelling the magic upwards and waking the bell as Bellara alerted them to the arrival of Venatori. Out of the corner of his eye, Emmrich caught Rook’s swift movement, the long skirts of her leather coat flying around as she threw her shield behind him, marching after it, eyes on her next target before catching it, turning with it’s momentum and throwing it at her next target.
Throughout the fight, Rook focused on putting herself between Bellara and himself deflected the ranged attacks back at the Venatori in fiery showers of magic.
‘There’s too many of them,’ Bellara called above the fray, multiple demons rising around the room.
‘We just have to hold them off until the bell rings,’ Rook replied watching mist rise from her breath. ‘Professor, how long?’
‘About half way there,’ Emmrich responded.
‘Okay, Bel, keep them in front of you,’ Rook instructed. ‘Keep moving side wards with your back to the wall. Don’t let them get behind you, and on my mark, we’re going to aim for the pride demon. Professor, whatever you have to throw at that thing, please do.’
Rook set off into a run, dodging around two mages that she hit with her shield and followed up with swipe of her sword without losing momentum. Emmrich noted she was fast, covering the space then yelling her signal for Bellara. The roar of magic flew at the demon from three directions, Rook’s magical blades slammed into the Pride spirit, crystal shards sundering the body followed by Bellara’s arrows shattering them in a devastating shower of lightening charged shards exploding out of it’s twisted body. Emmrich followed up, his magic tangling around the remains of the spirit as it continued to lash out; Rook ran at it, kicking it then bringing her shield down as the bell tolled.
The spirits twisted until they evaporated into the Fade. Rook turned, throwing her shield one final time. It spun across the room into the remaining living assailant, striking between the eyes, dead before they even hit the ground.
‘Well, at least we’re not short of bodies for new undead guards,’ she remarked drily, catching Emmrich’s eye as she caught the sheild. She turned her attention to Bellara, walking towards here. ’Told you it would get dicey.’
‘Definitely worse than the ogre,’ Bellara replied. ‘The second one.’
Emmrich watched Rook walk to Bellara, place a hand on her arm. ‘You were brilliant,’ she said, a smile lifting her face.
‘Let’s ensure these cultists didn’t leave anything dangerous behind,’ he said once the two women were done exchanging words.
Rook clipped the shield to a leather strap over her chest and slung it over her shoulder.‘What are we looking for?’
‘Anything out of place,’ Emmrich directed, walking towards one of the alters around the central plaza. ’Scan for any magic that doesn’t belong.’
Under the resonating toll, silence fell across the chamber. Emmrich didn’t know exactly what he was looking for; it would have to be powerful but subtle magic to have been able to pass the wards.
‘And this is…’ Rook announced from the other side of the room. ‘Oh, a Hand of Glory. A real, working Hand of Glory.’
Emmrich turned to see Rook examining her find, the palm close to her eyes.
‘The Venatori should never have this,’ he declared crossing the space to Rook’s side, holding out his hand. ‘I must find out where it came from.’
Rook looked at him, steely-blues eyes met his with her eyebrows raised. Her head tilted to the side, stray locks of her lilac hair brushing her shoulder before she held the artefact out to him. He examined it, the runes carved into its flesh, noting the truncations as Rook watched him, apparently studying him.
‘We should head back up to the Upper Mortuary, I need to report this incursion,’ he said, referring to the headquarters of the Death Callers, pocketing the Hand in his Robes. ‘You can tell me why you’ve sought out a Fade expert on the way?’
‘Of course,’ she said, following him back out the chamber towards the elevator.
He watched her dust off her coat, patting out small puffs of dust from the leather sleeves.
‘I really need to stop leaving the Lighthouse without full armour - getting this repaired would take an age.’ Their eyes met; steely grey-blue eyes gently bore into him. ‘Thought we’d be relatively safe with this one, don’t know why,’ she finished looking at Bellara. ‘The Necropolis is a hive of hidden danger at the best of time.’
‘Especially at present,’ put in Emmrich, ‘if this incident is anything to go by. This way please.’
He led them to the elevator, Rook still dusting down her coat until they were moving upwards.
’So, how is it I can help you?’
‘Yes,’ Rook rubbing her hands together. ‘We, that is to say Bellara, myself and a number of my associates have found ourselves caught up in race to save the world from two blighted Elven gods who escaped from a prison within the Fade. We need a Fade expert to help us understand the nature of that prison and help us make sure the rest of the Blight remains locked away there as well helping us navigate a portion of the Fade known as the Crossroads safely.’
She spoke in a rush as if she had rehearsed what she was going to say a couple of times over. Her gaze had become a challenge; a dare to tell her that she was making things up but Emmrich had seen the changes to the currents of the deeper Fade. He’d even felt it pulling apart several weeks earlier with a fluttering of fearful excitement among some of the more volatile inhabitants.
‘And how do our new friends fit into this?’
Rook blew out breath she had been holding in the aftermath of her speech, relief sparking over her face at not being dismissed out of hand. ’They have aligned themselves with the Gods, doing their bidding.’
‘But why come here?’ Asked Bellara.’What’s here that could interest them?’
‘Bellara, the Necropolis contains powerful, magical relics that have been collected for over a thousand years as well as the raw magic that keeps it alive,’ Emmrich explained gently.
‘And they had vessels for siphoning magic,’ said Rook. ’No doubt the ancient magic here interests the Gods.’
‘Making it more imperative we discover who was behind the Hand of Glory,’ said Emmrich lifting the artefact to his eye line to examine it. ‘Who knows what destruction they could have wrought with it.’
He separated the fingers then turning it over to scrutinise the sigils carved into the flesh hoping they could tell him something about who had it. Bellara’s face screwed up in disgust while Rook’s eyes widened with curiosity, fire kindling in her express as she tilted her head in interest.
‘You’ve never seen one before?’ Emmrich enquired.
Rook focused on him. ‘There’s a dried up, dormant one used in practical demonstrations at the academy. Hardly comparable to an active one. The magic radiating off it -‘
‘Indeed,’ Emmrich said slowly, placing it back in his pocket and returning his full attention to Rook. ’Now, back to your query, navigating the Fade and understanding the nature of a prison within the Fade, how would you expect me to provide you with such insight?’
‘Our base of operations, the Lighthouse, sits within the Fade, built by the creator of the prison. We believe the prison is in close proximity to it,’ explained Bellara, ‘we also have access to where Solas opened the prison. But I can’t convert the information into something we can use. Artefacts are more my thing.’
‘Very your thing,’ put in Rook, placing a hand on Bellara’s upper arm. ‘We need help monitoring the prison, but also, perhaps find a way to return them to that prison.’
Bellara’s head turned sharply. ‘What? I thought we were going to attempt to kill them? After D’Meta’s Crossing and the dragons, Minrathous… It’s why you hired Lucanis.’
Rook squeezed Bellara’s arm, turning the younger woman to face her, expression serious. ’They’re Gods, Bellara,’ she spoke softly. ‘We need options to end this, and we have to consider that if Solas could not kill them, only imprison them, that might be our only way out of this as well.’
‘Solas?’
‘Also known as Fen’Harel, the Dread Wolf,’ replied Bellara turning to look at Emmrich.
‘The actual Dread Wolf,’ put in Rook. ‘He was also responsible for tearing the veil open over Ferelden and Orlais ten years ago.’
Emmrich frowned. ‘Then he too needs to be stopped.’
Rook nodded her head. ‘That’s another reason to look at the prison. When Elgar’nan and Ghilan’nain escaped, Solas was pulled in - now he’s trapped in the Fade prison, and we’d like it to stay that way.’
‘I will do all that I can to assist you,’ he replied with a resolved nod.
Self-Abnegation Techniques for Sub-Astral Navigation
Rating: Mature, contains sex.
Pairing: Rook Ingellvar x Emmrich Volkarin
Characters: Yaryna ‘Rook’ Ingellvar, Taash, Bellara Lutare, Neve Gallus, Emmrich Volkarin, OC: Ada Wiesinger
Summary: Rook was certain she had never met Emmrich Volkarin before he joined The Veilguard, but the arrival of a chest from her past reveals that might not be the case.
Set any time between The Flame Eternal and The Sacrifice of Souls.
Also on AO3- https://archiveofourown.org/works/61233742
——————
‘What’s in the chest?’
Taash’s voice rung out as Rook unsealed the locking spell and opened it.
‘Why? Wanna fence it?’ Rook shot back with a smirk.
Rook had recognised it the moment she saw it on the library table; one of her own, left with Myrna. It was meant as defiant remark, telling everyone who saw it that she would walk the halls of the Necropolis again.
At the top, her old house robe was folded neatly, the crescent moon clasp gleaming under the twinkling light from the astrolabe above them.
‘Just some personal belongings of mine,’ she elaborated, stroking the deep green velvet. ‘Couldn’t take more than what could fit in a rucksack, a sword, shield and armour when I left.’
She lifted it out of the chest, holding it to her body as the full length skirts tumbled to the floor. It had been an extravagant purchase, needing six months worth of her wages when she had received her promotion to Lieutenant four years earlier. Rook twisted from side to side, watching the skirts sweep the floor, letting a smile tilt her lips up.
‘Didn’t think you liked dresses,’ Taash remarked after a moment, prompting Rook to look up.
Taash’s expression was one of someone still at war with themselves. Rook huffed a sigh, laying the robe over the back of a chair.
‘Most people are surprised to learn that I love them,’ she said softly. ‘Tight bodices, long flowing skirts, and hats. I love hats. I used to watch the nobles come into the Necropolis as a kid, in their dresses, and coats and hats covered in gold and think, that’s what I want.’ She undid the buckles on her tunic, pulling it off to reveal a linen chemise. ‘I felt like a Princess the first time I put this on,’ she spun once she done the coat up, letting the skirts spin around.
Taash raised an eyebrow. ‘You actually look like a necromancer now,’ the qunari remarked drily to Rook’s laughter when she stopped spinning. ‘Is this when I find out you do corpse stuff too?’
Rook rested her hands on her hips. ‘No,’ she said. ‘It was decided that I did not have the finesse required for Death Calling, but had demonstrated a certain, disruptive aptitude that made me the perfect pick for the Reapers.’
Taash opened her mouth as the door flew open.
‘Is that yours?’ Bellara’s voice rang out, followed by the every other step clink of Neve. ‘I saw someone wearing something like it the first time we went to the Necropolis.’
Bellara’s excited chatter prompted Taash to roll her eyes but with a fond smile.
‘Neve, isn’t it amazing? She looks so pretty.’ The elf continued as she rushed forward to examine the clothing closely. ‘Is this what was in the chest?’
‘It’s just some of my old things Myrna thought I’d want,’ said Rook, turning back to peer into the chest.
Some bone white chemises, with draw string fronts and one of her full gown dresses had been carefully folded into the chest along with a box of jewellery containing her meagre collection of grave gold. She carefully lifted them out, settling them on the table to reveal some books and journals. She remembered packing this chest, to serve as a reminder as to who she was; the experiences and lessons learned over her life. She ran her finger over the oldest of the books.
‘Are all Watchers this careful with their books?’ Bellara asked.
‘When they’re as old as this? I’d hope so,’ Rook replied, lifting out her copy of the Fade Compendium and pressing her hand to the cover. ‘It was found with me,’ she said quietly. ‘Emmrich has a copy if you’d like to read it, this one is...’ she trialled off carefully putting the book back. ‘It’s mine.’
‘That’s okay,’ said Bellara. ‘I have more than enough to read with researching the Nadas Dirthalen and the book club.’
‘Book club,’ piped up Taash. ‘What book club?’
‘Oh you know, the one where we meet up, once a month and discuss a book we’ve read. Harding chose the recent one - Mistress of the Scarlet Moon.’
‘You go to this?’ Taash asked Rook.
‘I don’t like books by Irian Cestes,’ she replied. ‘She once wrote one about an undead in love with a woman, it was, ah, off putting. Especially, when she described unraveling the death shroud.’ She shuddered at the memory of the prose. ‘Relationships with the undead are considered a taboo, in most cases anyway.’
‘There’re exceptions?’ Taash groaned in disgust.
‘Besides,’ Rook continued as if she hadn’t heard Taash. ‘I’ve been busy trying to apply some new hexcraft to my shield, and it’s taking some experimentation, leaving little in the way of time for reading.’ She put her hands on her hips, gazing down at the books. ‘There might be something in my old notes that could help.’
She flicked open the top journal, dated five years earlier. Her writing scrawled across the pages, interspersed with diagrams from anatomy classes and magical runes.
‘Crafting Sheild-Hex, already done that,’she muttered, talking to herself as she skimmed the pages. ‘Self-abnegation techniques for sub-astral navigation, not particularly relevant in my field and probably fell asleep judging by the doodles on the page. Erm, Fundamentals of Advanced Hex-Wardweaves using Posch’s Theorem... old,’ she muttered, turning the page. ‘Could work though. I wonder if Emmrich has any books on it.’
‘Does it all have fancy titles?’ Asked Taash.
‘Instead of what? Slaying Dragons with Swords, a study?’ Drawled Neve.
‘It’s a good book for beginners, better title than Self-whatever-you-said,’ defended Taash. ‘What is that anyway?’ Returning her attention back to Rook as she flicked back a few pages in her journal.
‘She doesn’t know,’ pointed out Bellara. ‘She fell asleep in the class. Oh, I bet the Professor knows.’ She clapped her hands together in excitement.
‘Knows what?’ chimed Emmrich’s voice from the mezzanine, prompting all but Rook to glance up as she saw the page she was looking for.
‘What Self-abnegation techniques for.. what did you say Rook,’ said Bellara. ‘That last bit?’ She huffed in frustration. ‘You know, Taash is a right, it is a bit of a mouthful isn’t it?’
‘Sub-astral navigation,’ Neve finished. ‘Self-abnegation techniques for sub-astral navigation. See? Easy’
‘Yes, that, Rook doesn’t know because she fell asleep in a class about it,’ Finished Bellara.
‘And it’s a stupid title that doesn’t mean anything,’ put in Taash with a huff, placing their feet on the table. ‘Rook, you okay?’
‘Yeah,’ she said, snapping the journal shut and lifting a smile as she placed her journal back in the chest, ‘nothing like squandering chances of education at any age.’ She placed the dress and chemise back in chest and closed it with a click. ‘I’m going to put this away in my room.’
She wanted to glance up at Emmrich, but Neve’s eyes bore into her. That clever, inquisitive mind putting together everything that happened in the last few minutes as a smirk formed on her mouth. Rook answered with a grimace.
‘I somewhat suspect the Professor is quite well versed in the subject,’ Neve declared, drawing attention away from Rook.
---//-*-\\---
‘I didn’t realise you were back in the City, Yaryna,’ Ada Wiesinger said as she pressed a kiss to Rook’s cheek in greeting.
The blonde hair Watcher stepped back from her friend, her pin curls sitting perfectly under a wide brimmed hat trimmed with feathers and a bow on the side. Rook had refrained from a hat but looked no less striking in her grey gown and lilac hair caught in an updo with a half bun and corkscrew curls reaching the middle of her back.
‘I’m not,’ she replied as they stepped apart and Ada sat back down. ‘Passing through, with business here before I head back.’
‘Back where?’
‘Minrathous,’ said Rook, as she took the seat opposite, smoothing her skirt across her lap.
Ada’s eyes flared with interest. ‘What’s it like? Are the stories true?’
‘Sometimes,’ Rook replied. ‘Sometimes it’s not too dissimilar to here. Less undead, though.’
Beside her a skeletal attendant set a silver tray with tea before Rook. The scent of camomile and lemon filled her nose and she inhaled deeply; the smell of home, long denied to her. A second plate was set down with a clink. A large scone with heaped pots of clotted cream and jam sat tantalising before her and she grinned at Ada.
‘You shouldn’t have,’ Rook said, turning the cake into its side and slicing through it.
Ada smiled as she mirrored Rook with her own scone. ‘I thought it would be nice; tea, scones, gossip. Just like the good old days.’
‘It would be good to hear how the squad are doing,’ said Rook.
‘Still on those bottom end patrols,’ Ada said with a dismal downturn in her voice, corners of her lips dropping. ‘Fischer still hasn’t forgiven us for not falling back even though he wanted to see the rebellion put down. He doesn’t even censure your methods, in private anyway.’
Rook spread a blob of jam on her scone. ‘We’re soldiers,’ she said, ‘it’s supposed to be orders first, our opinion second. Or preferably, not at all.’
‘That’s alright for you to say,’ groused Ada. ‘You got whisked out of here to go on some grand adventure. To Minrathous.’
‘Grand is one word for it,’ acknowledged Rook. ‘Terrifying is the usual, actual reality.’
‘There’s been talk of a new Blight and the Wardens have scattered,’ said Ada, placing her scone down. ‘There can’t be another so soon after the one in the South, can there?’
Rook placed her scone down, drawing herself up with a straight back to meet Ada’s green eyes. ‘It’s true.’
‘Maker help us,’ breathed Ada. ‘You’ve seen it, haven’t you?’
‘Up close and personal,’ Rook confirmed. ‘It’s unlike anything I’d seen before; a force of pure corruption.’
‘And somehow you have time for tea?’ Asked Ada, picking up her scone then biting into it.
Rook spread some cream over the jam. ‘It’s important to take a moment and pause, connect with those you care about if the opportunity arises.’
Ada drew in a shocked breath.
‘I’d rather be doing bottom draw patrols with you,’ said Rook, biting her own cake. ‘Most of the time anyway.’
She moaned at the taste of the cake, remembering why they used to do this so often once they had earned their paid commissions. Ada laughed at Rook’s reaction.
‘I haven’t had one of these since I left,’ Rook protested with a laugh. ‘Although, I bet Lucanis could whip up some amazing scones if I get him a recipe.’
Ada’s eyebrows flicked up in interest. ‘Lucanis?’
‘A friend who joined my team,’ she replied brightly. ‘Turns out, he’s a bit of a genius at the stove; we’ve not found anything he can’t cook yet.’
‘Fighting the a Blight, and still having time for dinner at a stove?’
‘We have a base, and the ability to travel quickly,’ Rook explained. ‘It’s a lot to explain and take in. The situation isn’t at full, open warfare yet. Diplomacy is needed. And careful planning.’
‘Well you certainly learnt something from the Banners,’ said Ada.
‘I tried to talk them down, as you will recall,’ shot back Rook. ‘But they were determined in their actions. Did anyone look into it? How and why the undead were able to become so riled up?’
‘They sent Mecklesburg,’ Ada informed her. ‘He hasn’t returned and the Necropolis reshuffled. He’s probably found the Halls of Consecration and can’t find his way back. They’ve sent the rescue parties out, but nothing as yet.’
Rook chuckled, picking up her cup and bringing to her nose to inhale it. A thought ticked over as she sipped the tea, the spiral of events leading to the rebellion and a frown straightened across her lips. She placed the cup down on the soft with a clink, a mental note forming to speak to Emmrich about it.
‘So, if you’re in the midst of all that is going on,’ Ada said, ‘but finding time for tea, why are you actually here Yaryna?’
Rook clicked her tongue, leaning back into the chair with her hands on her lap. ‘Five years ago,’ she said, ‘why did I attempt advanced classes on metaphysics?’
‘Seriously? That’s your question?’
Rook nodded. ‘What goes around is apparently coming around, and...’
‘Klaus Van Markham,’ replied Ada as Rook winced at the name. ‘You were trying to prove that Reapers weren’t just shield slingers, that we could understand the intricacies of Death Calling, so you signed up to the hardest class you could find - but you’d been on the overnight patrol.’ Ida sighed with a soft chuckle. ‘You woke up, middle of the auditorium, when the wraiths stormed the class, earning your commendation for valour - you saved two senior professors with a hexed-weaveward that repelled the wraiths back into The Fade.’
‘That was the same event?’ Rook asked, struggling to pull the strands of her memory together. She remembered the attack and the medal but not the proceeding events. ‘I barely remember it.’
Ada laughed. ‘And this has nothing to do with you being seen in the company of Professor Volkarin, one of the aforementioned senior professors, on a regular basis? Including, I heard, kissing in the Memorial Gardens?’
‘They were meant to be closed.’
‘To the public, yes, not the Mourn Watch guards and you know how they gossip,’ replied Ada, then grew serious as she met Rook’s gaze. ‘Yaryna, is it a good idea after everything? He’s a senior Watcher. Senior faculty as well. It could be argued that you’re trying to get yourself back in the good graces of the Watch by being romantically entangled with one of their best.’
Rook froze, opening her mouth then closing it a few times. ‘It’s not like that,’ she managed eventually, rising from her seat.
Ada held her hands up. ‘I’m sure it’s not, but others will think it is and you have to be ready for that.’
‘I don’t care what others think,’ said Rook, placing a couple of gulders beside the plate. ‘Much less anyone who doesn’t know us. Thank you for the tea.’
---//-*-\\---
She stood braced against the table behind her sofa gazing at the aquarium. In the corner of her eye, Varric’s mirror glinted, her jawline visible. It crossed her mind that she should take it to the infirmary, give it back to Varric but he seemed to be doing okay without it. Ada’s words had cut her, worming deeply on her journey back to the Lighthouse. Rook could not have prevented herself from falling in love with Emmrich.
She’d never really considered what other members of the Mourn Watch would think of her relationship with Emmrich. Rook rapped her nails across the table in frustration as a tap to the door echoed through the room before it opened. The soft footsteps prompted her to draw in a deep breath to steady herself.
‘Yaryna, darling.’
Emmrich’s voice was its usual balm. She turned her head to watch him approach. His ever curious gaze sweeping over her. He’d never seen her in a full day gown, nor with her hair so carefully styled but the quirk to his lips told her he enjoyed the sight. She filed the thought away for future use.
‘I feel that you’ve been avoiding me,’ he said quietly with a humorous lilt in his voice.
‘I fell asleep in your class,’ she whispered. ‘It hardly feels like a ringing endorsement.’
Emmrich chuckled, a deep throaty sound that surprised Rook. ‘Yaryna, I’ve fallen asleep more than once in lectures I didn’t feel concerned me. I imagine advanced wardweaving would have me in a stupor.’
‘You’re just saying that,’ Rook replied, turning into him, one hand going to his shoulder, the other to his chest. ‘I can’t imagine there is a single element of Necromancy that wouldn’t interest you, including wardweaving.’
She lifted herself on her tiptoes,pressing a soft kiss to the corner of Emmrich’s mouth. He turned into her, returning her kisses, stroking her jaw.
‘I went to the Necropolis earlier,’ she said once the kiss came to its natural conclusion. ‘Convinced an old friend to tell me why I’d been attempting advanced metaphysical classes but I have to report that we’ve been seen in the Gardens.’
‘Ah,’ Emmrich said. ‘Is that a problem?’
Rook shrugged and held his gaze. ‘I don’t want it to be but we may have to consider my position within Mourn Watch when this is all over. Ada said something about this looking like I was attempting to work my way back into the good graces of the Watch by entangling you in a romantic relationship.’
‘Darling,’ he said softly, pressing a kiss to her lips. ‘There will always be those who might feel the need to judge our relationship. What matters is how we feel.’
‘I know,’ Rook replied, placing her head on his shoulder, letting his presence settle her. ‘Ada did also tell me why I attempted the class - caught up in proving us shield slingers weren't idiots. Fine job I did of that. But I did save your life when the wraiths stormed the auditorium.’
‘That was you?’ He laughed, drawing away to look at her. ‘I knew we’d met before. Your hair is very distinctive.’
‘Lilac,’ Rook intoned with a smile, as Emmrich twisted a curly lock of her hair through his long fingers. ‘Are you really not upset that I fell asleep in one of your classes?’
‘Well, I can’t deny that it was a bit of a blow, particularly when you’ve been at pains to inform me how interesting you find me,’ he told her, the sparkle in his eyes belying the seriousness of his tone.
She stroked his upper arm. ‘Perhaps I can find a way to make it up to you.’
‘Giving you the lecture in person?’ Emmrich suggested, his voice dropping to a salacious tone that had managed to set her alight time and time again, turning her so she pressed up against the table.
His lips moved to her jaw, tracing a route to the sensitive spot just behind her ear eliciting a soft sign. She arched into him, open and willing to his ministrations. Her fingers moved to work the buttons on his vest while his pulled at the laces of her dress’s bodice. The thought of his hands on her body, again, enough to make her rapturously dizzy. The bodice came away leaving her upper half in just a chemise.
‘I’ll need some form of instruction on how to get you out of all these layers if this attire is to become a regular occurrence,’ he muttered against the skin of her neck, drawing the wide neck of her chemise across her shoulder and down her arm with a tantalising scraping of nail against skin before following the line with his lips.
‘They’re just eyelets and hooks, or laces,’ she managed, head rolling back, using a hand to free her skirt on one side. ‘Easier than your buttons.’ She freed the other side to let the skirt slip off her waist and over her hips to begin pooling around her knees. ‘Like anything, however, one only truly learns through regular practice.’
Emmrich used his foot to push the dress the rest of the way to the floor, coaxing Rook forward to step out of the puddle of fabric leaving her in just a chemise and woollen stockings.
‘But I don’t think...’ Rook breathed hands, going to Emmrich’s chest and pushing him against the concealed bedroom door. ‘You need further instruction,’ she finished pushing up onto her tiptoes to kiss him again as he shucked off his vest. ‘You already seem pretty well-versed.’
Rook unclipped his collar pin, pulling it free and placing it on the bookshelf beside the door. With a quick flick of her fingers, she freed the top button and pressed a kiss to the exposed hollow of his throat. She smiled at the sound of him attempting to hold back a moan of satisfaction and Rook flicked out her tongue to taste his skin.
It was enough to enliven her lover. Emmrich turned them so Rook was now against the door, his long fingers bunching her chemise towards her waist. His hands brushed against her hips tugging at her panties and pushed them down. She kicked them aside before turning the door knob. They tumbled into the bedroom beyond.
As their relationship progressed the Lighthouse responded to their need for privacy. Between their living quarters a suite of rooms appeared containing a beautifully adopted bedroom that they had taken to sharing most nights.
Emmrich landed on the bed first, Rook on top. His greying hair falling across his brow. They had found they fitted together with perfection.
‘You are sublime,’ Emmrich rasped out, pushing the chemise over her head and throwing it aside.
Cupping his face in her hands, she pressed another kiss to his lips; long, slow before changing to soft shorter kisses. ‘Am I forgiven?’ She asked between each one.
‘Not yet.’ Emmrich gently bit her lip, tugging it gently, hands moving across her skin, along her rib cage. ‘Lie down, let me see you.’
Rook crawled off him, and moved to lay along the bed collapsing back into pillows at the head of the bed as he stripped down exposing his rakish but well toned body. Rook had been breathless the first time she’d seen him; lean, beautiful, proud and erect in his adoration of her. He was beautiful. Every night they were together she felt the same. Emmrich walked back to the bed kneeling beside her, holding her gaze with blazing emerald eyes as he untied the ribbon on one of her stockings.
‘You should wear these more often,’ he said in a deep voice as he slid the first one down.
He made his way back to her up her leg; pressing a kiss to her ankle, blazing a trail along her calf to inner thigh, slowing as he moved close to her centre of need. Emmrich pressed gentle kisses around her core before blowing a soft breath over her most sensitive area.
‘Don’t tease,’ she warned through a sigh of pleasure.
‘As you wish, my love,’ he told her, untying the other ribbon and repeated his ministrations on her other leg before lifting it over his shoulder.
Rook cried out, her hand meeting his hair as he licked a firm line through her core. She arched into him, crying his name as white light blinded her vision. He was an exemplary lover. Rook cried out again, her free hand going to her hair, tugging at her roots. The cool air touched the rest of her skin, caressing her nipples and behind her knees, the tip of her nose in stark, nearly unbearable contrast to heat within her body.
Then Emmrich was gone. A moment passed before he dropped a kiss to her abdomen, up the soft valley of her stomach to the firm path between her breasts. The words of love they’d shared were nestled in her chest as their fingers entwined above her head.
Their eyes met as he sank into her. Her free hand stroked his jaw, foreheads meeting as she opened her mouth in a silent cry which Emmrich kissed away, reaching for her knee, pulling over his hip to his waist. Their blazing passion ebbing into the flow of love they shared.
She cried out again. This time Emmrich encouraged her sounds with kisses to her jaw, behind her ear.
‘Let me hear you again,’ Emmrich whispered, his own body beginning to coil.
The words were enough. Rook’s cry mingled with Emmrich’s moan until nothing remained but the aftermath of pleasure.
Time vanished until the cool air touched Rook’s skin again. She was curled into Emmrich’s side, one leg over his, hand on his chest. The slow rise of his chest and soft breaths told her he was close to sleep. Rook traced a finger over the soft plane of his chest.
Emmrich opened one of his eyes. ‘Dearest?’
‘Am I getting this lecture?’ She asked, lifting her head.
‘I thought I’d save it until the next time you can’t sleep, darling,’ he replied, closing his eyes and pulling her into a tighter embrace.
A wee ficlet inspired from my EmmRook romance headcanons.
Rating - U
Characters: Rook Ingellvar & Neve Gallus
Pairings: Rook & Emmrich, Neve & Lucanis
—
‘So, you and Emmrich,’ Neve broached with a lilting voice as they stood at the Minrathous waterfront eating fried fish.
Rook turned her head. ‘What do you mean?’
Neve laughed. ‘Come on, Rook, it’s obvious. The way you two just look at each other is enough to tell, so you can’t tell me you are spending all those late evenings giggling over the fundamentals of necromancy.’
‘I already know the fundamentals of necromancy. Learnt it when I was five,’ Rook replied haughtily. ‘It’s more robust debate about the safety of exploring the Fade.’
‘Really, you want me to believe that is a topic worth giggling over?’ Neve’s eyebrow arched highly towards her hairline as she spoke.
‘I suppose it depends on how funny you find early theories on metaphysicality in the Fade,’ Rook conceded. ‘It’s a very niche sense of humour, even among Watchers.’
‘You know it’s okay if you two are coming to care for each other,’ Neve said, ‘having a bit of shelter in the storm...’
‘Like you and Lucanis?’
‘That’s not what we’re discussing here.’
Silence fell between them. Rook nibbled on her fried fish as she gazed out of the lapping waves.
‘I didn’t expect for him to be so kind, gentle,’ Rook said after a moment. ‘Our eyes meet and I forget we’re in the midst of the fight of our lives. And I keep expecting him to tell me I’m too young for this, for him, and that he’s just letting me indulge my curiosity.’
Neve clicked her tongue loudly. ‘Have you seen the way he looks at you? And so what when it comes to age gaps? You’re what thirty--‘ she cocked her head to the side’’--six, seven at most and he’s what--‘
‘Fifty-three,’ Rook interjected. ‘He’s fifteen years old than me.’
‘I thought he was older,’ replied Neve.
Rook laughed. ‘It’s the whole gentlemanly persona, makes one appear older in my view.’ A mischievous smirk crossed her lips. ‘You haven’t seen him without his collar pin.’
The two women dissolved into laughter, and Rook threw her now empty skewer out to sea. She watched it bob on the languid waves, moving away from them towards open sea.
‘It must be serious if Emmrich has let you see him without his collar pin on.’ Neve’s voice dropped to a salacious drawl. ‘Whatever is next, his top button undone? Hair slightly out place?’
Rook bit her lip, and Neve laughed.
‘You have it bad,’ Neve declared. ‘Enjoy it! It’ll all be worth while in the end. Come on, it’s getting late.’
They turned away from the waterfront. ‘Seriously, though,’ said Rook as they walked up the sloped path. ‘You and Lucanis?’
