Do you think that if Gabrielle had survived, Darien would have chosen her? Or would it still be Vestige?
Taking into account all of their previous history, I think Darien would have chosen the Vestige.
Maybe not before Rivenspire, and he's still quite the flirt even in Bangkorai, but I think that what happened at the Doomcrag, especially once it fell, may have started to put things into perspective for him.
By the time we've battled through Coldharbour to the Endless Stair he's far more serious and honest with us about his nightmares, and despite staying back with Gabrielle to protect her - which he would have done for anyone, despite how she may see it - it's not her he's so earnest with during our final words with everyone before entering the Planar Vortex.
Darien doesn't mention Gabrielle even once during Summerset, instead he quite literally says to us "I wouldn't do this for anyone else." moments before sacrificing himself to restore Dawnbreaker.
In 'Words of the Fallen", he singles the Vestige out saying he doesn't "...know if they'll understand how much they truly meant to me."
There was something there, and losing him in the Crystal Tower before it could be acknowledged hurt.
SOTWC spoilers below the cut:
(More on how I view Gabrielle's feelings and her confession regarding Darien here)
Solstice made it very clear how much more Darien has in common with the Vestige beyond just their shared adventures; a dubious mortality, doubts about what exactly you each are (these are probably not your original bodies, after all), even the ability to channel powers that don't quite belong to you.
I've seen these characters as two faces of the same coin for some time, and I can't imagine either of them with anyone else.
Spoilers ahead depending on your Vestige's previously completed quests, which Player Response Options you chose at Li-Xal Pass, and whether you've completed SOTWCpt1 / Western Solstice's main quest.
It's been widely assumed since the base game that Gabrielle has a crush on Darien; her reactions to things he did especially that breathy way she said his name during Coldharbour established her feelings for him really well.
Then there's the discussion you can have with her in Anvil's Mages' Guild library if you'd found Darien's note in Orsinium first, and the one in Solitude's Antiquarian Circle if you'd completed Summerset.
Provided you've done the relevant content, Gabrielle mentions Darien's absence and her continued search for a way to find him every time you see her from your last shared moments in Coldharbour until reuniting with Skordo and the Vestige during Seasons of the Worm Cult's Prologue.
And then she suddenly doesn't.
Gabs' and Skordo's complete silence regarding Darien during the Prologue only added to my suspicions in early April that he'd be returning very soon.
So it really shouldn't come as a surprise, especially after the way Gabrielle casually drops that "Dear Darien" when you find her in Broken Light Temple, that if she considers your Vestige a friend based on a shared history and some kindness towards her, she confesses her feelings for Darien to you at the end of Li-Xal Pass.
But I'll admit, it still came as a gut-punch when I first ran it on the PTS, I was not expecting those lines to ever appear in-game after the years of more subtle exposition we'd been given.
Well played, you got me, and I actually wished for just a moment that despite their long friendship by this point my Vestige could yeet Gabrielle off that nearby cliff with a well-aimed Fus.
Reliving the events of Senalana with Raz in the very next stage of the same quest was the knock-out blow that had me needing to step away and go cuddle my cows for a few hours to calm down.
And that's when I got to thinking:
Gabrielle admitted she never told Darien how she felt, and she only assumed he returned her feelings; the underlying cause of her assumption could in part be due to his habit of flirting, but it's compounded by how those intervening interactions between her and the Vestige played out since there was no guarantee of them even happening for some players.
Gabrielle didn't read Darien's note so she couldn't see that it wasn't specifically addressed to anyone although the implication is that it was meant for the Vestige, we didn't give it to her in Anvil and some players might not have completed Wrothgar first so the line referring to it wasn't guaranteed to appear.
Then in Solitude at the Antiquarians' Circle, if we told her about finding Darien during Summerset's events, specifically "He wanted us to know how much we meant to him. And that he hopes we won't forget him." we left unsaid the part where he singled out the Vestige as if they meant more to him after mentioning he would miss Gabrielle and Skordo at what's implied to be a shared, slightly lesser degree.
We don't tell her about our conversations with Darien on Artaeum or in the various Daedric realms we battle through with him, his goodbye to us in the Crystal Tower, or that he somehow sent those final words via a book from the Colored Rooms.
So Gabrielle knows nothing of how things may stand between Darien and your Vestige, because what we did tell her had consistently been left vague by the writers. Possibly deliberately, in order to more easily work with all potential playthrough variables and player headcanons.
The fact this perfectly set up the opportunity for what could be a series of emotionally devastating events on Solstice for the players who had come to invest in these characters and their interactions since first meeting them is the best example of a Chekhov's gun hanging around for years before being made use of that I've ever experienced.
From the moment I heard SOTWC would be a sequel to Coldharbour and saw the number of Meridian themed visuals during the promos for this update, I was expecting Darien's return.
Then the Broken Light Temple's quest turned out to be a red herring, we couldn't discuss Darien with Gabrielle in the courtyard when she mentioned him, give a personal reaction to her confession at Li-Xal Pass or propose searching for Darien when the plan to lure Wormblood to the Colored Rooms was decided upon.
I started to lose hope we'd see him during Part 1, despite overthinking things to the point where I was wondering if the Vestige could survive sacrificing their restored soul using the Gift of Death to retrieve Darien from wherever he was, a 'lost soul' who hadn't been confirmed as truly dead.
So Gabrielle's decision once she was stabbed to have our Vestige use the Gift with her as the sacrifice to restore Darien once again blindsided me. Our final words with her can evoke some truly Chef's Kiss™ levels of angst and guilt, especially for me, given my earlier brief impulse on that cliff and provided a tidy way to prevent what had been a potential love-triangle from fully developing for players who headcanon their Vestige as being involved with Darien.
And then there's Darien himself and his reactions to this situation:
Of course he's devastated by Gabrielle's loss, he's mentioned his frustration at 'failing people' in the past so seeing a friend sacrifice herself for him would be especially painful. Maybe it even has him thinking about how his friends felt after losing him in Coldharbour, or what watching him restore Dawnbreaker felt like for the Vestige?
Darien's impatient tone when urging us to get out of the Colored Rooms if you speak to him once some of the others have left is also completely understandable when you consider that he's already been trapped in this particular plane of Oblivion twice and wants to make his escape before Walks-In-Ash's portal closes.
The way he doesn't do more than briefly acknowledge Summerset if your Vestige had completed enough of that questline for it to trigger as a dialogue option also makes sense when you recall that he had asked Valsirenn to give him and the Vestige some privacy for their chat on Artaeum; he's not someone who'd have a deeply personal discussion while an audience is within earshot.
The anticipation of what we might get the chance to say to him during the Writhing Wall event or SOTWC Part 2 makes the brevity of his content at the end of Part 1 and the potential retconning of what he told us about his disappearance from Coldharbour and being Meridia's Champion while on Artaeum and in the Crystal Tower before he restored Dawnbreaker bearable in the meanwhile.
For now I'm just happy Darien's back again, excited by the hint made on launch day that we ain't seen nothin' yet, and if we can finally have the chance to share that long-promised drink my Vestige may even survive losing him for a third time.
Because let's face it, Darien's developed a bad habit of dying heroically while involved with the Vestige in saving the world, so unless he becomes available as a Companion or Houseguest some day there are no guarantees he won't break our collective hearts by doing it yet again.
A new mount as a gift for the man who likes his current armor because it has lions on it 💕
(although I had to change the colours, his canon gambeson looked like it had been scavenged from a sulphur pool ten years after someone left it soaking to remove a mustard stain...)
