I think I'd prefer if Solas attempted to remove Lavellan's vallaslin and finds that he simply is unable to.
Because the Dalish are different, they're not slaves, and removing a Dalish's rite of adulthood is not granting them their freedom. Maybe it's because the ink formula changed over the eons. Maybe the rite is just inherently different.
This not only narratively validifies the Dalish in who they are now, but also drives home the point to Solas that the world is completely different. He's not freeing Lavellan, he's shackling himself.
Still thinking about the dalish last name thing. I’m doing research.
A TL;DR of what I’ve learnt (sources here and here)
Dalish last names might come from their clan’s name (which is based on the original noble family who founded it), but there will be more names/lineages inside the clan based on emerald knights names who joined with said noble
You usually keep your last name, whatever it is, even if you switch clan (which ofc means even more different last names inside the same clan)
Which, for me, means:
I kinda don’t like that Ayanne has a random last name which is not tied to her clan, giving her own background. I KNOW it makes sense for the VJ origin (which might not be an elf) to just have a random last name, but my Ayanne is dalish-to-the-bone and I want something super traditional for her. So well, since her family belonged to another clan 3 generations ago, I guess I’ll just say that’s where the name comes from.
I’ve had Davrin (in my headcanon) asking Ayanne to take her last name. Truth is, at this point it doesn’t make sense in a dalish context and between two dalish ppl. They do hang out more in Ayanne’s clan than Davrin’s after the game events - but still doesn’t matter since it’s not even her own clan’s name. But I still think it was super romantic so I will ignore the canon for them and you all will agree with me :nods:
Adahlen is definitely direct lineage from the super ancient noble elves of whatever, because that’s just what he is, so he’s got the clan name. I just have to make up one XD (no I’m not there yet)
I’ll probably keep calling him by his first name only because I’m embracing the (head?)canon that within the clan they just don’t use last names, there’s no need to, and it’s just something to use when you’re dealing with ppl from other clans (eg an Arlathvhen) or outsiders. So, yeah, I imagine his people now just call him “Keeper Adahlen” out of respect and that’s it.
But I would like to come up with a name for Ayanne and Adahlen’s clan, we will see when inspiration strikes.
So yeah, going back to Dav taking Ayanne’s last name…. Same thing goes for him - the not using a last name unless in outside context I mean, especially out of dalish context in their case. So it’s just kinda a game / cute agreement between them. They book a room in a tavern? They give the same last name. They go the Arlathvhen and someone asks Dav where’s he from? He’s just gonna say his original clan’s name (but idk, in the form of “I’m Davrin from XXX clan”, so not used as a last name). (Parenthesis again: in the same scenario, so talking to another elf from another clan, I think also Ayanne wouldn’t just say “hey I’m Ayanne Aldwir”, but also add “from XXX clan”, because it really gives more information in this context 🤷♀️)
hello and happy late thedas weekend prompt! i'm always a fan of meta narratives and "that's not how I remember it" stories, so how about another competing dalish-vs-solas tale about fen'harel or ancient arlathan? :D
This @thedasweekend prompt possessed me completely this morning on my walk, and it stirred itself into life. Not what I had intended to write at first, but I like the direction it ended up. Thanks for the prompt.
Halla (3274 words)
Summary:
Lavellan reflects on the importance of the halla to the Dalish, and wonders what the true story is.
And an excerpt below the break:
He’d always asked, if he was offered dried meat, if the meat were halla. And he’d hidden a look of revulsion if someone had said it was. She’d wondered about that. The Dalish didn’t eat halla, but the city elves did, sometimes. Not as a preference, but it was hard for them to be choosy. But she’d wondered, since he didn’t believe in the Dalish tales. Why would he hold then to a Dalish tradition? Perhaps it had only been something so simple as having bad halla meat once. She’d thought, at the time, that he must have had a Dalish parent that had left the clan who had instilled that in him, and that was why he’d been so upset by being rejected by the Dalish clan he’d come upon in his travels. But they’d never really talked about it before. He was sensitive about the Dalish, and so was she, and it had seemed like something better left alone.
She had to fight with so many other people about being an Dalish elf; she really didn’t want to fight about it with Solas.
It had been another interminable dinner at another noble’s house, trying to secure support for the Inquisition. Or, perhaps now, to curry favor, since they had thwarted the plot at the Winter Palace. And this one was trying to secure additional aid for Sahrnia, which was well worth while. If they could get the Orlesian nobility to stop with all the political infighting and actually help their people, their people would be far better off. They were finalizing the details of their trip.
Josephine was coming to handle the trade arrangements, obviously. She’d bring Vivienne, naturally. This was her element, and she was always an asset to have at a negotiation. And Solas, who was very good at it, and another mage. She liked bringing mages to these affairs, because she didn’t trust any of the nobility, and her mages came with concealed weaponry if things went south.
“I will, of course, be attending as the Inquisitor’s elven manservant,” said Solas, and she whipped her head around to look at him.
“No,” she said, “you won’t. They shouldn’t have announced you as that at the Winter Palace. You aren’t, and I find that assumption deeply insulting.”
“The Marquis has already sent word that he will be expecting myself, Madame de Fer, and you, Inquisitor. He won’t be expecting to host an elf at his table,” said Josephine.
“Odd,” she said, spat through her teeth, “since we sent him notice of the members of our party, and he’s invited Inquisitor Lavellan to dine with him. Or does the title make up for the ears and the vallaslin?”
I mean… why ? Why WOULDN’T I make myself cry a little, wallowing in sadness as I’m reading the Dalish codex entries in Origins, showing the results of a successful smear campaign against Solas by the Evanuris, one that lasted for millennia? Is it so wrong that I love to ceaselessly torture myself with fictional tragedies ?
Or maybe I should just go outside, take a walk and bask in the glory of the morning sun, as the first warm days of Spring bring with them the grace and magic of nature’s renewal… I don’t know… !
imo I think there's this misinterpretation of what constitutes 'excusing the imperfection of the elves'. Now, I'm not a Dalish player. I main mages all the way through for my primary timeline, but because of that I also empathize with the problems that a lot of Dalish players have. DAI retconned and added a LOT of information that wasn't applicable in any of the prior games or books, both for the mages and for the Dalish, all for the sake of pushing a really poorly executed 'All Sides R Bad' faux grey situation to pretend there's an equal moral struggle and not a clearly in-the-wrong side. Like the whole exiling their mages thing is a direct contradiction to prior established lore, a contradiction that already had a canonical and not-cruel solution to the original issue, and I think it's okay for people to criticize those additions without being told you're 'pretending bad things about your side don't exist'.
Another explanation for the “Dalish clans can only have 3 mages” — other than it being another piece of chantry propaganda to make the elves look bad/justify their own mistreatment of mages — is that this is a lie Dalish tell non-Dalish to keep the Templars off their back, bc you know that if the Chantry heard that Dalish clans have 10+ mages they’d be lighting that shit up big time.
Alternatively, it’s half true in that they have 3 official mages — the Keeper and their First and Second in line — and everyone else is just another dude who happens to have magic. Case in point: when you side with the werewolves against Zathrian’s clan, a bunch of randos start coming at you with magic. There’s no reason you can’t have magic and contribute to your clan without being a wizard all the time.
In regards to Minaeve’s clan, we already know that the Dalish are not homogenous. It’s perfectly likely that for some reason or another, they’re just like that. Maybe they got attacked by Templars recently and decided to overcorrect in response, maybe something got lost in translation and they thought every clan was doing that now, or maybe they’re just assholes and don’t care what the other clans are doing. Just bc Minaeve’s clan is like that doesn’t mean the rest of the Dalish are the same.
Furthermore, maybe that’s where the misinformation comes from in the first place? One Dalish clan kicks out their mages, who end up as apostates or taken in by the Circles, and bc they’re the only Dalish mage representation most non-Dalish ever meet, they end up heavily misinformed about common Dalish practices. When talking to Minaeve as Lavellan, you can sound pretty surprised that it’s even a thing, like you’d never heard of it before bc it’s not commonly done.
Felassan talking to Briala in The Masked Empire.
I’ve just found this gem. Apparently, Fen’Harel had committed crimes against the Forgotten Ones.
Anaris is present here too. I had forgotten entirely when I read it.
Detail: The Tale gives us the important information that Solas did some heavy stuff against the Forgotten Ones, so the theory that they were Solas' fellows in his fight against the Evanuris seems pretty poor now.
Even though this tale comes from Dalish folklore, and we know those are made of small deformed and mutilated pieces of bad history, it is Felassan who is narrating it. And he is not adding any extra remark like “at least that’s what tales say”, which is a phrase he uses a lot in his talking with Briala to subtly tell the reader that such Tale has a lot of mistrustful info.
