faderift | closed.

Zevran will not be the first to speak, too busy stirring a simmering sauce and tossing pasta in it to coat. Wine is poured and bread is sliced and flaked with garlic and butter on the table; but the actual meal? Not quite ready. By the time Fiona winds herself up to speak, though, three hearty plates of Antivan pasta will be set out. Or rather two hearty and one Grey Warden sized portion.

Fiona had been the first to enter the kitchen, she could have delayed a while longer, but what good would that do. She could pace down here just as easily as she could pace in the kitchen...it also gave her more than enough time to give Zevran pointed looks as he cooked, far too content for her liking. She idly wondered if this was entirely altruistic and for the sake of friendship, or for his own amusement.

Whatever the case she let Alistair take his seat first only following suit after the meal had been served. She figured it would be appropriate to wait that long before they had this conversation, sliding into her seat. The food she forewent, but the wine she threw back easily enough, deciding this had been drawn out long enough, "what do you know about your mother, Alistair?"

"My mother?" Alistair echoes.

It buys time. Not because he needs time to understand the question, but because he is smarter than he looks, and behind his bewildered eyebrow raise he's running through and discarding possibilities. She knew his mother. She's about to be a mother—no, that's ridiculous. She's Zevran's mother? Not the least reasonable idea. Or she's stalling for time before the two of them tell him that Zevran is dying of something she magically detected. Maybe that.

While he's thinking, he manages two bites of pasta in a short amount of time. His helping is enormous; he will absolutely finish it. He shoots Zevran a look that's very briefly grateful for the food before it sharpens back into what is going on here suspicion.

"She was a scullery maid at Redcliffe Castle," he says shortly, rather than anything he's thinking. "Got a bit starstruck over the king and paid for it."

Unobtrusive as possible, Zevran pours them all a glass of wine. In deference for how difficult this conversation is for her? Fiona's is noticeably larger. She will likely be needing it.

Once everyone has been served, he settles back with his glass, and waits.

"That...is not entirely true," that was a statement that should be completely amended in hindsight, "actually...that is not true at all. Yes there was a scullery maid, and yes she did die giving birth...but the infant died as well."

Fiona was noticeably neglecting her meal in favor of sipping her wine.

"She was not your real mother...but you were a stand in for the child that perished...it made it easier to hide the details surrounding your mother from you," taking another long sip from the glass she let that sink in for a moment.

While she talks, Alistair continues to eat. It will take more than the possibility that one mother he's never met and knows little about may in fact be a different mother he's never met and knows nothing about to dull his appetite—but at that last part he does lower his fork to a resting hold, chewing without twirling up additional noodles, so after he swallows there's time to ask, "And why would anyone need to do that?"

He can't imagine a secret bigger than royal bastard, and no one hid that from him. Not once he was old enough to mind his tongue.

"To protect you..." Fiona said simply, "...your life has not been normal, and it has not been easy...but knowing the truth about her? You had enough on your shoulders being the illegitimate son of Maric..."

More wine...just give her the whole bottle.

"...having an Orlesian mage for a mother...an elf? It would have exacerbated your struggles if you knew, if the whole world knew."

The fork stays at its resting hover over his plate, forearm braced on the edge of the table, and the rest of him is held very still as well, except his eyes, which narrow incrementally and flick to the wine glass as she drinks. There is a great deal that should be happening in his head: a dozen questions, relief to not be tied to Goldanna after all, maybe a moment of unhappiness born of ingrained Thedosian prejudices (it's fine for other people to be elf-blooded), irritation, disbelief.

But there's mostly silence, or white noise, and it will stay that way until he hears from someone he actually knows. He turns his head to look at Zevran instead, frowning and wordless.

Zevran finishes his first glass of wine and pours himself a second, slowing into stillness just as Alistair does. He knows that look, knows that fear and hesitance. And as expected, he looks to him.

Whether or not he is upset, well. That comes later.

"It is true." That is all he can offer. That is all he will offer. The rest of this? Is for Fiona and Alistair to sort out. He is merely here so Alistair does not feel quite so alone. And to keep Fiona's glass well full.

"I...am your mother..." instead of dancing around it, she officially said it, not certain where else to go form there. Zevran confirmed that her story was true so what more could she say? She could answer questions, she could sit here in this awkward silence, gripping her glass of wine as if it were the only thing anchoring her.

Alistair's attention darts to Fiona when she speaks, then back to Zevran, to give him a second chance to break into that cackle of his and explain what's really going on. In the absence of that—he reaches for his wine, for the first time since he sat down, and does away with half of it. He can drink his feelings with the best of them. He can keep at it for years.

For a moment, with years of experience villanizing Maric, he wonders—in a distant way, still, muffled, as if his thoughts are happening somewhere outside of him, where it's calmer—if it wasn't her choice.

The moment passes.

"You know, despite all the talk of shadows and secrecy," he says, glass still in hand and voice shifting toward sharp, "I've always been a fairly easy man to find."

Well...

Shit.

He owes Fiona some coin and more wine, apparently. This was not going how he thought it would -but then again he never truly had an idea as to how this might go.

It was very tempting to give Zevran the I told you so look, a look that she would certainly save for later, in the near future, approximately after this disaster had reached its conclusion.

The best she could do now was keep her expression level and as calm as she could manage, she had no right to be upset...or at least no right to outwardly appear upset.

"I never really lost track of you," Fiona said honestly and with a soft sigh, because it wasn't just herself that she was informing on now, it was Duncan. She had no wish to sully the man's memory, but if Alistair was going to know the truth it should be complete, should it not, "I might have mentioned to you that Duncan was my best friend, yes? He had a gift, a gift for being noticed only when he wanted to be noticed. He watched over you from the time you were very young up until he died...he sent letters, sometimes the letters came with other things related to you."

All the creepy things that parents kept while children found it weird: a lock of hair, a lost tooth, anything he might have scribbled or written, small things he might have touched or created...Duncan was a thief after all. Damn good at it too.

Maybe that should make him feel better. Maybe it will make him feel better, later. But he'd already known that Duncan reported to Maric and Cailan, already known his recruitment was planned rather than earned, so right now, instead of Duncan was always there and look how much Fiona cared, he mostly hears Duncan lied to you, too.

It isn't fair of him. But none of this is particularly fair to or of anyone.

He sets down the wine glass, which might seem like a good sign but isn't particularly; he picks up his utensils again, but he only lasts a second and a half in the attempt to gather food onto them again before he sets them back down with a quiet clatter. Appetite quelled—also not a good sign. There's so much to say to Fiona, questions and accusations both, that it's stuck in his throat like too much debris hung on a river bend. It's easier to glare at Zevran, who could have warned him.

"What do you have to do with this?"

Now that had been a detail he hadn't known- even as Fiona speaks Zevran flinches. Visibly flinches. Duncan has ever been well of grief but when Fiona mentioned being 'well informed' perhaps it should have occurred to him that she meant Duncan. It put quite a bit else into alternate perspective but-

Truly. Who in their right mind thought the best place for a King's Bastard was the Grey Wardens? The Joining might have killed him, any number of darkspawn attacks might have killed him, The Blight nearly killed him several times over and now? Now he might have one foot in the grave due to all this mess and for what?

Not...that he has much a leg to stand on when Alistair turns his eyes to him and he settles into his usual manner of flinching- locking up entirely. Ah, good. This he might have expected to some degree. "I found out, recently, and...thought perhaps it best you hear it from her yourself."

"I don't know her," Alistair snaps. Irrationally, unreasonably. Maybe he'll be sorry later. To both of them. Maybe. Right now he feels trapped in his chair, even without anything physically holding him there, and he isn't sorry at all.

Fiona could not honestly say this would have been the life she would have chosen for Alistair, the life of a Grey Warden. Still there was clearly a great deal more to it than earning ones place among the Grey Wardens. Who truly earns such a thing, but the strong possibility of his chances of surviving The Joining? This made Alistair a reasonable candidate, and tactically she could understand why, but also Fiona had her own personal feelings on the matter. Alistair as a Grey Warden was more complicated than that and Fiona knew exactly what it meant.

"The situation was...unanticipated on Zevran's part," she couldn't believe she was saying it, given the ferocity with which she suggested they let the matter go, and she would probably deny it later, "that illness was the catalyst for this meeting, Zevran saw something that I never intended to speak to anyone about, incidentally...and he gave me the ultimatum...either I tell you or he would. So I asked him to give me a bit of time, just until things had calmed down a bit."

Zevran's stillness continues- save for the faintest twitch of his eartips, a tell Iron bull informed him of that he cannot quite rid himself of just yet. "Alistair..."

A timely and not entirely unwelcome intervention from Fiona gives Zevran time to clear his throat and pull some manner of mask back in place.

"My famous luck at work, seeing what I should not." A very tender image indeed, of Duncan with the infant. For what isn't the last time he aches for a man he has never met- if only in knowing him would teach more of Alistair. But he tries to laugh it off, to paint on a casual smile. It does not hold up well under the gaze of someone that knows him well.

Alistair—blissfully ignorant of anyone's mixed feelings about his occupation (the only thing he's ever truly been proud of, the only thing he's ever really wanted) or else he'd be announcing where those feelings could be shoved—looks at Zevran, irritated by his humor and his smile until the falsity of it sinks in. Then his face... softens isn't the right word. But it blunts. The flat of the blade instead of the edge. He isn't off the hook for the subterfuge, but at least the secrecy was temporary. At least he thought Alistair deserved to know, unlike, apparently, everyone. else.

His attention and his ire return to Fiona, who's—small. Aged. Nonthreatening. They don't look much alike, or anything alike, honestly. That's the way things seem to go with elves and humans, but he could refuse to believe it. Demand better proof than Fade whispers. But he does believe it, really. There's nothing for her to gain; he doesn't have anything to offer her anymore than he does Goldanna. She knew Maric, knew Duncan. If he'd sat down to puzzle through the stories he's heard, perhaps he might have noticed the timing and wondered when Maric found the opportunity to go to Redcliffe and take advantage of serving girls.

So she isn't a liar. She also isn't his mother. Not now, not yet, not in a way that carries any weight. He shifts again in his chair, agitated and restless like a horse that won't settle. "And if he hadn't forced your hand, you'd have gone on as normal," he prompts. Confirm or deny, and either way, good luck.

Edited (oh my god autocorrect) 2016-05-06 01:04 (UTC)

"The honest answer to that question is, I do not know, but the very likely answer is yes--unless I decided to have something dictated posthumously. It did not seem necessary for me to bring such an upset into your life at this point in time," that was the only honest answer she had to give him. She was no fortune teller, no seer, she could not know for certain what she would have done if they spent too much time in their presence, "but I seek nothing from you, there is no entitlement, or obligation, I have not been much of a mother to you and I cannot say that having you know would have changed my absence much. I thought I was doing what I could to protect you, but I also realize that I took your choices away in asking Maric and Duncan to uphold such a promise all those years ago."

It really was difficult, maintaining a calm demeanor, but she was older, she had gotten better at it, and she realized that it would not be a very good counterbalance to Alistair's own restless agitation. She was stressed out in a way that she was very good at hiding, there was an urge to put an end to the conversation and leave it at this, but Alistair deserved more and she knew it. Checking her own feelings took every ounce of her strength and never before had Fiona really felt her age than she did right now. One hand gripped the edge of the table until her knuckles were white, the other still on the glass. If she didn't hang onto these things she very easily could have flown apart.

To recap, from Alistair's perspective—which is very similar to the perspective of an overtired toddler, to whom everything seems like too much and nothing can possibly be good—what's come out of this talk so far is (1) a mother who would have been willing to go the rest of her life without talking to him and (2) the knowledge that Duncan and Arl Eamon and probably Teagan lied to him and (3) —

(3) would be the idea that Maric might have neglected to ever say a word or even look at him for a better reason than an inability to be bothered, but Alistair can't deal with that right now.

He can't really deal with anything.

He spreads his hands above the table, like a shrug, or maybe a display. A what do you want from me gesture. Nothing, she's just said. She doesn't seek anything. And at the moment he can't think of anything he might want from her that it isn't too late for her to give. (He'll thaw, probably, with some time to feel less ambushed and overwhelmed.)

One of those hands drifts toward his shirtfront. There's a pendant beneath it, has been for most of his life, but just as quickly as it occurs to him to ask if it's hers, he decides, viciously, that he doesn't care. He picks up his fork instead and jabs at his food.

"This is really good, Zev," he says. He's not good at sounding casual and dismissive. He sounds like he's trying to sound casual and dismissive but actually speaking with a sharp rock in his mouth.

So...

This is going.

Well.

No, no it isn't, but Alistair is not throwing daggers with his eyes or food at either of them, nothing is on fire, and no one is bleeding. So it is not as bad as Zevran thought it might be. No one is even yelling! He will take what small victories that he can. And Alistair is eating which- well- he'd expected. Put food in front of a warden, that food will vanish eventually. Zevran himself clears his throat, (that is what one does when a situation is terribly awkward, clear their throat and toss someone a significant look though whether he ought to toss that to Fiona or Alistair, he can't say), and pours himself another glass of wine.

"...More wine, Fiona?" Like this is normal. When in doubt pretend everything is normal. Do not make a joke about Alistair suggesting this would end in a threesome. This is not the time.

Fiona did not hear Zevran, not really, or Alistair if she was being all that honest. Her ears were ringing like the first time she ever heard her father swear and they just wouldn't stop. She also felt physically ill which was why she contemplated the food more than made an attempt to touch it. It would definitely repeat on her if she swallowed even a single bite, or it might just turn to ash in her mouth...she hadn't decided.

Still, scrutinizing the intricacies of the pasta was better than looking anywhere else. She might have preferred yelling, accusations, endless questions, something aside from this farce. This pretend little act in which everything was okay, but you could cut the tension with a longsword as thick as it was. Fiona was not good with anything that she could not rise up and confront, like a hoard of darkspawn.

"Mm..." it was a noncommittal noise, not a yes, not a no, just a sound. What she really wanted was to dismiss herself from the table and let the two of them enjoy their meal without her. It had been a long time since she last felt like she had to be glued to the seat with compliance. It was vaguely uncomfortable and left her drained on color and strength. She would give it a moment, if nothing further was needed of her then she would take her leave.

Alistair wouldn't be particularly bothered if she left. But the quiet—that does bother him, in a sense, while soothing him in another. It gives him a few moments to settle, think, stop feeling barraged, and briefly glance up to take quick stock of both elves. Quiet is awful, but it's also a void he can fill however he likes. Get some measure of control back.

He's still not happy. His voice still has sharp corners, his gaze is still returns to sullenly focus on his plate. But between bites, he says, "Thank you for leaving me in Ferelden."

Taking him to Ferelden? Giving him to someone else to take to Ferelden? He doesn't know the story. Regardless of the logistics, leaving is still the bottom line.

—anyway, the weak and bitter punchline is, "No one would take me seriously with an Orlesian accent."

He tops off Fiona's glass and snorts a weak laugh despite himself at Alistair's joke. It takes a moment of mental calculation, another moment to consider 'is it worth it or not or will it make this worse' and honestly?

At this point it couldn't possibly make things worse.

"Ah, yes-" He starts, with a vague approximation of an Orlesian accent and a solid mimicry of Alistair's voice. "How terrible it would be to sound like this all the days of your life.'

Fiona glanced up, it took her a moment to register what was being said and when she did she didn't wear the same expression of amusement as Zevran. While Fiona was not at all expecting a warm reception, attacking her accent and her language, two things that she could not help were entirely different from attacking her for the actual situation at hand. It was an attack on her identity, and one of the more biting ways to show one's low estimation for another person was to attack their language.

She raised her eyebrows first looking slightly outraged, she knew that she probably shouldn't be, but that was not what she came here for. To be yelled at for leaving him in Ferelden? Yes. For never reaching out to him? Yes. For a number of other reasons related to the mysteries surrounding his origins? Yes. This? This she would not sit here for and she slowly stood up, not seeming quite as small as before, the steel in her eyes only softened by the hurt.

"I do not expect you to be pleased with me for the things that I have done, but I cannot help what I am..." Fiona wanted to say more, but she thought better of it. There were some things that were harder to undo once they were said, but she'd also suffered enough systematic shredding by the razor white teeth of prejudices her entire life. Even if it was subtle and in jest it was a perception and one she'd spent a long time battling until she finally found some dignity in her own being, "...if you have anything to say to me about what I have done then I will gladly take it, my moorings are bedrock, not sand...otherwise I will be obliged to let you both finish your meal in peace."

Alistair huffs once at Zevran, quick and quiet and not something that could fairly be called a laugh, but still—better than nothing.

He misses Fiona's look of outrage, but not her slow stand. He raises one eyebrow without looking up from his attempt to make the pasta cooperate with his utensils, at first, then abandons that attempt to fix her with the expression instead. It's dubious, mildly confused, persistently resentful. He's offended her, he can see that much, but he doesn't think he's sorry. Alistair is no great patriot—he would have learned to be, if he'd taken the throne, but instead he's been in Orlais for ten years, cheerfully playing along with jabs about Fereldan food and women, or about his own intelligence and brutish klutziness, with friends and enemies alike delighted to inform him that he's a barbarian from a provincial backwater that would be greatly improved by reoccupation.

Jokes. He doesn't mind them. He teases back. Everyone pretends that cracks about accents and finicky habits and masks settle the score on near-sixty years of brutal subjugation—though the Orlesian nobility's treatment of its own peasantry was always a good reminder of what re-annexation would mean, just in case anyone is at risk of forgetting. And Alistair never ruins the the mood by telling anyone that his personal introduction to the lovely Orlesian accent was Lady Isolde putting him in his place, which was outside with the animals.

—so no, in conclusion. Not sorry. He looks back down at his food.

"'Do what you're good at,' they say." Leave.

Perhaps this resolves any outstanding questions as to how Alistair managed to make Eamon give up visiting him.

Edited 2016-05-06 14:35 (UTC)

Fiona had no idea what was going on inside of Alistair and odds were he did not know what was going on inside of her either, but at least now they were touching on something that she was prepared to deal with. At least she was prepared on some level--not jokes quite possibly disguised as barbs, not uncomfortable silences, certainly not this dinner that seemed to be necessary for whatever reason.

"Alistair," Fiona began with a soft exhale, "I didn't leave you in Denerim with Maric by choice or because I had many options, you were unexpected. It is not often that Grey Wardens produce offspring. You were singularly the happiest experience of my life, but I could not keep you...I pretended for several months that maybe we would be okay in Weisshaupt and then I was expected to follow the trail of the Architect and Utha...and that meant Darkspawn. I couldn't very well induct you into the Grey Wardens before you could even speak, and at nineteen and a half inches you would have been the smallest. I left you in Denerim to keep you safe."

"You know-" Zevran cut in. "Supposed infertility or not there is this marvelous safeguard for such things. A truly miraculous herb called 'witherstalk'. Not that I am at all complaining that Alistair has come to be and- actually, no. From what little I know of Maric I suppose I should not be surprised he did not think of it as the burden of such a thing is as much on him as it would have been on you. It was a complicated time from what little I know and I expect that to be barely scratching the surface. I take it back."

They both likely had many other things on their mind and love, in the midst of all that? A complication that was likely worth cherishing.

"...You have to admit-" To Alistiar, now, whom he nudges with his foot. Be nice to your mother. "She did not have much choice."

Happiest experience, Fiona says, and for a moment Alistair's eyes burn. Which is horrifying. He won't cry in front of her. He refuses. But he needs several blinks and a nose twitch to completely eliminate the possibility.

Zevran's interruption buys him time, (though it makes his nose wrinkle for other reasons), and he returns Zevran's subtle foot nudge with a gentle but unsubtle kick beneath the table.

"No one ever does," he says, but it's quieter than before. More sulky than steely. He shifts back in his chair to look at Fiona, challenging. But not dismissive. Maybe that's improvement. "I've been six feet tall since I was seventeen."

And he's been here for months.

And she's here because someone made her.

"We were in the Deeproads at the time, I think the lot of us forgot to pack our plan B," she seemed oddly serious if not mildly perturbed to be having this discussion in front of Alistair, "I was also very certain I loathed Maric."

She hoped the vaguest details were enough to satisfy that conversation.

"I had fewer choices in the circle. If I could have plucked you out of Redcliffe and kept you with me then I might have had you spirited away immediately...but what sort of life would that have been? Regardless it was impossible," and people often wondered why she was so belligerent toward the circle, she had her personal reasons on top of her moral ones.

"There was a time you were small and chubby...you were easy to carry around, but you were not much for sitting," Fiona's eyes fell to her hands, as though she could remember how small he was and how well he fit, "I would sit you up and you were fine for a moment or two and then off to one side you would roll, sit you up again and off to the other side."

"And yet you- no...wait. I have done that as well. Nevermind." He waved a hand vaguely, settling back to sip his wine and grimace a the bruise from Alistair's kicking, offering him a faintly wounded expression.

Here he was, trying to help. He was being helpful, why would Alistair hurt him? It was terribly sad, the face he made, all wide eyes and dowturned ears-

At least until Fiona began to speak of Alistair as an infant. That.

That warranted investigation.

"Get enough pints of ale in him and he tips over easily- so I would not say he has quite grown out of that." Attempting to imagine a tiny, chubby Alistair was difficult to say the least, but one that rolled over? He snorted into his wine, hard pressed to not.

The baby talk makes him blush, of all things, though underneath the color that spreads over his face his expression doesn't soften. He's not embarrassed, exactly; everyone was a baby, babies are cute, and Alistair is only ever protective of his masculinity in jest. But how close she's coming to the things he's always wanted—close, not quite there, because he's thirty-one years old and she's only here now because her hand was forced—does make him feel vulnerable, which is a rude thing to do when he's trying very hard to regard her with the same disinterested disdain he's bestowed on Maric and Cousland and everyone else who's ever chosen not to keep him around.

(He didn't want them to anyway. Except, you know, he totally did.)

So he flushes, tries to continue looking defiant, shoots Zevran a look for his snorting, and declines to be distracted.

"Duncan could have told me. You could have written. It's been a long time since anyone could have used you to hurt me." The elf-blooded son of a mage—he's not stupid. It would have made life in Redcliffe hard. It would have made life in the monastery impossible. But no one touches a Warden. "I would have found you."

It would have been a much less pathetic companion quest than the one he got.

That was a difficult statement to respond to, if only because the answer wasn't as easy as being unable to keep an infant with her as a Grey Warden or in the Circle. As a grown man he probably could have found her, the Circle would not have kept him out, not a Warden. So why didn't she seek him out later on in life? It was the sort of thing that could get stuck in your head and rattle around in there for years, she suspected.

"I guess a small part of it was because you were a grown man, you didn't need me to kiss the bump on your head or scare the monsters out of your wardrobe. That my presence would have been more of a disruption to a life that you knew...these reasons are weak and I know it even as I say it," Fiona was pacing at this point and with nothing to do with her hands she used them to speak, to gesture. Not so much as a means to find words, but as to push the words out, "but I think the honest reason and the only reason that matters is that I was a coward."

She stopped pacing so that she could level him with a withering look. It wasn't an easy thing to admit either, it had been a long time since Fiona had been afraid of anything what with all that was out that trying to end her life--darkspawn, other mages, half-mad Seekers, "I was afraid of all the what ifs...if this would only be trouble for you, if this would only hurt you, if you hated me. So many what ifs made it hard for me to see the positives in all of the negatives...but my complexes are not excuses. Maybe you were afraid too...maybe I could have withdrawn from the politics, I could have helped you. Maybe things would have been easier if I'd been present long enough to ring Loghain's head like a bell. I don't know..."

If there's ever a guide to Alistair's good graces and the getting-into thereof, making digs at Loghain Mac Tir will probably earn its own chapter. That chapter will come after the chapters on things like 'sticking around' and 'being nice to animals,' but still. It's a good thing. Five points to Fiona. He doesn't exactly smile, but his narrowed eyes brighten with better humor than he's displayed since he sat down.

"Weeell," he says, "it's never too late for that."

No bumped heads to kiss, no monsters to scare, but Loghain could still stand a punch or two. (If he isn't dead in Orlais. Alistair can't quite hope that he is—not like that. He can die another way. Maybe in a ditch.) Dig at Loghain, five points; saying it was cowardice instead of more reasons why it was for the best, another five. But the thing that really softens the rigid line of his shoulders is remembering standing in front of Goldanna while she looked at him a lot like he's looking at Fiona now.

"What hurts is that you didn't try." He picks up his wine glass but doesn't drink, yet, only rolls the restlessly between his fingers. He glances at Zevran, as if to make sure he's paying attention: look, he's trying to be nice to his mother. "So you should sit back down," he says, "if you want to try."

She wasn't sure if knocking Loghain around would make up for so many years, but the man had it coming if she ever laid eyes on him again. Simply for the overwhelming degree of treachery...particularly of Maric, the man who was his best friend and how he'd wronged not one, but both of his children, the Wardens...so many others. How could he have become so completely lost? Fiona wasn't sure she knew the answer for certain. She did know that the man hated her and her group from the moment they stepped into Ferelden, but she was used to people looking at her like vermin. Whether or not she would have an opportunity to connect her fist with his face, just once, was a pipe dream. What she could do now was slide back into her seat across from Alistair and try to make some things a little better.

"I...am sorry, for whatever it is worth," it was really all she had, she couldn't give back 31 years and she couldn't take back her inaction on Alistair's part. She should have been more proactive in his young adult life, perhaps she could have spared him a lot of grief and some embarrassment. Fiona knew of Goldanna, just not the extent of her rejection of Alistair, "I...am not expecting anything from you, you have no obligation towards me and I have very little to give in return. Some of your childhood things, old letters from Duncan, a single portrait...and I think Arl Eamon had the amulet I left with you when last I was informed. I'll answer as many questions as you can think of or...I'll try to...I may not know the answers to everything. I would...I would love to get to know you and help you in any way I can...it's what I should have done a long time ago."

Alistair listens without outwardly reacting very much, still swirling his wine, frowning at her. It isn't a hostile frown, at least, only a wary one. At the mention of the amulet his free hand moves on the table, but he stops it before it makes it to his chest. Not ready to give her a way in, yet. She already knows far more about him than he does about her--which is the natural order of things, really, with parents and children, but this is taking it a bit far.

"I don't know where you're from or... anything," he says, prompting, and finally takes that drink.

"It...is not an easy story to tell...but you have that right, you deserve to know where you come from," after waiting long enough he's clearly earned that right, "I was born in Orlais...a given...an alienage near Montsimmard. Your grandmother was Iona and your grandfather was Finlay...and a younger brother...if you've ever wondered about your name...he was my Aly."

She wasn't really eating, she was simply pushing the food around on her plate, making shapes, distracting herself, "we were...okay, well off than most...there was meat on the table. Enough for me to sneak a portion of it to a stray cat every night. My...father was protective of his family, his children...he wanted to spare us from as much of the world's horrors as possible. I was seven when I lost my family...a stupid little girl."

She couldn't eat, no matter how well meaning the gesture was in preparing the food. She still poked at it though, with her knife.

"I was cold and hungry, but not for long...I was taken in and given food and a warm bed to sleep in until I was claimed by a human noble who was also kind...and he took me away to stay in his home. My first impression was that it was so beautiful...like a glimmering palace. How lucky could a child be?"

She said it wasn't an easy story, but she would spare as many of the details as she could.

"But the Comte was a cruel and angry man under his smile and I never saw much of that glimmering palace outside of the dim cell he kept me in. He let me out only when he wanted to go to Val Royeaux without his wife...when I was about fourteen a woman in Val Royeaux noticed my magical gifts even though I did not. I had never seen the Comte so angry, though he didn't need a reason to do the things he did, he was simply a cruel person...but he wouldn't even release me from the pain of living under his cruelty, and the cruelty was constant after that day. Then I became angry..."

A very dark expression crossed Fiona's face, before she took the knife in her hand and viciously drove it into a piece of meat.

"How dare he!...It was all I could think before my magic manifested nearly killing us both...though it did kill him. I only wanted to bring that glimmering palace of his down on his head...fortunately I did not. His wife found me...and for some strange reason she did not have me killed, she did not call for the guard. It was the first thing she had ever done for me that wasn't in complete apathy of my situation. Grateful to me I expect, for making her a very rich widow and ridding her of a cruel husband."

She let the knife go and it remained standing upright where she skewered the meat. She released a sigh and some of the tension escaped her as well.

"From there I was transferred to the Montsimmard Circle where I excelled out of spite. I was the only elf, you see, and even then there was a hierarchy...I was at the bottom of that hierarchy. My teacher wanted to do everything in her power to turn me into a proper lady and I wanted to do everything in my power to defy her. Every step of the way."

And finally Fiona smiled, almost triumphantly.

"Then one day Genevieve came to the Circle. Warden-Commander in Orlais. When I laid eyes on her I knew there was nowhere else I wanted to be. It had to be better! She wouldn't take me at first, but no one else was volunteering and I pleaded...and I became a Grey Warden...and Genevieve was everything I'd dreamed...I wanted to follow her. She was brave and strong, stern and fair, she ploughed through obstacles as if nothing could stand in her way...and it didn't matter who I was or where I came from. She was larger than life itself...someone I wanted to emulate."

And with that Fiona ended her story, having gone on long enough she reached for her own glass of wine. It was a rattling experience, but Alistair deserved to know about it.

It's a lot to process--on top of everything else, but also on its own. It doesn't take much for Alistair's heart to start bleeding. Fiona wouldn't have to be related to him at all for him to look crushed on her behalf.

And to stop eating. And to not look at Zevran at all, because there's no reassurance to be offered.

"I'm sorry," he says uselessly.

"I'm not," did it still make her angry sometimes, yes, anger was a passionate emotion and Fiona had always been driven by passionate emotions. Was she sorry, did she have any regrets, did she feel bitter? Once upon a time she did, but then she reflected on her life and looked at the bigger picture, "it would be a lie to say that it doesn't upset me every now in a long while, but to do it all over again? To choose between you or a better life? I would choose you every time."

Fiona wasn't at all sure how reassuring that would be, she'd made her own mistakes where Alistair was concerned. It was the truth as she knew it, however, extreme happiness even for a moment was worth it.

closed.

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sneaks in out of turn la la la

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