#about.kasaanda

[oedonretired]

"You tricked me!" Solas exclaims in what could only be described as amazement.

Zaarilek laughs. "Did you forget who I was? That is your fault, not mine."

"Did you send em to thwart me? A Qunari?"

"A Vashoth," Zaarilek corrects, its deep and jagged voice underscored with the lilt of amusement. "And yes, I sent em. But not to thwart you. You thwart yourself, as you've always done, as you ever will. I simply sought entertainment. A dash to sweeten the pot, as they'd say."

"I can't use the Anchor like this," Solas grouses, looking down at Kasaanda as ey appeared in the Fade, shrouded and flickering, a dim and uncertain presence. A green light blooms from eir hand and snakes up eir arm. "It's ruined."

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic." Zaarilek saunters around Kasaanda's prone astral form, smiling. The creation of the kossith had been the loveliest of mistakes. Had the corruption not come to the Old Gods, it believes they would have tried again. But perhaps this flawed creation was all that was granted to the Great Ones, and if that were so, Zaarilek would make the best of them now. "Join em."

"What?" Solas frowns.

"Join em. Befriend em. Befriend those ey befriend. Join a pack, Dread Wolf. Be patient and observant. You're good at that, aren't you?"

"I am not that sort of wolf," Solas growls.

Zaarilek laughs again, mockingly. "The only other kind of wolf is a dead one. Or a sleeping one, if you must split hairs...”

[oedonretired]

me: hmm how do I fill my NaNo quota today

me @ me: hey so did you know Solas actually got tricked by Razikale/Zaarilek into thinking that giving the Orb to Coryphytits would get him the Anchor that he could use to banish the Veil? and then Zaarilek went off and pushed Kasaanda off a cliff so ey’d almost drown (issa metaphor) and Solas would meet em in the Crossroads and unthinkingly lead em to the Temple where ey would run into Coryphytits and pick up the Anchor and completely foil Solas’ plan all because it just utterly amused the shit out of one Old God?

me: oh yeah you right

[oedonretired]

this puts a new spin on Kasaanda, who was born Vashoth and also a mage, and who eventually ends up with an anchor in eir hand

Kasaanda is almost a liability to the Inquisition, all told, but Lady Inquisitor Ashala-aqun is of the Qun, and she speaks the words that quiet Kasaanda’s feverish, seeking mind

(killing dragons never ends up suiting Kasaanda’s palate, though. Iron Bull comes back to Skyhold smelling of dragon blood and Kasaanda glares daggers at em for the rest of the week

Iron Bull lets em do it because IB doesn’t get it but also... ey get it... at the same time)

[oedonretired]

37,38

37: Which mount did they choose to accompany them on rides in the wilderness?

Kasaanda and Ashala ride a dusky Tirashan Swiftwind called Sounder. He’s technically Ashala’s, but he bonds very well with the quiet and intuitive qunari too, so they share him.

Elias prefers not to ride, finding the entire process uncomfortable and hard on his muscles.

(Zimir rides an Asaarash because they’re appropriately intimidating as well as resilient. He would ride a hart, since they make such a regal impression, but for some reason harts can’t stand him. It pisses him off.)

38: How do they feel about Dragons ruling over certain areas? Is there a Dragon, that fascinated your Inquisitor especially?

Kasaanda loves dragons, awed by their majesty and the differences between subspecies. Elias avoids them like the plague, knowing full well he can’t fight one (but he’ll sit pretty at home and appropriately admire and ego-boost his blood-stained battle-lusty companions when they return!). Ashala avoids them for similar reasons, but she also finds them fascinating in a mythological context. She becomes even more fascinated in them after meeting Zaarilek.

Elias loved the story of the showy Greater Mistral, Kasaanda found eir communion with (and regrettable defeat of) the Kaltenzahn to be most riveting, and Ashala was over the moon when she heard about the high dragon that served as a vessel for Hakkon Wintersbreath.

(Fighting and defeating dragons was a high point of Zimir’s life, definitely-- to know he had that kind of power was exhilarating, and every defeat of a dragon made him feel like a god -- never mind the fact that defeating a dragon was a team effort and not his work alone. He relishes the story of the defeat of the Vinsomer, especially since that one happened during a hellacious lightning storm, appropriately.)

[oedonretired]

♠

(you didn’t choose a fandom but I’m hard-up so I’ll go ahead with Dragon Age... and random.org chose: Kasaanda)

♠ What were their friends like growing up? How popular were they? What kind of people did they hang out with? Was the group reliable or untrustworthy? Did they have any inside jokes or activities that your muse still remembers today?

Kasaanda had the Vashoth enclave in Amaranthine, where ey were born and grew up. The “crowdsourcing” method of child-rearing is hella embedded into the qunari psyche (makes me wonder if dragon broods are raised similarly but LET’S NOT GO DOWN THAT DUSTY ROAD RIGHT NOW) and even Vashoth are more likely to communally raise young than they are to adopt the old human two-parent-and-maybe-grandparents method.

Anyway, I digress. Even though ey were raised around a few young and about twenty to thirty adults (the enclave was still small when ey were born, although it would grow to a respectable size before the Mess At The Conclave(TM)), ey largely kept to emself -- ey were not energetic or ebullient as a child, but rather somber and dreamy, to the point where Briar Heart and Sten began to wonder if their child was spirit-touched. (BH and Sten debated theological theories a lot, but they both agreed that even if none of those gods or what-all existed, the Fade was very much a dominant sphere of influence upon the mortal realm. Considering what they’ve experienced, that was impossible to write off as bullshit.)

So, no, Kasaanda wasn’t popular or gregarious and ey didn’t really hang out with the other young, but I don’t think ey suffered for it. That early familiarity with isolation and alienation probably helped em in the future, when ey’d be alienated even further because of eir mysterious lack of spoken language and that strange glowing wound in eir hand...