Warden of Darkness (Dragon Age/World of Darkness)

Urabrask Revealed

Let them go.
Founder
This isn't true. Those guards were alive but under the control of the desire demon possessing the boy. The woman, Isolde, while not enthralled still cared for her son and tried to get between him and a rampaging Gangrel. In the game, the main character can end up killing the boy, his mother, or neither, but not both. The guards get killed regardless.
Ah. As already mentioned, I haven't played DA:O, so I assumed there was some crazed bloodmage.
 
Interlude – Leliana’s Last Song

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
Earlier that night

Leliana knew that this was the Maker’s will.

Though Jack wasn’t what she expected from a Grey Warden, much less someone who the Maker had chosen to defeat the evil of the blight, she knew it was her destiny to assist the Warden.

Even if she did not understand the Maker’s decision, she would obey him, nonetheless.

That was the essence of faith.

And her faith had seemingly been rewarded.

Jack was exactly what Redcliffe needed to survive the undead horde. He looked young, but he knew what he was doing.

Jack Tanner may not have been a good person, but he was nonetheless doing good.

Even then, although Leliana didn’t see Jack as a good person, she didn’t see him as an evil one either. For all his gruff exterior, and his rather disturbing habits, he had never killed anyone who had not attacked him first. Or at least not since Alistair had started traveling with him.

And although Jack assured them that his decision to defend Redcliffe was purely for practical reasons, Leliana wasn’t convinced.

His plan to use himself as bait for the undead was hardly what you would expect from a selfish person. Though it may have been the safest option for Redcliffe, it was certainly not the safest option for Jack.

He could have easily chosen a strategy that placed him in a safer position, but he hadn’t. And even if he was supernaturally tough, the undead still posed at least some threat to Jack’s life.

Jack had gone out of his way to save as many of Redcliffe’s people as he could. Even at risk to himself.

Leliana watched him from behind a makeshift barricade as Jack fought against the walking dead.

Against a smarter enemy Jack’s idea would have failed, but against the mindless dead it was working well. Most of the creatures threw themselves head on against the first thing they encountered instead of trying to flank of simply going around.

The few undead that got by him were easily hacked down by Ser Perth and his knights.

“Men, get ready!” Perth shouted. “I think we’re about to be in for some trouble!”

“My lady, you may want to ready your signal arrow.” Perth said to Leliana. “We may need it shortly.”

“What do you mean?” She answered. “Jack seems to have the hungry dead well in hand.”

“It seems strange to say, but it’s not them I’m concerned about.” Perth answered. “It’s your Warden friend fighting them.”

“I’m not quite sure what you mean.”

“I’ve been fighting since I was a boy, and I’ve fought everything from Orlesians to darkspawn. I know when someone is about to lose control of themselves. Your friend there is starting to act like a dwarven berserker.

“Also, it’s a bad sign when they start frothing at the mouth.”

A closer look proved Perth correct. While Jack has started the fight calm and composed, he was now swinging his claws wildly while making animalistic snarls.

And yes, foaming at the mouth.

“That doesn’t necessarily mean anything.” Leliana said. “I don’t know much about how his . . . people behave. For all you know this could be normal for them.”

“Perhaps.” Perth answered. “But if everything goes well, then preparing costs us nothing. If he goes berserk, then it will have been well worth the effort.”

That made sense to Leliana, and so she decided to wait and see what would happen.

At first Ser Perth’s worries seemed misplaced. Though Jack continued to behave erratically, he didn’t seem to be getting worse either.

Until a lone undead managed to sneak up behind him and hit him in the back of the skull.

Jack let out an inhuman scream and tore the walking corpse in half. After destroying any undead in range, he ran off into the mist in the direction of Redcliffe Castle.

Oddly enough, all the remaining undead followed in pursuit, completely ignoring the knights and the village.

“Hmm. That could have gone a lot worse.” Said Ser Perth. “I honestly thought he was going to attack us.”

Leliana wasn’t so relieved. Jack may have been powerful, but she didn’t think he could survive against an entire castle of the hungry dead. He’d said so himself.

As she moved to go after him Perth grabbed her shoulder. “I wouldn’t suggest that. No one who has gone into that fog has come out alive. I know you want to help your friend but getting yourself killed isn’t going to help him.”

“But . . . I . . .” Leliana tried to object, but she really couldn’t. She may have left Bard work behind, but she still remembered the lessons of the trade.

One of those was that when a mission went bad, sometimes you just had to accept that. You can’t always save everyone.

Besides, surely the Maker would save Jack. He would never let the Darkspawn overtake Ferelden.

And so, she waited. Then about fifteen minutes later, the unnatural fog vanished.

“This is new.” Said Ser Perth. “On all of the previous assaults the fog dispersed around sunrise.”

“Hello?” Alistair’s voice came up from the path behind them. “Are you all still alive up there?”

“Alistair, what are you doing here?” Leliana said. “Shouldn’t you be defending the town?”

“Well, that’s not really a problem anymore.” Alistair said. “The undead have . . . stopped.”

“What?”

“I’m not really sure what happened. The mist just vanished and all of the undead just collapsed. I came up here to see if you were all still alive. The rest are still defending the chantry in case more come.”

Alistair looked around the area and frowned. “Speaking of that, where is Jack? Shouldn’t he be with you?”

“Jack,” Leliana grimaced, “Jack took a head wound and ran off towards the castle. He didn’t seem to be in control of himself.”

Alistair frowned. “I think he mentioned something like that on the road to Lothering. He said that his kind could sometimes loose control of themselves and go on violent rampages.

“If this is what has happened, then Arl Eamon might be in danger. We need to get to the castle now.”

“You’re right Alistair.” Perth said. “That’s why I’m coming with you. It should be safe with the undead and fog gone.

“And Eamon is the only noble powerful enough left to oppose Loghain. Without him we will have no choice but to accept Loghain’s rule or fight the darkspawn on our own.”

They left for the castle and Leliana followed.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

If anyone had felt concern that the Cainite might have run off to somewhere other than the castle, the trail of bodies on the road put an end to that idea.

Undead were strewn all along the path to Castle Redcliffe. Most of them had been cut apart with his claws but a few of them seemed to have been bludgeoned to death with other undead.

One even looked like Jack had torn off its limbs with his bare hands.

The amount of strength that would require was far more than Leliana had considered possible for someone of Jack’s slim physique.

It was another reminder that for all his outward humanity, Jack was utterly unnatural.

When the group reached the castle gates, they saw that an opening had been cut straight through the metal bars of the portcullis.

Past the gates, the courtyard was a scene of utter carnage. Desiccated corpses were everywhere, though Jack himself seemingly hadn’t come out of the fight unscathed as half of his left arm was lying next to a shredded suit of armor.

After entering the castle keep, the group finally found Jack in the great hall. He was standing calmly amongst the dead knights, which Leliana noted looked not to have been previously undead, strewn on the floor.

When he heard the group’s footsteps Jack turned to face them, revealing the mutilated bodies of a woman and a young boy lying behind him.

“Well, what do we have here?” Jack said in clipped tone that Leliana had never heard him use before.

“If I had known I would be expecting guests I would taken some time to tidy up. You will have to excuse the mess.”

Alistair and the knights didn’t respond, their attention focused on the corpses of the woman and child. “Isolde . . . Connor. Jack, what have you done?”

The vampire gave a small smile. “I think you may be under a misimpression. I am not Jack. My name is Roy Vannier, former prince of New York City. Mr. Tanner has mentioned my name a few times.”

Alistair blanched. “He said that was the name of his former leader. The one that he ate.” Alistair said. “But how is this possible?”

“When one Cainite devours another,” Roy explained, “They consume not just their vitae, but their soul. But my former subordinate lacked the age or the power to subsume me, and thus I am still here. Jack’s frenzy allowed me to come out for a bit.”

“Enough of this!” Ser Perth demanded, drawing his weapon. “Where is Arl Eamon? Why have you killed his family?”
Roy sighed. “Stop.” He said, and Leliana’s entire body froze stiff. Though she was vaguely aware that the rest of the group had also gone still, her full attention was focused on Roy’s gaze.

There was something unnatural in his eyes that demanded her obedience. If the creature in front of her demanded anything of her then she would do it. She couldn’t even imagine anything else.

“This is the power of dominate.” Roy said, still holding the party in his sway. “Proof of the rightful Cainite dominion over mortals. Jack never bothered to learn it, but I am not constrained by what he can and cannot do.

“Your lord is alive, if comatose by the way. Apparently, he was poisoned and his son,” Roy gestured to the body of the boy, “made a deal with a spirit to save his life. The spirit then possessed him and brought the plague of undeath to this castle.

“The guardsmen here were all under the thrall of the spirit and thus tried to protect it from a frenzied Grangrel. They failed. The boy’s mother didn’t seem under the spirit’s control but tried to defend it anyway and suffered the inevitable fate of the stupid.

“When Jack killed the boy, the magic animating the hungry dead dispersed. Which leads us to the current situation. Feel free to verify this yourselves at a later time. The man who poisoned your master is in the dungeons and should be able to provide whatever answers you need.”

Roy turned his eyes to Perth. “You and your men are no longer required. Return to your hovels and trouble me no more.”

Perth and his men shuffled out of the castle with glazed looks in their eyes. Once they had left, Leliana felt Roy’s control lift from her mind.

“What was that?” Demanded Alistair. “Did you just use blood magic on us?”

Roy rolled his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. That was just a discipline. Though I do know how to use true blood magic, I have no intention of using it in my current state. I doubt Jack’s body could handle it.”

“It seems a . . .” Alistair paused mid-sentence, looking a but confused. “What are those things on your head?”

Leliana hadn’t noticed until now, but upon closer inspection it seemed that Jack had grown a pair of fuzzy looking animal ears from the top of his head.

In other circumstances Leliana would have found it adorable.

The Gangrel Clan,” Roy spat out the name. “When they frenzy, they sometimes gain a trait from one of the beasts they so venerate. It usually fades away after a day’s rest.”

“Speaking of animals,” Alistair said, “Jack named that dog of his Roy. Did he name that after you?”

Roy snarled. “I have had enough of your questions.” He snapped. “Our time is limited, and I have things of importance to discuss with you mortals.”

Leliana had been fairly quiet until now, not quite knowing how to react to such a strange situation. But what Roy had said made her wonder about the creature’s intentions.

“What do you expect of us?” She asked. “Do you want us help you take over Jack’s body? If so, you’re going to be disappointed.”

“Such loyalty to someone you barely know.” Roy said. “While I do plan to take control of this body eventually, I lack the ability to do so at the moment. Even if I could do so now, I certainly wouldn’t need the assistance of mortals.

“My worry, or at least the one that concerns you, is that Jack is not far off from turning into a wight.”

“A what?”

“That is what happens when a Cainite loses control of their beast.” Roy said. “The beast takes complete control of them, leaving a slavering animal driven only by their hunger. I believe it is somewhat similar to what your people call an abomination.”

Alistair grimaced. “That would be bad.”

“Indeed.” Said Roy. “Not only would this land be plagued by a monster, but more importantly, whatever is left of myself would disperse. While my current existence is not optimal, it is all I have.

“You will assist me in preventing this.”

“What do you mean?” Leliana asked. While she was suspicious of this creature, the idea of Jack becoming something like an abomination was not appealing.

“Jack’s main problem is that he lacks an emotional connection to anything or anyone in this land.” Roy said. “Even in New York he didn’t really have much to keep him grounded. I think the war was the only thing keeping him going after the shock of his embrace wore off.

“Part of the difficulty is because of how young he was embraced. Sixteen is too young to form many of the emotional connections that we remember to keep us human.”

Leliana was taken aback at the implications. “You want us to make an emotional connection with him?” She asked. “Are you . . . asking us to be his friend?”

“No.” Roy stated with a bit of annoyance. “Not that it would be a bad outcome, it is simply unlikely. Instead I plan to use his past trauma for a positive purpose.

“I believe that if he were to embrace someone that his lingering feelings of resentment for his sire would cause him to become emotionally invested in the care of the new embrace. By the time that is resolved the Sabbat will have started to move into Ferelden from Orlais.

“He will then have the choice of fighting against them or joining them. Either path will give him a cause to fight for.”

The Cainite turned his eyes to Leliana, staring at her intently. “And so, Leliana, I am going to gift you with the embrace.”

Leliana’s mouth dropped open at Roy’s words. She had gone through a lot of horrible things in her life, from torture to betrayal by her mentor and closest friend, but this was something she had never even considered.

The thought of becoming an abomination, accused in the eyes of man and the Maker was too horrifying to imagine.

“Wait!” Alistair yelled, wide eyed. “You don’t have to do this, Flemeth said that the joining may have done something to him and that she could fix it. If we defeat the darkspawn and go back to her everything will be fine.”

The former prince shook his head. “That witch knows nothing of the curse of Caine. It may be possible that the joining ritual did something to my host, but if so, then whatever unholy magics she would use would undoubtably only make things worse.”

Roy began to walk towards the pair. “Besides,” he said, “There are other concerns. My people are on the verge of destruction. The red star hangs in the sky and the Antediluvians rise from their slumber. The existence of the Cainite race and of Western civilization itself hangs in the balance.”

Hold.” Roy spoke and Leliana froze in place once again.

“This land could be the salvation of mine.” Roy said. “If we could open a way between Thedas and Earth then some of us could wait out Gehenna in safety while the Antediluvians destroy each other. Even if that is not possible than we could at least save our race. It only takes one Cainite to start our people anew.

“Jack is so busy wallowing in self-pity that he would let this opportunity pass. I will not. Unfortunately, either option will require assistance. Cainite assistance.

“And while Jack may not have noticed I can tell that you have a background in intelligence work Leliana, I have. That and your skills in combat make you worthy to receive the blood of Clan Gangrel, though not the blood of one of the higher clans.”

He glanced at Alistair. “We shall return to our campsite outside the village when we are done. Now leave us.”

Alistair walked out leaving only Leliana and Roy. “I am sorry about this but understand that this is for the greater good.” Roy spoke quietly. “Not just for my people but for yours. Only when Cainites united through the Camarilla did humanity lift itself out of its primitive squalor into something glorious.

“You now have the chance to join me in saving your people from yourselves. To give these humans the enlightened guidance they never knew they needed, either through a new Camarilla or as the guiding hand behind the savage Sabbat.”

As the Cainite sank his fangs into Leliana’s neck she felt indescribable pleasure followed by nothing.

Ever since she had been betrayed by her mentor Marjolaine and joined the Chantry, Leliana had believed that the Maker spoke to her, that she was chosen for a greater purpose.

In later times she would ponder whose voice she had been hearing for years. She wondered it had been the Maker and receiving the embrace had caused him to cast her from his sight, or if she had simply been delusional the whole time.

Regardless of whose voice it was, after her embrace she would never hear it again.

__________________________________________________________________

Author's Note: Sorry about the Hiatus. The quarantine just killed my motivation to write for a while.

I'm still not really happy about this chapter but here it is anyway.
 
Warden 2.7

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
This wasn’t Jack’s first frenzy, but it was easily his worst. Not just in terms of casualties, though that was a concern, but the most awful part of this was the cat ears.

Finished screaming, Jack knelt down on the floor and put his head in his hands.

If it was just something like a lizard tail or a pair of owl’s eyes, He could have lived with it. But cat ears?

Dear God, he was a fucking furry.

If the ears didn’t fade away, then he would never be able to go home again even if he did find a way to get back.

He could just imagine what would happen if he tried. Everybody at court would start calling him a catboy or a neko and he would probably be banished to the wilderness or kept out of sight as a danger to the masquerade.

Worst of all, Sheriff Yui and that sadistic harpy Christine would probably think his ears were cute or something. Knowing Christine, she might even try to put a collar or a bell on him.

It was hideous enough before when she called him her “pet” without it becoming literal.

It was just too awful to contemplate.

Still, there wasn’t any point worrying about that unless he was sure the ears wouldn’t go away on their own. If they were still there in a week, he could freak out then.

A glance at the still feral if currently placid Leliana was a reminder that there were other things that the Gangrel should be worrying about.

“This would probably be easier with both arms.” Jack muttered as he pulled a crossbow bolt out of the quiver of one of the fallen guards.

“Hey Leliana,” Jack said as he walked up to the former sister, “I have something for you.”

Leliana swung a fist at Jack but he dodged and shoved his crossbow bolt into her heart.

As Leliana fell unconscious Jack grabbed her by the waist and hoisted over his shoulder.

“I guess the only thing I can do know is head back to camp.” Jack said to himself. “It’s not like I can head back to the village or stay here after I killed those people.

“I’m still going to have a lot of explaining to do. Which might be easier if I knew how any of this actually happened.”
Jack sighed.

“And on top of that I have to teach the Chantry sister how to be a Cainite. And I’m going to have to figure out how I managed to embrace her in the middle of a frenzy.

“I never should have joined the Grey Wardens.”
_________________________________________________________
When Jack got back to camp both Alistair and Morrigan were waiting for him. Both of them armed and looking rather upset.

Not Sten through. He was just sitting by the fire and looking stoic with the dog.

“Uh, I know that this doesn’t look good,” the Cainite noticed Alistair staring at the torpid form of Leliana draped over Jack’s shoulder, “But I can assure you that there is a reasonable explanation for all of this. And I someday hope to know what it is.”

Alistair lowered his sword and grimaced. “I don’t think it’s him.” Alistair said. “Roy didn’t talk like that.”

“Of course, Roy doesn’t talk like that.” Jack snarled. “He’s a dog. Now what the hell are you talking about?”

“You don’t remember?” Alistair asked.

“I do not remember anything from my frenzy.” Jack said frostily. “Now get to the point before I frenzy again.”

Alistair sighed. “Alright, but you should probably sit down for this. This might be a bit of a shock.”
___________________________________________
That turned out to be an understatement.

If Alistair was to be believed, and Jack was still skeptical of anything that came out of his mouth, Prince Roy’s consciousness was apparently floating around in Jack’s head and wanted to take over his body on a permanent basis.

Roy putting him under a blood bond back in New York had a hellish experience. But the very idea of the Ventrue possessing his body was so appalling that Jack couldn’t even muster the strength to be angry about it.

In retrospect, diablerizing Roy instead of tearing his head off may have been a bad decision.

But what made the situation worse was that Jack couldn’t think of any way out of this. Besides the unreliable promises of Flemeth he had nothing to go on.

If he was back on Earth then he would have had options. He could have asked an elder for advice, gotten a Tremere to use some sort of magic on him, or even tried to go down a path on enlightenment.

But here in Thedas, all of those options were closed to him.

Still, it’s not like any of that was Jack’s fault. There had been no way of knowing any of this would happen back on Earth, it was just bad luck that this had all happened now.

It’s not like Jack had any forewarning of this.
____________________________________________
New York City, October 3, 1999
“Are you feeling alright?”

“Hhm?” Jack grunted as he glanced over his shoulder. “What are you on about this time Dieter?”

While Jack didn’t really have any friends, Dieter Mach was probably the closest thing he had. The German Tremere had lived in New York City since 1934 and currently served as an unofficial leader for the city’s Tremere after the death of Regent Gavin.

Though Gangrel typically didn’t get along with Tremere, Dieter was an exception to that rule. Dieter had always shown a respect for members of other clans and had ideas about ethical uses of thaumaturgy that were unusual for the Warlocks.

Those sentiments didn’t make him popular with the Pyramid, but Jack and other younger members of the Camarilla appreciated it.

“I’m just pointing out that you haven’t really been acting like yourself lately.” Dieter said. “Honestly, I’m kind of worried.”

“That’s all you have to say to me? I just got myself acquitted from a bunch of Archons for diablerizing the former Prince in front of the whole court. Don’t I deserve some congratulations?”

Jack was still honestly surprised he managed come out the trial intact. If the circumstances hadn’t been so strange than he probably wouldn’t have.

While diablerie is normally illegal, it is the prerogative of a Prince to authorize it under certain circumstances. As such, at one point in 1998 Prince Roy issued an order legalizing diablerie against Sabbat elders to anyone who would assist in the war effort.

Of course, when Roy defected to the Sabbat himself a year later that made him a valid target for his own order.

What made the trial even stranger was that the Archons had handled it directly.

Normally a trial for diablerie would be handled by the Prince, but with Roy’s death Sheriff Medici, who had led the coup against him, took over the position. But a few days later when Medici’s childe Yui reported that he was consorting with demons the Archons had arrived in the city and had him burned at the stake.

And he
had been consorting with a demon. Jack and the rest of the court had seen the evidence firsthand.

The demon had even told them so itself.

But even with the unique circumstances surrounding the trial, it was still very odd that Jack hadn’t been executed. Technicalities had never meant much to the Camarilla when they wanted someone dead. And the elders never trusted anyone who had committed diablerie.

“I have to admit, I’ve never seen anything quite like it.” Dieter said. “Your legal argument was absolutely brilliant. But that’s the problem. You’re not actually smart enough to pull that off.”

“I’m not smart enough?” Jack snarled at the Tremere. “Do you think that I’m an idiot?”

“I wouldn’t say that.” Dieter said. “You’ve never been stupid, but you’ve never been intelligent either. Until now.

“In the last month your vocabulary has improved dramatically, you’ve stopped going on random profanity laden rants, and your general education level has gone from that of a high school graduate to a college graduate.”

“Where are you going with this?” Jack asked.

“Fine, I’ll be blunt.” Dieter responded. “When you diablerized Roy some part of him left its mark on you. You’ve even taken on some of his mannerisms.

“We overthrew Roy for a reason, and I don’t want him to come back in some new body. Things are bad enough as it is.”

“You’re full of crap Dieter.” Jack said. “You say that I’m behaving strangely? I think that’s normal when the entire world seems to be heading off of a cliff. If you hadn’t noticed, an Antediluvian just rose from its slumber and got nuked, our former sheriff summoned a demon which is still loose in the city, and the entire country of Bangladesh was turned into a radioactive pile of slag.

“If all of that isn’t enough to change a person than what is?”

“Alright I get your point.” Dieter said. “Just don’t say I didn’t warn you if this goes wrong. Of course, you might not have that chance. I hear the Archons just came up with a plan to catch that demon. By using you as live bait.”

“Of course, they did.” Jack sighed. “Do you know what sadistic idiot came up with that plan?”

“Nothing I can verify. But I heard through the grapevine that Christine is the one who suggested the idea to the Archons.”

Jack grit his teeth in anger. “Damn it, not again. Just what else is this city going to throw at me now? Can it get worse than this?”

Dieter gave the Gangrel a tired smile. “Believe me kid, things can always get worse.”
_______________________________________________________

Okay, maybe Jack had been given a little warning. But really, with all of the stuff that had been going on at the time he couldn’t be blamed for getting distracted.

At least that’s what Jack kept telling himself.

“So, what’s our plan now?” Jack asked Alistair. “Where do you think we should go from here?”

“What? Why are you asking me?”

“Because I don’t know a damn thing about this place.” Jack said. “So, what are our options here?”

“I think we should go to the Circle of Magi next.” Alistair said. “We need them to fight against the darkspawn and they might even be able to help with your condition.”

“Wait,” Morrigan interrupted. “Do you really think those fools will know anything that my Mother doesn’t? A bunch of cowards who let themselves be locked in a cage by the Chantry?”

“Maybe not.” Alistair answered. “But they might. And even if they can’t then it puts us one step closer to stopping the darkspawn and getting Flemeth to help.”

“What about the Templars?” Jack asked. “I doubt they’ll be pleased to see either me or Morrigan.”

“Morrigan shouldn’t go anywhere near the Circle.” Alistair agreed. “But I think I can convince the Templars to leave you be. Grey Wardens have wide authority during a blight and Commander Greagoir is a reasonable man. I think he will understand under the circumstances.”

“I’ll take your word for it.” Jack said. “But I’m trusting you on this, so don’t screw it up.”

Jack held out the stump where his left hand used to be. “Also, I think we should stay here for a couple of days to recuperate. Also, I’m going to need a lot of human blood.”

“What?”

“I’m in no state to fight like this and I’m going to need a couple of days to heal.” Jack said. “And I’m going to need a lot of blood to do that. And animal blood won’t cut it for something like this. Which means that you are going to convince the villagers to let me feed from them.”

“That . . . won’t be easy.” Alistair’s voice quivered a bit.

“It’s either that or I starve and go on a rampage. And the second option would permanently ruin any chance of an alliance with Redcliffe. Which we need to defeat the darkspawn.”

Alistair grimaced. “I can try. But can you do this without hurting anyone?”

Jack nodded. “If I make sure to feed without hurting anyone then I’m going to need to feed on three people a day for three to four days. We should also keep Leliana staked until we leave. She’ll need to feed as well, and I don’t want to take more blood from Redcliffe than I have to. And while you’re at it try and smooth out any hurt feelings regarding the incident at the castle.”

Alistair sighed. “I’ll try. But I can’t guarantee this will work.”

“Just try your best. If you want to get treated like a real Grey Warden, then you should start by doing something worthy of one. And this would certainly qualify.”

Jack felt his cat ears and frowned. “I just hope that these stupid things go away before we leave. They usually do but it’s not guaranteed. If they don’t fade, then I’ll never by able to set foot in any town again. Or I’ll at least have to buy a hat.”
_________________________________________________
Despite Jack’s worries, Alistair had somehow managed to keep the situation in Redcliffe under control. And strangely enough though the locals weren’t exactly happy with the slaughter of the Arl’s family and personal guard they weren’t that angry about it either.

It turns out that since the Arl’s family were under the control of a malicious spirit then they were already under a sentence of death from the Templars.

Basically, nothing had changed but the name of their executioner.

And to Jack’s utter confusion, Alistair had even convinced a few peasants to let Jack use them to feed. Apparently, they were thankful for Jack saving them all from being killed.

Still, a lot of the locals were pretty terrified of the idea drinking human blood. But after the first couple people Jack fed on turned out to be perfectly fine most of them calmed down.

They still weren’t happy about it but at least they wouldn’t be breaking out the torches and pitchforks.

Things seemed to be going fairly well, and after two days they got even better.

Jack’s cat ears went away.

Once again, he looked like an actual person instead of a disgusting animal creature. He hadn’t felt this good since killing Prince Roy.

After four days Jack was healed up and the Wardens were ready to leave Redcliffe.

The only thing left to do was to revive Leliana.

“Well, here goes nothing.” Jack said as he pulled the crossbow bolt out of Leliana’s heart.
 

Tiamat

I've seen the future...
No need to apologize for the hiatus, this damn quarantine has really killed the enthusiasm of a lot of good folks. ☹️

That said, glad to see this continuing.
 

Urabrask Revealed

Let them go.
Founder
“I never should have joined the Grey Wardens.”
A lot of people say that. Hindsight is 20/20 and all that.
In retrospect, diablerizing Roy instead of tearing his head off may have been a bad decision.
Naaah, you think so?
Can it get worse than this?
Lol, don't ask questions you don't want answered.
the slaughter of the Arl’s family
I fully expect there to be consequences down the line. Killing a prince and consuming him was a border case, however justified it might've been. Killing a whole family of nobles in Theldas is going to make other nobles concerned about Grey Wardens more than they already are.
 

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
I fully expect there to be consequences down the line. Killing a prince and consuming him was a border case, however justified it might've been. Killing a whole family of nobles in Theldas is going to make other nobles concerned about Grey Wardens more than they already are.
Sure, but keep in mind that the nobility in Southern Thedas has other issues that worry them far more than this. Compared to the Blight and certain things going on in Orlais Jack killing an abomination and a foreign woman who may or may not have been mind controlled are not high on their list of priorities.

On a related note, the next chapter is going to be another Sabbat interlude.
 
Interlude - Sword of Caine II

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
Cassandra Pentaghast hated Orlais.

The nobility of Orlais was depraved. They schemed and murdered one another and treated it like a game. They viewed anyone who wasn’t them with contempt and treated their lower classes like livestock.

And worst of all was how they used the Chantry as another piece in their game.

As much as Cassandra hated to admit it, the Chantry had become corrupt in recent centuries. Where once they had dedicated themselves to spreading the Chant and caring for the less fortunate the revered mothers now focused most of their time on politics and enriching themselves.

And much, though not all, of the blame for this belonged to Orlais.

Perhaps that was inevitable. With the Chantry founded and based in Orlais it was natural that the two would become intertwined. It was equally natural that the clergy would come mostly from the Orlesian aristocracy.

After all, serving the Chantry required a level of education that could be found mostly in the nobility. Considering that many peasants couldn’t even read there was nowhere but the nobility that the Chantry could find so many potential recruits.

And while the Chantry did recruit foreign nobles, especially for regional positions, that did not change that the Chantry’s administrative center was in Orlais. Thus, most of the top positions ended up in the hands of Orlesian noblewoman.

Unfortunately, these noblewomen tended to use their positions in the Chantry to assist their families in the constant power struggles between Orlesian noble houses.

And once that precedent was set it was inevitable that the Chantry would use their power to benefit the Orlesian Empire as a whole. After all, if it was acceptable to use religious authority to empower a noble house than why not a country? Why not the monarch?

For instance, a decade ago the Divine had used the Templars in Kirkwall to depose the city’s Viscount who had been heavily taxing Orlesian shipping.

Oh, the Divine had claimed that Viscount Perrin had been removed for being a tyrant and a heretic. And while that may or may not have been true everybody knew the real reason he was deposed.

Because the Emperor asked her to.

Whatever their vows, many in the Chantry clearly saw their duty to Orlais to be greater than their duty to the Maker.

And so, when the peasantry of Orlais were oppressed by the nobility, which was often, the Chantry did nothing. How could it be otherwise when the Chantry and Orlais were almost one and the same?

Free from consequences, both the nobility and Chantry wallowed in corruption for centuries and believed that it would last forever.

But nothing lasts forever.

Several months ago, a series of peasant revolts had broken out in the eastern regions of Orlais. And while peasant revolts were not that uncommon in Orlais these ones were very unusual.

Usually, these uprisings would be bloody but brief, with the Chevaliers putting down any insurrection brutally and most of the rebels dispersing after the initial bloodbath.

But not this time.

Even though the Chevaliers and the Orlesian Army had been ruthless in putting down the rebellion, now their brutality only seemed to encourage the rebels to further resistance. In the rare instances where the rebels stood and fought instead of resorting to guerilla warfare, they fought with a fanaticism and a sense of discipline that should have been beyond them.

Confronted by the failure of their usual tactics to restore order, the Orlesian authorities responded by doubling down on atrocity. Where normally they might just hang the leaders of a village supporting a rebellion, they were now wiping out whole communities just for being connected to a rebel.

Naturally enough the Chantry took an interest in this. Though the Chantry was corrupt it still contained some honest elements, some of whom sympathized with the plight of the lower classes and suggested an investigation to see if there was a possibility of negotiation with the rebels. This was also supported by foreign elements who wished to see the Orlesians cut down to size.

Regardless of the reason, the Chantry had sent a team to investigate these rebels who called themselves the Sabbat.

What they found was far worse than the Orlesian aristocracy.

Much like the nobility, they made no distinction between soldier and civilian. For them, anyone supporting or connected to the Orlesian government was fair game. They commonly resorted to things such as assassinations, poisoning water sources and food stocks, and other scorched earth tactics.

This in of itself was disappointing but not surprising. While such brutal tactics were to be condemned, they were not particularly unusual in rebellions. And although the Imperial nobility whined about such “dishonorable tactics”, few sympathized considering that they themselves were happy to use the same methods when convenient.

Though some did express concern how well these rebels carried out these operations. The level of coordination and competence of some of these rebels almost suggested that they were an actual army rather than a peasant rabble.

Still, this didn’t worry the Chantry too much. The moderates in the clergy felt that they could offer the rebels limited reforms to stand down and that the nobility would accept it so long as a few of the rebel ringleaders were hanged.

While no one would be happy with the compromise, the livelihoods of the peasants would get a little better and the nobility would still be in control. Life would go back to normal.

These optimistic thoughts vanished when more reports started to come in.

The rebels had abandoned the worship of the Maker and adopted a new religion.

This alone was enough reason for the Chantry to sanction a violent purge of the Dales, but somehow this wasn’t even close to the worst news from the area.

From what the Chantry’s investigators had discovered the rebels seemed to be led by a group of some sort of undead. Apparently these undead, who referred to themselves as Cainites, subsisted off of human blood, could convert captured humans into more Cainites, and had their own supernatural powers.

Powers which were unaffected by the abilities of a Templar.

That bit of information had the Casandra’s superiors in the Seekers of Truth reeling. And honestly, she wasn’t handling it well herself.

The powers that Templars wielded had always been the Chantry’s greatest weapon against malificar and abominations. If those could no longer be relied upon then how long would it be until the mages smelled weakness and rebelled?

The mere fear of that was already empowering anti-mage extremists among the Templars and Seekers. Some voices suggested that if magic could not be controlled than all mages should just be made tranquil.

They called it the “Final solution to the mage problem.”

While normally such ideas would be swiftly suppressed, terror was opening doors that would otherwise be closed.

Never mind that there was no proof that human mages could understand, much less use the abilities that Cainites wielded, the mere possibility that they someday might do so was terrifying.

In light of her investigator’s discovery, the Divine Beatrix III had decreed that the Sabbat were enemies of the faith and were to be destroyed as quickly as possible. She also sent out a few messages to Orlesian nobles stating that the Chantry was willing to ignore any atrocity in service of putting down the rebellion.

The Seekers of Truth estimated that the rebellion could last for years before it was put down, and that after it was the Orlesian nobility would use the aftermath to increase their control over the peasantry. And that wasn’t even considering the Blight that brewing in southern Ferelden.

There seemed to be no end in sight to the carnage.

At least until the Chantry’s agents in the Dales sent back a very interesting report. The report said that these Cainite creatures had a leader, an original monster that had spawned this whole infestation and had masterminded the rebellion. It also seemed that ordered all of its closest lieutenants to attend a meeting to discuss their future plans.

This was an opportunity to destroy the rebellion before it could spiral further out of control.

With this information, it was decided by the leaders in the Seekers of Truth to put together an elite team to wipe out the rebellion at its source. Ideas of sending in larger forces were discussed but shot down due to the likelihood of the rebels noticing the attacking force and fleeing.

As the Right Hand of the Divine, Cassandra was a natural pick to join this team.

With most of their leaders’ dead, it was hoped that the Sabbat rebellion would collapse, and the peasants could be returned to the Chant of Light.

Even though Cassandra knew that this was the right course of action, she couldn’t help but feel conflicted by her assignment.

The rebels had abandoned their Maker and sworn themselves to unholy monsters and therefore had to be defeated, she was certain in this. But it still felt wrong to help prop up the corrupt nobles and priests who had driven them to such desperation that they would prefer to be ruled by blood drinking abominations than by their own lords.

But conflicted or not, Cassandra Pentaghast would do her duty. Even when it felt wrong.

All she could do now was put her trust in the Maker.

____________________________________________

Somewhere deep in the Emerald Graves, about a dozen relatively young Cainites sat at a table waiting for their leader to start their meeting.

Said leader was currently cutting the throat of a peasant who was struggling in his grip. As his knife slid across the peasant’s neck the blood that flowed from that man’s arteries seemed to turn to an oily smoke as it hit the floor. The smoke then flowed towards a nearby wall, where it joined the smoke taken from the lifeblood of four previous peasants in a large pool of darkness that was stretched across the wall.

“Archbishop Dawson?” One of the men nervously asked. “Could you inform us of the reason for,” he gestured at the pool of darkness, “that?”

“We have had a security leak.” Arthur Dawson answered. “These humans gave information on our movements to the Chantry and therefore had to die. Though perhaps that was for the best. I needed to sacrifice several lives anyway and it is better that those killed should actually deserve death. While innocents sometimes must suffer for the greater good, it should be avoided if at all possible.

“As for purpose of this ritual, that shall be clear shortly. For now, let us proceed with the meeting. Bishop Rainier will begin with his report on Ferelden.”

“Yes, your lordship.” Bishop Thom Rainier said. “While we had hoped that Loghain might have been able to rally against the darkspawn his army after the defeat at Ostagar, it appears that his bannerman have risen in revolt rather than except his authority. And considering that Loghain has sent most of his troops not fighting the nobles to the Orlesian border rather than fight the darkspawn, I believe that Ferelden will be unable to contain the blight.”

“How long to you believe it will take before the darkspawn attack Orlais?” Dawson asked.

“I’d estimate eight months to a year before raiding parties start crossing the border and then another year before a full-scale invasion.”

“Bishop Auguste, I put you in charge of tracking the Orlesian army.” Dawson said. “Do you think they can hold back the darkspawn?”

“Normally yes, but our insurgency throws that into doubt.” Auguste said. “The Orlesian army has withdrawn a large portion of their forces from the Ferelden border to Halamshiral to meet up with Chantry forces in an effort to crush us. If we are still holding on by the time the darkspawn arrive, it is likely that Orlais will be overrun.”

“I take it you have a suggestion to avoid this?” Dawson said.

“Yes, my lord. Even if we can defeat the forces that the Empress is marshalling against us, which is unlikely, we would almost certainly be destroyed by the darkspawn. But there is another way.”

Auguste and Rainier exchanged glances for a moment before Auguste continued. “Some of us have discussed this issue and decided that it might be best to make a strategic retreat.

“We can’t defeat either the Empire or the darkspawn alone with our current forces. So, we should instead let them weaken each other before moving to crush both.

“What we propose is that we leave a rear guard in the Dales to let the Chantry think they’ve destroyed us while we evacuate our most important assets to the Western Approach and the Arbor Wilds. The moment that the Archdemon is dead we should strike.”

Bishop Rainier stepped forward. “The Orlesian army will probably have to fight their way into Ferelden to draw the Archdemon out so once it is dead their remaining forces will be completely out of position. With most of the military out of the country we will be able to take over large parts of the nation before they can return.”

Arthur Dawson narrowed his eyes. “An interesting proposal.” He said softly. “Of course, this rear guard you propose will all be wiped out. Do you have any suggestions for who should lead it?”

“As we have devised the plan, I and Bishop Auguste volunteer to lead the rear guard.” Rainier said.

“Before I continue, let me state that I am not angry with you.” Dawson replied. “Based on the information that you currently have your plan is the most sensible course of action. Indeed, when I first arranged this meeting, it was to propose a similar idea to what you have come up with.”

“Does this mean the situation has changed somehow?” asked another of the Cainites.

“Indeed, Bishop Fortin, for in the last few nights, I have been dreaming.”

The gathered men looked at each other a moment before one spoke up. “Forgive me my lord, but you have told us that our kind cannot dream. Are we missing something?”

“Yes. For you see, while normally while dreaming is beyond us the oldest and most powerful of Caine’s descendants can surpass the normal laws of our species, such as our inability to dream. Some even have the ability speak with others in their sleep.

“While there are few left in these nights who could perform such a feat, and even fewer who I would actually wish to speak to, I have recently had the unexpected pleasure of being contacted in this way by one of the most powerful and most noble of our kind. The man who more than any other could be called the founder of the Sabbat.”

Arthur waved his hand at the pool of shadow on the wall. “He has shown me how I can assist his efforts to use the Abyss as a bridge between the worlds. All he needed was someone on this side to open the way for him. And I have.”

The shadows rippled as a man walked out of it. He was a rather short man with a neatly trimmed beard and a very expensive suit. As he entered Thedas the man graced the room with a winning smile.

Arthur gave a deep bow. “Archbishop Gratiano de Veronese, it is an honor and a privilege to host you in my domain. I am thankful that you somehow noticed this world and moved to intervene.”

“Luck had little to do with it.” Gratiano replied. “And I have not come alone.”

The pool of shadows rippled again and out stepped another man who Dawson recognized. It was Charles Delmare, Priscus of the Sabbat, and leader of the Ultra-conservative faction. He was closely followed by six bodyguards with assault rifles and full combat armor.

“Priscus Delmare.” Dawson nodded at Delmare. “I was not aware that you would be here.”

“This is new to me too.” He answered. “But when de Veronese contacted me, I could hardly ignore what he had to say.”

“What did he have to say?”

Charles sighed. “That we would soon have access to another plain of existence, filled with primitive humans. And that Regent Galbraith is an infernalist.”

Dawson’s eyes widened. “Melinda Galbraith is an infernalist?” he exclaimed. Turning to de Veronese he asked, “Are you sure this is true?”

“Completely.”

“Then she must be overthrown.” Dawson said. “I knew that she was corrupt and loathsome, but this cannot be tolerated.”

“Gratiano and I agree.” Delmare said while going over Dawson with a critical eye. “We also agree that I should succeed her as Regent. There is no other possible successor with the will and the power to bring the Sabbat to glory and expunge Galbraith and her heresy.”

Dawson simply nodded in assent.

“I’m glad you see it that way.” Delmare said. “But if we are going to bring down Galbraith and still keep the Sabbat intact then we are going to need more soldiers, resources, and extreme secrecy. All of which this place can provide. Now, what will we need to do to bring this land under control?”

“First of all, I believe that the local forces have a small band of elite operatives in the area sent to eliminate me and my commanders. Several of my patrols have gone missing recently. If you could lend me a few subordinates skilled in domination than I might be able to bring them in alive and see what they know.”

Delmare gestured for two of his men to step forward.

“Very good.” Said Dawson. “Bishop Auguste.” He said to the Orlesian Cainite who was looking rather confused be recent events. “Take these two, put together a team, and bring down the Chantry’s dogs. They should be able to subdue them alive but if something goes wrong then don’t hesitate to kill.”

“Yes, my lord.” Auguste saluted and left the room.

“Anyway, if we want to conquer this place then we are going to need an enormous amount of equipment and expertise.” Dawson said. “Guns, training instructors, other equipment . . . and we have to keep it quiet from Galbraith and her cronies. That might even make it worth it to try and manufacture equipment locally. In which case we will need to bring in mortal technical experts and industrial machines.

“This will be unlike anything the Sabbat has ever done before. This will be the conquest of an entire nation inhabited by millions of subjects. Still, with our technological advantage and support from sympathetic locals, I believe we can accomplish this feat in ten to twenty years.”

“I disagree.” Gratiano spoke.

“My lord?” Dawson asked questioningly.

“I have gazed upon this world, and I have seen that the Empire of Orlais gathers their forces at Halamshiral to crush your rebellion. Not just the army, but her court, the vast majority of the high nobility, Chantry sisters, and even senior enchanters from the circles of Magi. The entire support structure of Orlais is in that city.

“I propose that we attack Halamshiral and destroy everyone inside. Without leadership the Empire will crumble overnight, and we can rule over all of its remains within two years.”

Dawson frowned. “Forgive me, but we don’t have the forces to do that at the moment.” He said. “Even with support from Earth there are simply too many locals opposing us right now. It will take years to build up our power to the point where we can conduct an operation on that scale.”

Gratiano smiled. “You lack the power. I do not. I devoured the soul of our clan founder and I have had over five centuries to learn his secrets. It is about time that I put them to use.”

Arthur’s eyes widened momentarily before he managed to compose himself. “Very well, in that case what do you require of us?”

Gratiano de Veronese smiled even wider. “For now? Just sit back and watch.”
 
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Warden 2.8

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
A few moments after Jack tore the crossbow bolt out of Leliana's heart, she opened her eyes and picked herself off the ground.

"By the Maker what just . . ." she started to say before she froze in place her eyes widening.

"Easy there, you've been through a lot." Jack said. "But before we do anything else, here." Jack pulled a live rat that he caught earlier out of a satchel on the ground. The rat bit at his hand as he picked it up, but it did nothing to his supernaturally tough skin.

"Feed." Jack ordered as he held the rat to Leliana.

"But how . . . what . . ." Leliana spluttered before Jack cut her off.

"Just do what comes naturally." He said. "Trust me this will make things easier."

Leliana hesitated a moment before instinct kicked in and she plunged her fangs into the screeching rodent. It took a few moments for her to drain the creature dry before threw its corpse out of the camp in disgust.

"I can't believe I just did that." Leliana muttered.

"I admit that rat isn't the most appetizing meal, but I didn't want to feed off of your first human until you've learned to control yourself. The only people nearby are villagers from Redcliffe and there was a risk you'd drain one of them dry."

Leliana sunk to her knees and put her head in her hands. "By the Maker, I'm one of you now. That means that I drink human blood."

"Yes." Jack stated. "But try not to think too much about it. All Cainites have a presence of rage and hunger inside of us that we call the beast, and if we let ourselves fall into depression or monstrosity then we become animals.

"This may sound cliché, but I understand what you're going through. I was forced into this just like you were, just like almost every Cainite is. None of us get a choice about becoming a monster but we all have to learn to live with it anyway.

"I guess it's time to teach you how to be a Gangrel. I don't have a lot of experience with this so bear with me.

"Also, if Prince Roy is back then I should probably rename my dog, so I don't get them mixed up. I'm thinking Roy Jr. What do you think?"

Leliana's only reply was to groan into her hands.

___________________________________________________

It had been a few days since the party had set out from Redcliffe and so far nothing serious had gone wrong. Leliana was still in shock and Alistair was still giving both Cainites strange looks but that was to be expected.

So far Leliana and Jack had managed to keep themselves fed off of local wildlife during their travels, but that wouldn't last if they had to stay in one place for too long. Hunting also took a fair amount of the day, which might have been a problem had either he or Leliana needed to sleep.

Which was another problem entirely. Back on Earth Cainites fell were forced to rest when the sun rose but without Earth's sun to force him into slumber Jack had been almost constantly awake since arriving in Thedas.

Within the last few days Jack had begun to feel something that he hadn't felt since he was a mortal, fatigue. This was different from the irrefusable need to rest that came with the rising of the Earth's sun. Instead, this was the gradual tiredness that crept up on mortals after a long day's work.

Jack had never heard of a Cainite staying awake past the rising of the sun (except the Antediluvians who didn't count) and therefore had no ideas what long periods of uninterrupted consciousness could do to a Cainite.

If the Gangrel had to take a guess, nothing good.

On reflection it might be good to take a few days for some R&R once the mages were recruited. Until then Jack would be busy instructing Leliana on her new abilities and how to behave as a Cainite.

Ferelden was in a bad enough state already without a wight running around.

On this particular day, the rest of the party had just woken up and were making breakfast, and so Jack had decided to begin teaching Leliana the basics of how to use disciplines.

The results so far were mixed.

"Remember that speaking to an animal is not like speaking to a human." Jack lectured as Leliana knelt on the ground locking eyes with Roy Jr.

"An animal operates on instinct, regardless of how intelligent it is. The use of Feral Whispers is not speaking to an animal. It's a communication on a more basic level."

To emphasize his point Jack picked up a stick off the ground and pointed it at the dog. "As with all disciplines, Animalism uses the Beast within us to effect change upon the physical world. In this case my dog."

The Gangrel threw the stick into the distance. "Now I want you to tell him to fetch the stick. Try and think about the idea of him doing it without thinking of any words. Then look into his eyes and let the beast transfer the idea between you and him."

Leliana looked deep into Jr.'s eyes, who just made a slight growl in response. With a look of intense concentration on her face Leliana kept her eyes locked with the dog's, with neither moving until eventually Jr. rolled out his tongue, gave a loud bark, and charged at Leliana.

She tried to scramble back but was instead knocked over by the enormous dog who immediately began to lick her face.

Jack looked on awkwardly as his dog covered his childe with its slobber as the former sister desperately tried to get Jr. off of her without actually hurting him.

"Huh," Jack mumbled to himself, "perhaps we should move on to Fortitude for a while."

"Hey Jack," Jack heard Alistair's voice call out behind him. "I think you need to see this."

"What is it now Alistair?" Jack said as he turned around. "I don't have time to deal with your . . . oh no."

At this point the Gangrel saw what Alistair was worried about and was at a loss for words himself. On the horizon, reaching up as far as the eye could see, was a swirling pillar shaped mass of darkness. It was obviously not natural and the inky blackness of it reminded him suspiciously of the powers used by clan Lasombra known as Obtenebration.

As for how far up it went, Jack figured that it reached all the way out of the atmosphere.

Surely no Lasombra could create such a thing. Their clan had trouble using their shadow powers in the presence of artificial light much less sunlight. What kind of a monster could do this during the day?

"By Caine. I . . . what the hell is this?" he muttered as he stared at the pillar of darkness.

The rest of the group didn't seem to be doing any better. Even Sten seemed to be in shock.

But Morrigan's reaction was especially interesting. While the whole party was staring at the pillar with shock and fear, Jack didn't think that Morrigan's expression looked like the fear you see when confronted with the unknown.

She looked more like someone who just had their worst fears confirmed.

How interesting.

"I have to admit, you don't see that every day." Jack said in a more flippant tone than he actually felt. "But does anyone have any idea what it is?"

Most of the party simply stood in silence in response but Morrigan continued to stare at the pillar.

"I have only heard of events like this in the stories that my mother told me when I was a child. Stories of when Arlathan was still young, and the ancient elves waged war against the Antediluvians. She told of how the Lasombra Antediluvians used vast clouds of shadow to devour entire cities. I know of nothing else that could do this."

Jack stared at her for a few moments before he started to chuckle. "What a ridiculous idea. I'd thought from what your mother had said that your family might know something about my kind but now it's clear that you're just as ignorant as Alistair here. Whatever that thing is it certainly isn't the work of a Cainite, and definitely not the work of the Lasombra Antediluvian."

"What else am I supposed to believe?" Morrigan sneered back. "Since before the birth of the Tevinter Imperium Cainites have been nothing but a myth, lost to history and known of only to a few people like my mother. And then one day you show up and all of the sudden Orlais is overrun by Lasombra.

"In all my life I have never seen my mother frightened of anything, I was not even sure if it was possible. But after she first met you, she told me that the legends were clear that a Cainite could only cross the boundary from their world to this one through the power of an Antediluvian. And that terrified her."

Jack shrugged. "I have no way to judge whether any of what you claim is true, but regardless of that the Lasombra Antediluvian is not here. After all, he was killed over five hundred years ago.

"But what I find really interesting is how you seem to know so much about my kind all of the sudden. When we first met you mistook me for an abomination. And now you seem to think you're some kind of expert.

"The only one who actually seemed to know anything about Cainites here was your mother. I think you've been talking to her. Recently. I haven't bothered to keep an eye on you every moment of the day and it certainly wouldn't be hard for you to meet discreetly when you can both turn into birds."

Morrigan looked at bit nervous at that. "I did learn about Cainites from my mother before meeting you. But from what she told me you were a species that had long since passed into history. I did not make the connection when we first met."

"But you still do seem to know a bit more this subject then you would get from bedtime stories." Jack said. "And from what you and Flemeth have said then before I showed up, she considered Cainite lore to be nothing but historical trivia. Interesting, but not really relevant enough include in her child's education except for the basics."

Morrigan pursed her lips and looked rather sour. "You are not as stupid as you appear. I have indeed met with my mother a few times since we began this journey. She wanted to keep an eye on our progress. She also thought it would be prudent to teach me about vampires if I was going to traveling with one."

"You seem to be fairly calm to learn that Flemeth has been spying on us." Alistair said to Jack while glaring at Morrigan.

Jack shrugged. "I would have done the same in her place. If some mythical monster showed up on my doorstep back in New York I certainly wouldn't have let it go running around without supervision. I'd have been more surprised if she hadn't been spying on us."

"I am glad you see it that way." Morrigan said insincerely. "Though as long as you are aware of my mother's observation, you should know that she is quite interested in the recent history of your species. She asked me to find out about it from you if I could. I would be open to an exchange of information if you are interested."

"Be specific." Jack said. "What exactly does Flemeth want to know? And what exactly would I get in return?"

"She wishes to know the current status of the Antediluvians and of how you arrived in Thedas. In return I would tell you of the history of the Antediluvians in Thedas and what the Sabbat are doing in Orlais."

Jack had to admit it was an interesting offer. On one hand it was pretty much taboo to tell humans anything about Cainite history or culture. The things he'd already revealed were bad enough but talking about the Antediluvians to a human seemed almost sacrilegious.

On the other hand, Jack really did need to know what the Sabbat were up to, and he was very interested in Antediluvian history. Also, the Camarilla wasn't present to punish him for revealing Cainites secrets. Of course, he was still unwilling to reveal Gangrel secrets, but some other information wasn't out of the question.

"I admit, I'm interested." Jack said. "But first tell me about the Sabbat. Depending on what you tell me I might agree to the rest of this deal. You could refuse, but the only other source of what you want to know is the Sabbat, and if your mother could have gotten it out of them, she already would have done so."

Morrigan scowled in response. "Very well." She bit out. "What do you want to know?"

"Everything you know. But we can get to most of that later. For now, I'll settle for the Sabbat's war effort against Orlais is going and how they're governing their territory."

"Fine." Morrigan said. "But be aware that my mother's information is limited. She is powerful but not omniscient. And even then, she has not had the time to tell me everything.

"The Sabbat is so far stalemated in their conflict with Orlais. For the moment they seem more focused on insurgency than outright warfare, but they do govern a number of small settlements in the Dales. They mostly use human troops for combat and limit the embrace for commanders or elite forces."

"These villages they rule," Jack asked, "How do they govern them? And how do they get the blood for their Cainites?"

"They mostly leave the peasantry to govern themselves, though they have killed almost every noble and priest they could get their hands on. So far, they have careful to take only what blood and resources they can from the population without causing undue harm, at least for the moment."

That was certainly unusual. The Sabbat usually just took whatever they wanted and worried about consequences later. And they almost never used humans to fight their wars. They didn't even like using ghouls. A lot of their ideology was based on the idea of Cainite supremacy, the idea that Cainites were so far above humans that they didn't need to worry about their opinions.

Whatever person was leading these Orlesian Sabbat must be a very strange individual.

"Interesting." Jack muttered to himself. "Next question. Are the Sabbat spreading their ideology and theology to local humans under their rule or are they reserving that for their Cainite recruits?"

"They are spreading their ideas to the populace, though in a very limited form. Mother suspects this more due to lack of ability than lack of interest. There is only one of them who is actually from the Sabbat homeland, and he has to spend most of his time on warfare rather than instruction."

Now that was very interesting. If it was true that whatever Sabbat was running around in Orlais intended to teach the local humans about Sabbat ideas, it meant that most Cainite secrets would get out regardless of what Jack told Morrigan. Jack may as well get some benefit out of his people's secrets being revealed as long as it was going to happen anyway.

"Last question." Jack said. "Do you think the Sabbat can win?"

"No." Morrigan said. "By which I mean that they are unlikely to conquer all of Orlais unless something drastic changes." At this she took a moment to glare at the pillar of shadow, which seemed to have grown slightly larger since it had first appeared.

"My mother believes that while the Sabbat will be unable to hold their captured territory against the might of the full Orlesian army, the Orlesians will be unable to fully destroy the Sabbat. She expects their insurgency to last for several decades. The ultimate outcome is impossible to guess."

"Alright, I agree to your proposal." Jack said. "You said you want to know what the Antediluvians are up to?"

"That is correct."

"Then you are in luck. The Camarilla tries to discourage learning about the Antediluvians and of ancient history in general. Fortunately for you my sire is a former member of the Sabbat and she thought that I should be educated in such matters."

"Wait," Alistair interjected, "you said that the Sabbat are a bunch of murderous psychopaths. How could your sire have been one of them?"

"Keep in mind that the Sabbat is a big organization with a lot of different factions, most of whom don't have much in common other than a hatred of the Antediluvians and the Camarilla." Jack answered.

"My sire, Caitlyn Murray, was a member of a group called the Harmonists. They believed that while Cainites are the superior race, it was beneath the Sabbat to treat humans with deliberate cruelty. Eventually the rest of the Sabbat eventually got tired of getting preached at and had them purged. The few survivors, such as my sire, fled to the Camarilla."

Jack snapped his fingers. "I almost forgot. Alistair, I want you to take Sten and patrol the area for any bandits or darkspawn."

"Wait, "Alistair said, "what about-"

"I only promised to tell Morrigan about the Antediluvians Alistair." Jack interrupted. "I never said anything about you or Sten. Now get going and don't come back for about an hour."

Alistair grumbled but still complied while Sten, as usual, said nothing. As they left Jack could hear Alistair complaining to himself that he thought that he was supposed to be the one in charge.

"Now," Morrigan said, "fulfill you end of the deal."

"Sure." Jack replied. "Saulot, the Eldest, Lasombra, and Cappadocius have been diablerised. Zapathasura was destroyed by other means fairly recently. Nothing has been heard of any of the others in almost two thousand years. I don't know much more."

"That's all you know?" Morrigan hissed. "What of Ennoia?"

"That's not something my clan really talks about much with outsiders. But I suppose . . . the Clan elders think she's still alive in some form but not active. That's all I can say."

"Fine then." She said. "How did you arrive in our world?"

"I don't know." Jack answered. "I remember being in New York City and then being here. I have sort of a vague recollection of things happening in between, but it is rather foggy."

"While that is not what I had hoped for, but if that is all you know than nothing else can be done. Shall I carry out my end of the bargain?"

Jack nodded.

"But be aware that this information is from so long ago that few records survive. Even my mother is not old enough to have lived through these events. My knowledge may not be entirely accurate."

"So how long ago did the Antediluvians show up here?" Jack asked.

"From what my mother said, about seven to ten thousand years ago. Anything more detailed than that would be impossible.

"In those days the Evanuris, the elven gods, ruled over the Empire of Elvhenan of which Arlathan was the capital. At the time the Empire had not yet reached its height, but it was still powerful. The elves were the only intelligent race in Thedas with no humans or dwarves to be found. At least until the Antediluvians arrived.

"Even the Evanuris did not know by what means they crossed the boundaries between your world and theirs. It must have been rather shocking for beings that considered themselves to be gods to be left clueless.

"The first Antediluvian to arrive was Saulot. He arrived in Arlathan with no warning and broke into a library belonging to Mythal. He devoured most of the staff, stole some of its most important texts, and left without a trace.

"This was not the last time Saulot came to Thedas, and he was soon followed by several of his brethren. For several centuries Saulot, Cappadocius, Lasombra, Ennoia and the Eldest intermittently travelled to Thedas, rarely at the same time and usually not for longer than a month. They seemed mostly interested in raiding the Evanuris's libraries and research facilities. With the exception of Ennoia who simply attacked elvish cities and the Evanuris themselves."

"Wait a second." Jack interrupted. "If these Evanuris were supposed to be gods, why would they need to do research? Wouldn't they already know everything? Not that I believe they actually were gods."

"Perhaps your understanding of godhood is limited." Morrigan replied. "Or more likely the Evanuris were never gods at all. I have never believed in such things myself.

"But returning to my point, while it probably didn't seem like much of a war from the perspective of the Antediluvians, the same cannot be said for the ancient elves. From what little evidence remains, it seems the Antediluvians were utterly unconcerned with collateral damage and tended to devour the population of any settlement they wandered into.

"They sometimes brought groups of their childer and human slaves with them on their excursions. When the Antediluvians left, they did not always bother to bring their human cattle back with them and the Evanuris did not see these abandoned humans as a threat and left them alone. These scattered groups were first humans in Thedas, the ancestors of the human tribes and kingdoms that later formed and eventually destroyed Arlathan.

"As time went on the Antediluvians visited less and less, and eventually they stopped coming at all. That was the last anyone in Thedas had seen of your kind until you appeared."

"This is all that I know. If you want to learn more, you shall have to find it from my mother or some other source."

"I have to admit, that's an interesting story." Jack said. "There are some noddist scholars who would walk over hot coals to hear this. But your story has a few holes in it."

Morrigan raised an eyebrow in response. Jack took that as an invitation to continue.

"Flemeth obviously knows something about Cainites, after all, she did recognize me and knows about the Antediluvians. But I'm skeptical that she learned all this from some ancient records or some other secondhand source.

"When she saw me for the first time, she was absolutely livid. I could see hate, disgust, and even a bit of fear in her eyes. You don't get that kind of visceral reaction without some kind of personal connection."

Morrigan kept a straight face, but Jack thought she looked a little unsure. "You do not need to have seen a volcano in person to know that a mountain that produces smoke is a worrying sign. Intellectual knowledge of something is more than enough to create fear."

"That is true to a certain extent," Jack answered, "but not the degree that I saw."

"My mother has ample reason to be worried. As far as we know the only way to enter Thedas from your world is through the Antediluvians. You simply appeared, with no knowledge of how you arrived or even of how you speak our language just at the right place and time for you to manipulate events. And as far as my mother can tell, the same goes for the leader of the Sabbat in Orlais."

"I admit that this is pretty suspicious." Jack said. "In fact, it is fairly obvious that someone or something sent me and that Sabbat guy here on purpose. But there's no way that one of the Antediluvians is responsible. It could be a Methuselah. There were several of those active in New York when I was last there."

"What is a Methuselah?" Morrigan asked.

"Right, I suppose if your latest information dates back as far as you say you wouldn't know that." Jack said. "Depending on context, a Methuselah can either be in the fourth of fifth generations, or over a thousand years old.

Granted, a Methuselah being behind my appearance here would still be horrible for me and everyone else, it just wouldn't be apocalypse level bad."

"Does this truly have to be the work of one of these Methuselah?" Morrigan asked. "Are you so sure the Antediluvians I mentioned are truly dead? You mentioned that four of them had suffered diablerie. So did your late Prince Roy, but he is still with us. Could not the Antediluvians too live on through these fools who have devoured them?"

"That's a fair point." The Gangrel responded. "But if the Antediluvians had possessed those guys I think everybody would know about it by now. The unstoppable rampaging monsters would be hard to miss.

"Hell, as far as I know the guys who ate the Eldest and Lasombra, Lugoj Blood-Breaker and Gratiano de Veronese, haven't done anything but sit on their butts for the last five hundred years. There's no way they wouldn't have used that kind of power by now if they had it."

"That could be true. But do you have an explanation for that?" Morrigan glanced at the mass of darkness off on the horizon.

"Nope." Jack said. "But if you or your mother are feeling particularly suicidal, you could always try asking the head of the Sabbat over in Orlais. Lasombra are experts on magical blobs of shadow."

Morrigan glared but didn't answer back. Jack took this to mean that their conversation was over.

The pillar of shadow, whatever it was, did not disappear until around midnight.

And though Jack may have pretended to not to be worried when talking to Morrigan he was absolutely terrified.

He had spent three years fighting against the Sabbat in New York and he knew what the shadow powers used by the Lasombra looked like when he saw them.

This thing on the horizon was definitely created by Obtenebration.

And with the Lasombra Antediluvian dead, the Gangrel was certain that such a feat could only be the doing of a very powerful Methuselah. Probably one the Lasombra Antediluvian's childer.

Jack Tanner had faced long odds before, but he knew that he would die for certain if he faced such a creature.

So, he wouldn't.

The Gangrel had already put together the outlines of a plan.

Even a Methuselah couldn't survive forever against humanity as a whole, or else the Masquerade wouldn't be necessary.

The moment the blight was stopped and Flemeth cured his condition, Jack would fake his death in a fire and flee to the Brecilian Forest. There he would wait until the Methuselah was killed or sent into torpor. At that point, he would make his triumphant return, either forming a new Camarilla to oppose the Sabbat or seizing control of the Sabbat remnants as their new leader and reforming them into a more rational organization.

And if the Methuselah and his cronies somehow managed to win their ridiculous war with Orlais then Jack would just hide in the woods forever.

It was unfortunate that his traveling companions would probably be killed by the Sabbat before his plans could come to fruition, as Jack had, with the exception of Morrigan, become somewhat fond of them.

But sacrifices had to be made for the greater good.

No matter what happened, Jack Tanner would make the best of it and live on with no regrets.
 
Prince 3.1

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
Alistair did not like Jack.

When he was first told by Duncan that one of their new recruits was an undead, blood drinking, maybe abomination Alistair knew that the next few years were going to be a gigantic headache.

And it turns out that he was right, though in a different way than he had expected.

Jack, while probably not the demon in human skin that Alistair had first expected was still a thoroughly unpleasant person.
But while Alistair did not like Jack, it was much to his own surprise that he didn’t hate Jack either.

While the creature was to put it bluntly, a huge asshole, Alistair did not see him as evil.

Despite how difficult it was to work with him.

“Look, I don’t care what your orders are!” Jack screamed at the templar in front of him. “I am a Grey Warden. That means your mages have to work for me in a blight. As there is currently a blight, let me in the damn building!”

“And I’m telling you,” The templar said, “I don’t care if you’re the Queen of Antiva. The Knight-Commander said no one gets in and so you’re not getting in.”

Even after sighting that . . . thing made of shadows while on the road it had been decided that it would be best for the group to continue with their mission to defeat the blight. And for that they still needed the help of the mages.

Unfortunately, when they arrived at Lake Calenhad, they were told that the Circle of Magi had been put on lockdown and that no one was allowed entry without permission. And as the Circle was located on an island in the middle of the lake they couldn’t simply barge in and explain themselves.

When he had learned that the templars had put a guard on duty at the docks to screen visitors Jack had hoped that he would be able to convince the sentry to let him see his commander.

So far it was not going well.

“It doesn’t matter what your commander says!” Jack yelled. “By Chantry and Ferelden law Grey Wardens have the right to take what they need during a blight!”

“Wait,” The templar said. “Are you saying that you’re a Grey Warden?”

Jack’s left eye twitched. “I-I’ve been saying that for the last half an hour you cretin!”

“Well, it doesn’t matter, you’re still not getting in. And anyways, aren’t you a little young to be a Grey Warden? Do your parents know that you’re out here all by yourself?”

At this Jack snarled and balled his fists at his sides. “Y-You stupid, worthless, ugghh.” Jack groaned and held his head in his hands while his body started to shake.

Alistair gave a small sigh. He knew what this meant.

All of the sudden the Gangrel’s shaking stopped and he stood up with his back straight and gave Alistair a piercing look.

“Tell me Alistair,” Jack’s body spoke in the clipped tone of Roy Vannier, “You were a former templar. Why was this imbecile left at the docks to receive visitors?”

Alistair may not have hated Jack, but he certainly did hate Roy.

After that night in Redcliffe when Roy had first taken over Jack’s body Alistair had hoped that he would never hear from the former prince again.

He had ended up disappointed.

Since then, Roy had emerged from Jack’s consciousness on a few occasions, usually when Jack become particularly aggravated, and Jack never seemed to remember it afterwards.

And he still didn’t know. By some unspoked agreement the rest of the party had decided not to inform Jack that his old boss was slowly taking him over.

After all, what good would it do?

“I was actually only a templar in training.” Alistair answered Roy. “But sometimes the lyrium that templars use can result in mental degradation. If there is an emergency in the mage’s tower, he might be the only templar the Knight-Commander could spare.”

“I suppose that makes sense.” Roy held his chin in his hand. “But that makes further negotiations useless.”

Roy glared at the Templar in front of him. “Take a break.” He said, his voice dripping with disdain.

The templar looked dazed for a few moments before regaining his composure.

“I think I’m going to take a break.” The templar said, walking off in the direction of the nearest bar. “Don’t go into the Mage’s Tower while I’m gone.”

Alistair waited until the Templar had fully left hearing range before demanding, “Did you just mind control him?”

“Yes.” Roy answered. “Is there a point to this question?”

“The point is that you don’t have the right to take over people’s minds whenever you want. How did you even manage that anyway? Magic shouldn’t work on a templar.”

“I could dominate that fool’s mind because it is not magic as you understand it.” Roy explained. “And I absolutely do have the right to dominate whatever humans I wish. As an elder of the Ventrue clan, I am duty bound to guide humanity and the other clans for their own good. This sometimes requires coercion.”

This is why Alistair hated Roy. He held everyone else in total contempt and went out of his way to show it at every opportunity.

Jack held the people of Thedas in disdain too, but he wasn’t as bad about it as Roy. Jack treated others like he was a Ferelden noble, and they were peasants. Roy acted more like Orlesian nobility.

He kind of missed Jack already.

“Morrigan, Leliana,” Roy said, “You will stay here while the Alistair, Sten, the dog, and I are busy with the mages. It seems unwise to bring either of you into a fortress full of magic-hating religious fanatics.”

Leliana said nothing but glared at Roy with hate in her eyes. Morrigan just looked bored. “And what shall we be doing while you are off playing hero?” The witch asked dryly.

“I leave that to your discretion.” Roy answered. “Just try not to get in trouble while we’re gone.”
______________________________________________
The entry chamber of the Circle of Magi was in state of utter confusion when Alistair arrived. Templars ran about frantically, wounded men lay strewn about the hall on makeshift cots, and the great steel doors that separated the entry hall from the rest of the tower were shut and barred.

Alistair had a feeling that recruiting the mages was going to be difficult.

“I want two men stationed withing sight of the doors at all times.” An older templar with grey hair barked at one of the others. “Do not open the doors without my express consent. Is that clear?”

“Wait, who are you?” The templar asked, noticing Alistair and the rest of the party. “I thought I told Knight-Carroll not to let anyone in here. How did you get in?”

“Your guard decided to take a break.” Roy answered in a flat tone.

The templar’s face twisted into an odd mix of anger and confusion. “He . . . took a break?”

“I sympathize with your difficulty.” Roy said. “It really is hard to find decent help these days.”

Alistair had the distinct impression that this comment was aimed at him.

“Be that as it may, you have yet to tell me who you are. I am Greagoir, Knight-Commander of this tower.”

“Very well. My name is Jack Tanner, and I am a Grey Warden.” Roy lied flawlessly. “By treaty, the mages are required to aid my order during a blight. As such I am here to acquire their assistance.”

“Then I am afraid that you will find no assistance here.” Greagoir said. “The entire tower has been overrun by demons and abominations. All my remaining templars are needed to contain the threat. And I doubt any of the mages are still alive.”

Roy raised an eyebrow. “How exactly did this occur?” He asked. “As I understand, it is the job of the Knight-Commander to prevent this sort of thing from happening. This seems like a grave oversight.”

Greagoir frowned and gave Roy a stern glare. “I don’t know.” He said curtly. “Abominations came out of nowhere, attacking mages and templars alike. I realized that my men could not defeat them and told my men to flee.”

This was extremely bad. While Alistair may not have paid as much attention as he should have back in templar training he knew how bad abominations were.

As harsh as it might seem, mages had to be controlled for the sake of themselves and others. The results that came if they weren’t could be seen in Redcliffe and now here. Redcliffe had been a nightmare and that poor town had only had to deal with one abomination. The thought of an entire tower of them being unleashed upon Ferelden was too horrible to contemplate.

This had to be contained no matter the cost.

Roy took a few moments to consider his response before answering. “And how are you planning to deal with this situation Knight-Commander?”

“I have sent word to Denerim, calling for reinforcements and the Right of Annulment.” Greagoir responded. “This will give us the authority to neutralize the mage Circle completely.”

While unfortunate, Alistair agreed that this was necessary. Even if any of the mages had survived it would be impossible to tell if they were possessed by a demon or not. Even if a few innocents died all the mages would have to be purged to keep the rest of Ferelden safe.

A templar’s duty was not easy, but it still had to be done.

“This is deeply unfortunate.” Roy said, his face still a picture of perfect calm. “If you destroy the Circle then it will be much harder to defeat the blight. You should also consider that it is possible that your reinforcements may not ever arrive.”

“What do you mean?” Greagoir asked, his voice filled with suspicion.

“You must consider that recent events may have left the Chantry with no resources to spare. With the civil war and blight in Ferelden and the rebellion in Orlais, your superiors may have greater problems to consider.”

“Perhaps you are right.” Greagoir conceded, looking very tired. “But what else can we do but wait and pray? We do not have the men to retake the tower by ourselves.”

The situation really did seem hopeless. Without the mages defeating the blight would be almost impossible. Perhaps the templars might be able to help instead, but they couldn’t do that while they were preventing abominations from wreaking havoc across western Ferelden.

The only way forward seemed to be if someone cleared the tower of abominations for the templars.

Normally Alistair wouldn’t even consider such an idea, but he was out of options and wasn’t about to ask Roy for advice.

“What if we were to deal with the Circle for you?” Alistair asked. “Would you be able to assist us then?”

Roy slowly turned his head away from Greagoir to Alistair, a look of annoyance on his face. Greagoir just looked contemplative.

“If by some miracle, you destroy the abominations, the templars will join your army.” Greagoir said. “Without word from Denerim, I must determine our course. Surely destroying darkspawn is a worthy goal.”

The Knight-Commander’s face harden. “But,” he said, his voice becoming stern, “I do have a concern.”

“Do you now?” Roy asked in a bored tone.

“Yes. I do.” Greagoir answered harshly. “When senior enchanter Wynne returned from Ostagar she told me that one of the newly joined Grey Wardens by the name of Jack Tanner was some form of undead. Why should I allow another abomination into this tower? Why should I not cut you down where you stand? Your very existence is an affront to the Chant of Light.”

“For one I’m not actually one of your abominations.” Roy said, looking utterly unconcerned by Greagoir’s threats. “And even if I was Grey Wardens are exempt from Chantry laws on magic and abominations. Besides, you are hardly in a position to be turning away potential help.”

“I actually believe you, though that doesn’t make me more inclined to let you live.” Greagoir responded. “Some time ago I received word from my superiors of a rebellion in Orlais. While normally the templars would not concern themselves with secular matters, this rebellion is being led by some new form of undead who call themselves Sabbat. From what I have read of them and of you they are the same type of undead as yourself. And you should know that the Divine has recently declared the Sabbat as enemies of the faith.”

“Then it’s a good thing that I am not a Sabbat.” Roy said. “While I admit to being of the same species as those fools, I am a member of the Camarilla, an enemy faction to the Sabbat. I have no affiliation with these rebels in Orlais.”

“Do you expect me to take your word for this?” Greagoir raised an eyebrow.

“What you believe is not my concern.” Roy stated. “But be aware that I will respond in kind to any attempts to detain or destroy me.”

This discussion was not going well. Granted, Alistair had expected that discussions between Jack or Roy and the templars might end in violence, but that didn’t mean that he was happy about being right. Mostly because that meant that he would have to intervene to keep things from escalating.

The world had to have truly gone mad for Alistair to be the responsible one in his group.

“Knight-Commander,” Alistair said, “Surely it would show Jack’s sincerity if he were to help purge the tower. Besides, even if he were an abomination or a Sabbat, is there any way that him entering that tower could make the situation worse than it already is?”

Greagoir seemed to mull over the question for a bit before responding. “Very well. I suppose you have a point. I am willing to overlook your companion for the moment. But know that once you enter the tower, we will bar the door behind you, and it will remain barred until either the circle is purged, or the First Enchanter tells me it is safe. If you survive I and my remaining men will assist in your fight against the darkspawn.”

Alistair figured that this was the best deal they were going to get. He just hoped that Roy agreed.

“This is acceptable.” Roy said, though Alistair thought that he could hear a note of irritation in his voice. “Do agree Sten?”

Roy was asking for Sten’s opinion? That was odd for multiple reasons. In the few times he had taken over Jack’s body Roy had never spoken to, or even bothered to acknowledge the Qunari’s existence. And while Alistair couldn’t claim to know the former prince that well, he didn’t seem to be the type of person to ask anyone’s opinion on anything.

Roy was up to something; Alistair was sure of it.

“I do not see the point of this.” Sten gruffly answered Roy. “Our purpose is to defeat the blight. Becoming sidetracked like this only allows the darkspawn to gather strength.”

“I admit that this is not ideal,” Roy responded. “But without the assistance of the mages or templars defeating the darkspawn will be difficult. And besides, there are other factors we must consider.”

Roy looked thoughtful for a few moments before turning to Greagoir. “Very well, I accept your proposal. However, may I borrow a few items from your armory before venturing forth? I feel a little underequipped to fight abominations.”

Alistair had to agree with that. While Jack had made do so far with a pair of daggers, a crossbow, and those strange magic claws of his, it might not be enough against a tower full of abominations, demons, and probably blood mages.

All of those types of enemies were rather fond of throwing fireballs.

“You may speak to our quartermaster.” Greagoir said. “Take what you wish within reason. Though considering current circumstances our stocks are somewhat depleted.”

“How very generous of you.” Roy said, walking off towards the quartermaster. Several minutes later he returned, wearing a steel helmet, and holding a one-handed axe in one hand and a large metal shield in the other.

“Let’s get this over with.” Roy said. “Unless anyone has something to say?”

No one did, and so the party entered the mage’s tower. As soon as they passed through the steel doors baring the mages quarters from the entrance, the templars shut the door behind them.

There was no going back now.

“So,” Alistair said as soon as he was sure he was out of earshot of the templars, “what are you up to Roy?”

Roy gave Alistair a thin smile. “Oh, what makes you think I’m up to anything?”

“You’ve made it clear that you don’t care about what happens to Ferelden or its people. Jack doesn’t either, but he’s helping us for now because Flemeth promised that she would get you out of his head if he did. But you have no reason to assist against the blight, but you are anyway. So, what’s in this for you?”

Roy laughed. “You’re smarter than you first appear Alistair.” He said. “Strange as it may seem, the reason I’ve decided to help is that I genuinely want to strengthen Ferelden.”

“Bullshit.”

“I’m actually telling the truth, though I will admit that my reasons are not altruistic.” Roy suddenly dropped his cheery expression and frowned deeply.

“That pillar of shadow we saw a few days ago could only have been created a powerful methuselah. I had hoped to usurp rule from the leader of the Sabbat in Orlais but I have no hope of defeating a methuselah on my own. I must therefore build my own power base away from that monster. Taking over Ferelden will be a good first step. And I can’t very well do that if the country is overrun by darkspawn or abominations.”

“That’s insane.” Alistair said. “How do you expect to conquer an entire nation by yourself?”

Roy smiled again. “It won’t be as difficult as you imagine. After all, I do control the only surviving heir to the throne.”

Wait, did Roy mean him? Alistair had mentioned that he was King Maric’s bastard to Jack which with the death of King Cailan left Alistair as the technical heir to the throne. But at the time the Gangrel hadn’t seemed to care. Alistair got the feeling that Tanner felt that human concerns were beneath him.

Apparently, Roy didn’t feel the same way.

“You want to make me king?” Alistair asked incredulously. “I would be a terrible ruler.”

“Don’t worry, you won’t need to actually run the kingdom.” The Ventrue said. “I can handle that for you.”

Alistair made to object, but Roy put up a hand to interrupt him. “As interesting as this discussion is, we really should start purging the tower. Our chances of salvaging anything of value from this mess get worse with each passing minute.”

As much as it pained him to do so, Alistair agreed with the former prince. And as strange as it seemed, he much preferred the idea of fighting through an entire tower full of demons to having to think about becoming king.

Once again, Alistair found himself really missing Jack. At least he hadn’t wanted to put him on the throne.
 
Prince 3.2

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
The first thing that Alastair noticed as he walked through the tower's hallways were the bodies.

Dead mages and Templars lay strewn across the hallway, some of them having been torn limb from limb, others showing signs of being burnt or frozen with magic. Dried blood caked the floor, and the smell of the corpses made him gag. To his sorrow, Alistair noted that a few of the bodies were too small to have belonged to adults.

He had known that seeing this was inevitable, considering that the Circle of Magi housed children, but seeing dead kids was never easy.

Or at least it wasn't for Alistair. Roy seemed to take it in stride, only stopping when he noticed Alistair starring a little too long at one of the bodies.

"Feeling sentimental?" The former prince asked. "Don't. Mortal life is fleeting. If you let yourself become emotional over such trivial matters, then you will never accomplish anything of worth."

"Doesn't the self-proclaimed future ruler of Ferelden have anything better to do than mocking me?" Alistair asked. "Like clearing the tower of abominations or saving the world from darkspawn?"

Roy frowned but otherwise choose not to respond. "Anyway, while we move through the tower, none of you are to touch anything unless absolutely necessary. And be on the lookout for boobytraps." The Ventrue said. "I don't want someone to mishandle some spell book and get blow up or turned into a frog or set on fire.

"Magic is dangerous. I don't want to take any chances."

"A sensible view." Sten said. And Alistair couldn't help but agree. For all his other faults Roy at least had a proper understanding of the dangers or magic.

Roy walked down the hallway without a word, motioning for the rest of the party to follow. For a few minutes the group continued forward without encountering anything other than more bodies.

Then they heard screaming from up behind a door.

"It seems that there may be someone alive after all." Roy said. "For the moment anyway."

The party burst through the door into a large room in which mages and children were running away from the fiery slug-like form of a rage demon. As the mages ran, one woman stayed behind to confront the demon. She was an older woman with white hair and red robes who for some reason looked rather familiar to Alistair.

I think I remember her now. Alistair thought to himself. That was one of the Senior enchanters I met at Ostagar. If I remember correctly her name was Wynne.

Wynne raised her staff at the demon and unleashed a blast of ice at the creature. The demon let out a roar as the ice encased it before slumping to the ground and disappearing.

Wynne seemed to have heard the Wardens approach and turned to face them after the demon was defeated.

"Who are . . ." Wynne started to ask before she got a look at Jack's face. "You're that abomination from Ostagar. You were working with the Grey Wardens. I don't know what brought you here but if you try to hurt those under my protection I will destroy you, Warden or not."

Roy just gave Wynne a bored look in response to her threat. "Senior Enchanter Wynne," he said in the tone of someone reading an extremely boring legal document, "In accordance with the Circle of Magi's treaties with the Grey Wardens to assist in times of Blight, I demand your service. Are there enough survivors left to be useful?"

Wynne's face reddened and seemed to be on the verge of an outburst before Roy interrupted.

"And before you do something as foolish as refusing me," the former prince said, "know that Knight-Commander Greagoir has invoked the Rite of Annulment. I am the only one with the power and authority to save you from the Templars."

Wynne grit her teeth in anger but said nothing. After a few moments she let out a sigh and seemed to visibly deflate.

"I would agree to your demand if I could. But most of the other mages, if they are still alive, are still in the upper floors. The few apprentices and children here would be of little help against the darkspawn."

"I can see that." Said Roy. "Do you believe that there could be enough of you left in other parts of the tower to assist against the blight? Greagoir has decreed the Circle will be annulled unless First Enchanter Irving tells him the tower is safe. But even if he isn't still alive, I am willing to override him if enough mages still live to fight against the darkspawn."

"Wait a second," Alistair said. "You told Greagoir that we would purge the tower if we couldn't save Irving."

"I lied." Roy answered. "Templars are only effective against magic, which while potentially useful against darkspawn spellcasters, still makes them less versatile than mages. Even if a few abominations do get loose, it would still be less damaging than if the darkspawn destroy Ferelden. Besides, we can still purge the tower if there aren't enough mages left alive to be useful."

"Are you really discussing how you plan to kill us all if you decide our lives aren't valuable to you? In front of those you plan to kill, without any thought that they might be able to defend themselves?" Wynne said, teeth gritted and her knuckles white as she gripped her staff. "In all my years I have never seen such hubris. What makes you think we will just stand by and let you do this?"

Roy moved so fast that he seemed to blur and in a fraction of a second, he had materialized behind Wynne with a dagger a centimeter away from her throat.

"What makes you think that your opinion, or anyone's opinion other than mine matters here?" Roy taunted Wynne with an obnoxious smirk plastered across his face.

A few of the other mages moved to point their staves at Roy and the Ventrue forced Wynne's body between him and the potential danger.

"Stay where you are." Roy warned them, still smirking. "You wouldn't want your Senior Enchanter to get hurt, would you? Who knows what might happen to a woman of her advanced age?"

"Stay back!" Wynne said to the other mages before glaring at Roy. "What do you want from me?" she said to the Ventrue.

"What do I want from you? What I want is for you to see the reality of your situation. If the Circle's ranks are so depleted that they wouldn't be of use to me then the abominations or Templars will kill you all regardless of what I do. But I am willing to save you where the Templars would have you purged.

"So why don't you stop with the pointless threats and just follow orders. Unless your ego is more important than the lives of your fellow mages."

"Fine." Wynne spat. Roy simply removed his knife from her neck and returned it to his belt.

"Good." He said. "Now, could you tell me what exactly happened here? From what I gather mage Circles being overrun by demons is not a regular occurrence."

"It is certainly not." Wynne answered. "Let us suffice to say that we had something of a revolt on our hands, led by a mage named Uldred. When he returned from the battle at Ostagar, he tried to take over the Circle. As you can see, it didn't work out as he had planned."

"Interesting." Roy replied. "Does mean that there is a possibility that we will be facing enemy mages as well as demons and abominations?"

"Possibly. For things to go this wrong at least some of Uldred's rebels had to have been using blood magic. It's quite likely that you may face maddened blood mages as you move through the tower."

"That could make things difficult." The Ventrue muttered to himself. "Wynne, you shall be accompanying us through the tower. The rest of the mages will remain here until we return."

Wynne glared but nodded her head in assent.

"Wait a minute," Alistair objected, "Are you sure this is a good idea? What if she turns against us later? She is a mage, and our duty is to purge the tower of mages if it is beyond saving. Is it really worth the risk to bring her along?"

"Yes." Roy said. "Magical support will be useful against demons. Also, we don't know what First Enchanter Irving looks like and we need someone to identify him for us, or at least his body."

"Fair enough. But it still doesn't seem like a good idea to have someone guarding your back who you were threatening a moment before. If what Jack told me about you before was true, it's that kind of behavior that got you killed back in your homeland."

"Shut up." Roy snapped back. "Just follow my orders and speak when spoken to. That goes for everybody." Roy gave everyone in the room a glare, but no one said anything, though Wynne did look a little confused.

"Excellent. Now let's go and get this nonsense over with. I'm getting sick of this place already."

____________________________________________________________

From that point the group proceeded though the tower in silence, interrupted by nothing but the occasional corpse on the floor.

Just as they were about to open a door to the next room Roy held up a hand for the rest of them to stop.

"There's something still alive in the next room." He said. "Three possessed humans and one demon, which I believe to be a rage demon."

"How can you tell?" Alistair asked. "Is it one of those supernatural things that you and Jack can do that you still claim isn't magic? What did you call it again?"

"A discipline." Sten answered, much to Alistair's surprise. With how quiet he was it was easy to ignore the Qunari warrior's presence, but he was always watching and, if you paid attention, you could see that the giant took a deep interest in his surroundings. Especially when it related to Jack or Roy.

It made sense as Sten had admitted that he had been sent to Ferelden to gather information for his leaders. But sometimes Alistair couldn't help but wonder if the giant's spying might come back to bite them in the future.

Still, that was a concern for another day.

"Yes, it is a discipline." Roy said. "Auspex to be precise. Now be quiet and listen. The moment I open the door Wynne will use her magic to freeze the demon while the rest of us deal with the others. There's no reason to make this complicated."

The Ventrue kicked open the door and sure enough the next room was occupied by a rage demon and three hideously twisted looking humanoid creatures that could only be abominations.

Wynne cast a spell and the rage demon was swiftly covered in ice. Simultaneously the rest of them charged forward and tore into the abominations.

Honestly, the result was somewhat anticlimactic. Though the rage demon was a decent opponent the abominations were surprisingly weak. Once they were dead the demon stood no chance against the entire party at once.

"That was easier than I expected." Roy said as he idly looked over one of the bodies of the fallen abominations. "We may have been overly worried about how difficult this mission was going to be."

Just as Roy finished speaking the body of the abomination exploded in a fiery blast. Roy somehow managed to get his shield up in time to protect himself though he was still blown over and one of his arms seemed to have caught on fire.

"Fire! I'm on fire!" The Ventrue screamed in panic. "Wynne, freeze my arm, quickly!"

Wynne looked conflicted but complied, nonetheless. Within seconds Roy's arm was covered in ice and the fire was put out.

"Thank you." Roy said in relief. "Now everybody get away from the other bodies. They could explode at any second."

Alistair needed no further encouragement and scrambled away from the fallen abominations as fast as he could along with the rest of the group. That turned out to be wise, as the bodies detonated only moments after the party had escaped from the blast zone.

"Damn it Wynne! Why didn't you tell me these things explode when they die?" Roy snarled in anger. "That might have been nice to know before I started hacking them apart with an axe."

"I didn't tell you because I didn't know." Wynne answered in a tired voice. "I escaped the main tower before I could see any of the abominations die. I've only fought demons since then."

"Well, what about you?" Roy said turning on Alistair. "You've supposedly gone through training to be a Templar. You know, that group dedicated to fighting demons and abominations? Some warning might have been helpful."

Alistair shrugged. "Abominations are too varied to predict in advance. One might explode on death, another might disintegrate. One might be able to cast magic, another might be limited to its claws. That's part of why abominations are so dangerous. You never know what to expect."

"Well, that's just great. We can't fight them in mele because they might explode, and we can't fight them at range because they might be able to throw fireballs. How the hell are we supposed to . . . get . . anywhere-" Suddenly the Ventrue, whose speech had already begun to slur for some reason put his head into his hands and gave a lengthy groan.

"Shit, my head feels like it's on fire." Roy said, seemingly more to himself than anyone else. "I think I may need to take a minute to re-" Midsentence Roy collapsed onto the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.

Alistair wondered for a moment if Jack was regaining control of his body but quickly dismissed that thought. While the scene in front of him closely resembled what happened when Roy assumed control of Jack the reverse was not true. Before, when Jack had regained control of his body it had just sort of happened. In one second Roy was in control and in the next Tanner was back and usually very confused as to what had just happened.

Alistair was willing to admit that he had no idea what was going on, though fortunately for his pride he was not alone in that. Wynne seemed to be in a state of near shock, staring at Roy writhing on the floor with her mouth hanging partially open while Sten looked over the same scene with a raised eyebrow. Which for the ever-stoic Qunari was quite an extreme reaction.

Even the dog seemed to be bewildered, with the hound sniffing at the vampire's prone form while making low whining sounds.

After giving one final spasm, Roy stopped thrashing on the ground and began to pull himself off of the floor.

"I . . . I'm fine." The former prince said in a shaky voice, fooling no one. "Everything is fine."

Just as Alistair was about to ask what just happened Roy started yelling into thin air.

"Be quiet!" Roy shouted at something only he could see. "I can handle it! I don't need you!"

Alistair was starting to get an idea of why Jack killed this guy.

"Roy," Alstair said, "there's no one there. You're screaming at nothing."

The Ventrue looked around in confusion for a bit before visibly calming down. "Um . . . right. I see." He said. "Let's just keep moving through the tower for now."

Without wait for a reply started walking away on trembly legs, leaving the rest of the party behind.

"What was that?" Wynne hissed at Alistair once she was sure Roy was out of earshot. "Is there any good explanation for what I just saw?"

"Uh, well . . ." Alistair mumbled as he tried to figure out what to say. "Back in his homeland Jack cannibalized his boss, a prince Roy, and apparently whenever one of their kind devours another, they also absorb their soul.

"And though I don't understand exactly how this works, but from what I gather when Jack was inducted into the Grey Wardens and put through the joining it woke up Roy's soul and now Roy sometimes possesses Jack. And now Jack, or Roy, or both may be going insane. Maybe. Honestly, I've been having trouble figuring out what's going on myself."

Wynne seemed to struggle for words for a moment before saying, "The Wardens put this creature, who you knew nothing about, through the joining when they had no idea what would happen? You should have at least asked the Circle of Magi for advice first. But I suppose that would be impossible since the Wardens refuse to tell anyone outside your order what exactly the joining is.

"I've heard stories of the Wardens going to extremes in order to stop the blight, but this was beyond reckless. Unleashing this mad abomination on Ferelden. How could you have possibly thought this was a good idea?"

While Alistair could see Wynne's point, he didn't agree with it. While it was true that inducting Jack into the Grey Wardens had created unforeseen consequences, defeating the blight was still more important.

While Jack and Roy had caused issues, Alistair had to admit that Jack at least had been very useful. For instance, without Jack dealing with the abomination at Redcliffe would have been much harder if not impossible. And while Alistair was still upset over the death of Arl Eamon's wife and child at Jack's hands, the consequences of doing nothing would have been even worse.

When Duncan had still lived, the man had often talked of how the Warden's mission took precedence over any other concern. That the sheer destructiveness of the blight made any extreme acceptable in pursuit of their goal. And while Alistair had greatly admired Duncan, he hadn't been able to bring himself to agree with him. But now after all this time and everything he'd been through Alistair could sort of see his point.

If Jack's condition didn't get worse, then he could be dealt with after the blight was defeated. Either cured or killed or whatever other option might become available in the future. But if the blight was allowed to go unchecked then Ferelden would be reduced to a lifeless desert. Any other good they might have done beforehand would become meaningless.

Though he still couldn't bring himself to fully embrace his mentor's utilitarian views, Alistair had to admit that Duncan had mostly been right.

"I think that we should go after Roy." Alistair said, not wanting to get into an argument with Wynne. "If he's allowed to run around like this he might get hurt or end up hurting someone else if he runs into a survivor."

"Fine." Wynne answered. "But we will resume this conversation later."

__________________________________________________

Sometime later as the party staggered out of the stairwell to the second floor Alistair found himself wondering if any of them would come out of this mess intact. On the way up the stairs, they had encountered an even larger group of even more powerful demons and abominations. And while the party had survived, it had been a close-run thing. If hadn't been for Roy's Auspex ability detecting the demon's ambush in advance, then they probably wouldn't have.

Speaking of the former prince, though he had regained his composure, the Ventrue had refused to answer any questions about his episode on the first floor. While that was concerning, there wasn't anything that any of them could do about it at the moment.

They had to survive first.

"Hold up." Roy said. "There's something in the room up ahead. It feels like a man, but he's . . . strange."

"What do you mean?" Alistair asked.

"One of the uses of Auspex is the ability to perceive a target's emotional state. But this guy has no emotional state. And everybody has emotions no matter how stoic they think they are. To be like this you would have had to have part of your brain scooped out or a magical equivalent. I've never seen anything like this except for Tzimisce war ghouls, and I'm fairly certain that there are no Tzimisce in Ferelden."

"Oh, that's probably just one of the tranquil." Wynne explained. "They are harmless."

"What is a tranquil?" Roy asked suspiciously.

"You'll see." Wynne answered.

As they moved into the room ahead, which Wynne informed them was the Circle's stockroom, they were greeted by a middle-aged balding man who seemed to have been trying to clean up the area before he noticed them.

"Please refrain from disturbing the stockroom." The man said in a dull monotone, his face utterly without expression. "It is a mess and I have not been able to get it into a state fit to be seen."

"What the hell has been done to this man?" Roy asked, squinting at the man as he spoke, his eyes glowing slightly. "It looks like someone intentionally destroyed the emotional centers of his brain. I can't even begin to imagine how painful that must have been."

"This is Owain, one of the tranquil." Wynne explained. "The tranquil are mages who have been deemed too dangerous to practice magic or are considered vulnerable to possession. To control them the Chantry uses Lyrium brands to cut them off from the fade and from their magic for the safety of themselves and others. While the process unfortunately removes their emotions as well, it is still kinder than death."

"You're wrong." Roy said as he intently examined Owain's forehead. "From what I can tell, enough of his brain is still intact for a part of him to still be aware of what he's going through. It must be like having someone else take control of your body while still being conscious of what's being done to you. It would have more merciful just to kill him."

"You're hardly one to talk Roy." Alistair responded, thoroughly annoyed at the Ventrue's hypocrisy. "The "blood bond" your people use doesn't sound very different from tranquility. And I know you've used it yourself."

Roy just scoffed. "Nonsense." He said as he waved a hand dismissively. "The blood bond only forces the subject of a bond to feel devotion towards the one whose blood they drank. But unlike with tranquility their core personality remains unchanged.

"I will admit that abuses similar to turning men into tranquil are occasionally carried out by individuals within the Camarilla, but they are never done as a matter of policy. Doing such loathsome things on such a large scale is more the domain of the Sabbat. Truly, the inhabitants of Thedas are a savage people to stoop to their level."

"Oh, really." Alistair shot back acidly. "Then what does it say that you were killed while betraying the Camarilla to the Sabbat?"

Roy slowly turned away from inspecting Owain and focused his gaze on Alistair, his expression as blank as any tranquil's. Despite this, Alistair could practically feel the rage that was pouring off of the old monster.

In all of the, admittedly, short time that he'd known the elder vampire, Alistair had never seen Roy become angry. Irritated at times, but until now Roy had always acted as he was above getting enraged at a mere human.

But now? He was livid.

"Be careful boy." Roy said in a quiet voice. "Do not speak of things that you know nothing about."

Alistair knew that it was a bad idea to respond. The Ventrue was clearly unwell and making him even angrier couldn't possibly help the situation. Who knew how much damage he could cause if he decided to go crazy again?

But Alistair was also just sick of Roy. His arrogance, utter contempt for everyone else, and now his disgusting self-righteousness. At least Jack worked to defeat the blight, however grudgingly. Roy mostly just stood around and sneered.

Alistair knew that he would regret this later, but right now he was going to tell the monster just what he thought of him.

"I don't need to know much." Alistair told Roy. "Everything that you or Jack has said about the Sabbat has painted them as vile monsters. What possible excuse could you have to betray your people to such wicked creatures?"

Roy's eyes glowed a faint red as they bored into Alistair with simmering fury. Apparently, he'd hit a nerve.

"I had my reasons." The vampire growled, barely keeping his rage under control.

"The only reason you had was your own selfish ambition. You sold out your own city, your own people, just to save your own worthless hide. Maker forbid that you actually manage to take over Ferelden. Even if you were to save the country from the darkspawn it would only be a matter of time before you sold us out to some other invader like the Orlesians or the Qunari."

Roy glared at Alistair in stony silence for a few moments before he, to Alistair's surprise, began to quietly chuckle to himself, softly at first, but quickly growing into a full-throated laugh.

Then, with no warning, Roy stopped laughing and grabbed Alistair by his breastplate and slammed him into a nearby wall with a strength that his body shouldn't have possessed.

As his back collided with the wall Alistair felt agonizing pain lance through his torso followed by a wet crunching noise as Roy smashed him into the wall again.

Maker, I hope that was just my ribs shattering and not my spine. Alistair thought as agony washed over his body. A hit like that in the wrong place could cripple me for life.

Roy snarled animalistically as he held Alistair against the wall behind him. He was vaguely aware that the rest of the party was doing something behind Roy, but it was hard for Alistair to concentrate with the mix of horrible agony and the near feral Cainite a few inches away from his face.

"I gave my entire life to the Camarilla." Roy said in a near whisper. "Centuries of service, to an organization that drafted me against my will, that took me away from my wife and children. And I served them anyway because I believed in their ideals.

"When the Sabbat attacked New York City I was sure the Inner Council would send aid. And what did I get? Nothing." Roy said as his face twisted in anger, bitterness seeping from his every word.

"I held out on my own for an entire decade against everything the Sabbat could throw at me. I near emptied my bank accounts, called in all my favors with the other princes, and nearly every subordinate I had either died or fled and had to be replaced by fledglings like Jack or misfits like Dieter and Christine.

"No matter how much I begged, those arrogant jackasses on the Council still refused to send help. They said that the resources I needed would be better spent defending Georgia against an expected Sabbat offensive out of Florida.

"And what happened when the expected offensive came? Did the vast amounts of money and weapons that were sent to Atlanta and Charleston stop the Sabbat or even slow them down in any way? No. Instead the Sabbat pushed all the way to Washington DC in less than a FUCKING MONTH!"

The vampire was now screaming at the top of his lungs. Without preamble the Ventrue threw Alistair to the floor and walked off in the other direction.

"And if that wasn't enough," Roy yelled into the uncaring void, seemingly no longer paying attention to Alistair or anyone else. "Those old fools on the Inner Council had the utter audacity to blame me for their defeat. They said that I had driven off the Sabbat in New York earlier then Atlanta wouldn't have fallen!

"The sheer fucking gall of them!"

All of the sudden Roy stopped walking and turned back around, his face now a picture of utter confusion.

"Uh, Alistair," the Cainite said in a much less refined tone than usual. "Where are we?"

That's odd, Alistair thought, his voice didn't sound like Roy's. He sounded more like- "Jack?" Alistair asked hopefully. "Is that you?"

"Well, I'm certainly not the Queen of England." Jack Tanner said while looking around quizzically. "But what's going on here? The last thing I remember was arguing with some idiot Templar, and now I'm in wherever this place is? How did I even get here? And what happened to you? You look like someone put you through a sausage grinder."

Alistair had been trying to avoid this conversation since Redcliffe, but it looked like there was no avoiding it now.

"Roy has been possessing you." Alistair stated plainly. "It's been happening since Redcliffe and it's not stopping. Roy also appears to be losing his mind and is rapidly getting worse. I may have also said a few unflattering things about him. He took exception to that."

"Huh," Jack mumbled, "that actually explains quite a bit. It certainly would account for the memory gaps I keep having."

While Jack was talking Alistair carefully pulled himself to his feet and looked over his injuries. Most of the pain had faded to a dull ache though one of his sides still hurt badly whenever he moved. At least the pain probably meant that his spine was still intact, though he would still need looking at by a healer.

"You're taking this better than I expected." Alistair said cautiously. "I figured that you would, well. . ."

"Fly into a violent rage? Eat someone?" Jack snorted. "I'm saddened by your lack of faith. I've also had my own suspicions for a while. I'm not as stupid as I look.

"Now could you fill me in on what happened while I was possessed? From the looks of things, I've missed a lot."

"Fair enough." Alistair replied. "And Wynne, could you look over my injuries while I'm filling in Jack? This might take a bit."

_________________________________________________________

As it turned out Alistair wasn't as badly hurt as he had worried. Though severe bruising and a couple of cracked ribs was hardly ideal, under the circumstances it could have been worse.

After Wynne had examined and treated Alistair to the best of her abilities and Jack had been informed of what had happened while he had been indisposed it was decided that the group would continue their mission.

Of course, that was easier said than done.

"How many more floors does this stupid tower have?" Jack whined. "We've been fighting our way through here over an hour and the only person we've found who wasn't an abomination or a crazy bloodmage was some idiot hiding in a wardrobe. I'm starting to think this whole idea is a waste of time."

Though Alistair had started to miss Jack when the Cainite had been possessed by Roy, his return had quickly reminded him of how taxing it was to work with the Gangrel.

"We only have one more floor until we reach the top." Wynne explained tiredly. "And do you have a better idea?"

"As a matter of fact, I do." Jack said. "The only reason the Templars are willing to stay barricaded on the bottom floor is that they have a sturdy solid steel door between them and the rest of the tower. If I tear the door open with my claws, then they will have no choice but to help us purge the rest of the circle. We should have done that from the beginning."

Sten nodded his head in agreement. "This is a wise suggestion. It is the Templar's duty to deal with this, not ours. Our focus should be on the darkspawn."

"But if we do that it would break our deal with the Templars." Alistair responded. "They won't let us have the mages if we go back on our agreement. Besides, we only have two more floors left. I think we can manage it ourselves."

"I'm not even sure if there are any sane mages left to save." The Cainite shot back. "And even if there are, the only reason that I can think of that they wouldn't have been able to fight their way down by now is if something extremely powerful is blocking the way.

"We've barely managed to survive against these scatted patrols we've encountered so far. You can barely fight, I have been set on fire multiple times, and Wynne is exhausted. So, I don't like our chances going against something really dangerous. Which means as far as I'm concerned, this is either a lost cause or a suicide mission. And I'm not a big fan of either of those."

"If we encounter something that I think we can't handle I'll consider it." Alistair said. "Now stop complaining and get ready to clear the next room."

"Fine." Jack answered as he loaded his crossbow. "But if I get hit by another fireball, I'll hold you personally responsible."

Positioning himself in front of the door to the next room Jack motioned for the others to follow behind. "You all know the drill. On three I'll open the door and we'll storm in and kill anything that looks hostile. One . . . two. . . three!"

With that Jack kicked open the door and went through with Alistair and the others close behind him. As soon as they entered Alistair found himself overwhelmed with an overpowering stench that somewhat reminded him of rotten meat.

The reason why soon became apparent.

Interspersed all across the surface of the chamber he had just entered, Alistair could see large fleshy growths coming out of the floor. To his disgust he noticed that the growths appeared to be pulsating as if they were alive somehow.

In the center of the room, next to a particularly large growth, stood what looked like an unusually tall abomination looking over the body of a fallen mage.

"Oh, look. Visitors." The abomination said in a deep gravely voice. "I'd entertain you but-" The abomination's speech halted as Jack shot it in the chest with his crossbow.

Unfortunately, the abomination appeared to be unharmed by the crossbow bolt sticking out of it, other than for a momentary look of confusion that passed over its warped face.

"Such a rude quest." The abomination resumed speaking. "I shall have to . . . show you the door."

All of the sudden a wave of fatigue washed over Alistair, and he found himself slumping to the ground in exhaustion. Through lidded eyes he could see that the same thing was happening to the rest of the party, with the exception of Jack.

"They're taking a nap?" Jack muttered to himself in an annoyed tone before turning on the demon. "What the hell did you do to them you freak?" The Cainite demanded as he started growing out his claws.

"I am simply giving your friends a much-needed rest." The abomination answered while raising a hand toward the vampire. "And now it is time for you to leave. It would be rude to disturb their slumber."

Jack barely dodged in time as the abomination shot a jet of flame at the spot where the Gangrel had stood just a moment before.

As Jack did battle against the abomination, Alistair collapsed to the floor and fell asleep. With his last conscious thoughts, he cursed himself for not following Jack's plan.

___________________________________________

Everything was perfect.

Alistair had always dreamed of having a real family. But as the bastard son of the King and a maid, he had never had that opportunity. At least Arl Eamon had done his best to raise him as a child, even if Alistair would have preferred it if the Arl's wife hadn't forced him to sleep in the stables.

Even so, Alistair had long known that he had a half-sister named Goldanna living in Denerim. He had always wanted to meet her but had never had the time while he was training to be a Templar or afterword once he had been inducted as a Grey Warden.

But now he had the chance, and it was everything he could have wished for. Goldanna had accepted him unconditionally as her brother, and her children had been a delight.

It was perfect.

"Oh Alistair, I'm so happy to have you here." Goldanna said. "I hope you don't have to leave anytime soon."

So did Alistair. He hoped he never had to see another darkspawn or sleep in another ditch again.

This was better. So restful.

His musings were interrupted as a cold breeze blew through the house, seemingly out of nowhere. The breeze grew in strength until it became a became a near tempest and then vanished as quickly as it had come.

The moment the wind died down, a tall, dark-haired man in black robes entered through the front door. The stranger had extremely pale skin and appeared to be in his early middle-ages, his expression calm as he gazed over the scene before him with a look of bored disinterest.

But Alistair couldn't help but be drawn to the man's eyes.

Though the man was almost expressionless, his eyes burned with an intensity Alistair had never seen in his life.

It was terrifying.

"I see that we have a guest." Goldanna said in a nervous voice, clearly uncomfortable. "Will you be staying for dinner?"

The man barely gave a Goldanna a glance before visually dismissing her. "Insect." He said, his voice deep and commanding.

Goldanna opened her mouth to respond but her words quickly turned into a scream as her face, and then then the rest of her body began to melt like candle wax.

Soon everything began to melt, Goldanna, the children, and even the house around them. Within a minute the screaming had stopped and all that was left was Alistair, an empty landscape, and the man.

"You are dreaming Prince Alistair Theirin." The pale man said, wasting no time. "This is the fade. You have been trapped here by a malicious spirit. While your mind is here, in the waking world your body is dying, and your Cainite companion is fighting for his unlife."

That's right, he could remember now. A fog seemed to lift from Alistair's mind, and he could remember the Circle of Magi, the abomination that forced him into a magical sleep, and the companion he had left behind.

"I can free you from the spirit's clutches." The stranger continued. "Return you and your friends similarly trapped here to the physical realm. I can even grant you victory over the vermin still infesting the Circle. All in exchange for one small favor."

"I-uh, what?" Alistair stuttered, overwhelmed by recent events. He still hadn't absorbed what had just happened. He certainly wasn't in a position to make an open deal with this mysterious stranger out of the blue, even if he had apparently saved him.

He hadn't even learned his name.

"I-I'm sorry. But who are you?" Alistair asked, hoping this would help him understand what was going on.

"Ah, how rude of me." The stranger answered.

"My name is Tremere."
 
Last edited:
Prince 3.3

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
Tremere.

In the past whenever Alistair had asked Jack about his people's use of magic, and of blood magic in particular, the Gangrel's answer had always been that he knew nothing of magic and left such things to the Tremere. Which as far as Alistair could tell was some sort of guild with a monopoly on magic and minimal oversight.

That meant that the person in front of him was definitely a Cainite and almost certainly a blood mage. And while Jack was insistent that Cainite blood magic and human blood magic probably had nothing in common other than a name, Alistair had his doubts.

Regardless, he was sure that whatever "favor" this creature wanted wasn't going to be anything good.

"So, what kind of favor do you want? And why ask me?" Alistair asked Tremere. "Surely there are other people more suited to doing whatever it is that you want done."

"There is an abandoned castle near the northern coast called Soldier's Peak where the veil is unusually thin." Tremere cut straight to the point in a very bored sounding tone. "You will go there and perform a ritual that will open a bridge between my world and Thedas. And I have chosen you because the ritual in question requires half a pint of blood from Cainite. Of which there are no sources of in Ferelden with the exception of your companion Jack Tanner."

"You want me to perform a ritual?" Alistair exclaimed in surprise. "But I'm not a mage. I can't perform magic rituals."

"This ritual does not require you to be a mage to use it. I shall send you more detailed instructions in a dream once you approach the coast."

"Wait a second," Alistair said frantically, "I haven't agreed to anything yet. Why do you even need magic to travel to Thedas anyway? Can't you just take a ship or however Jack got here?"

Though Jack had told Alistair some stories about his mysterious homeland, he had always been cagey about where it was or how he had arrived in Thedas. At times Alistair had wondered what the Gangrel was hiding but with the Blight ravaging Ferelden it had never seemed important enough to press the issue.

Perhaps that had been a mistake.

"You are mistaken if you think that I need you for anything." Tremere answered with a hint of annoyance creeping into his voice. "Your contribution would save me a bit of time and effort, but it is not vital. And I cannot travel by boat because Mr. Tanner lied to you when he said he was simply from a different continent. He, and I, come from another world entirely."

A different world? As in some other planet other than Thedas? That couldn't be possible. Even if Alistair were to ignore how utterly absurd the idea of multiple worlds was the Chant of Light was very clear that there was only one world.

The Canticle of Transfigurations said,

These truths the Maker has revealed to me:
As there is but one world,
One life, one death, there is
But one god, and He is our Maker.


While Alistair would be the first to admit that he wasn't the most faithful of men, he still considered himself to be a follower of Andrasteism. And the Chant of Light, the foundation of Andrasteism itself, said very clearly that there was only one world.

But if there wasn't only one world . . . well that was a question that Alistair would deal with some other time. His focus right now should be on the Circle of Magi and the darkspawn. He could deal with difficult religious issues later.

Much later.

"So," Alistair said, wanting to move on to a less complicated subject, "why exactly do you want to create a gateway to Ferelden anyway? What do you want from my homeland?"

Even Alistair knew that this was a stupid question, but he believed that it needed to be asked anyway. If the answer was anything but "I'm going to invade the country" Alistair would eat his helmet.

"I intend to carry out a variety of magical research involving the Fade." Tremere answered still sounding utterly bored with the conversation. "Thedas has a spiritual realm remarkably different from my home world and studying it might produce some useful applications."

Oh, well that wasn't so bad. It wasn't exactly good, but he'd been expecting . . .

"Though I expect my associates in the Camarilla to take advantage of the gateway to take over your kingdom. Something that I do not object to as it will make it easier to carry out my experiments without interference from unruly natives."

Never mind. It appeared that Alistair's first guess had been right.

Not that he was happy about that. Alistair would really not have Ferelden ruled by a bunch of blood-drinking foreign tyrants.

The Orlesians had been bad enough.

"What makes you think I would ever help your friends invade my homeland?" Alistair demanded angrily. "Ferelden has only recently freed itself of foreign occupiers and we have no desire to be oppressed again."

Tremere stood silently for a few moments before making a small gesture with one hand.

Suddenly agonizing pain tore through every part of Alistair's body and every muscle he had began to convulse uncontrollably.

Time seemed to lose all meaning amidst the agony, but eventually the pain stopped, and Alistair found himself lying breathless and exhausted on the ground with the figure of Tremere looming over him.

"I am not accustomed to being addressed in such a manner." Said Tremere in his usual bland tone. "While projecting my consciousness through the veil between worlds somewhat lessens my power, and thus I unfortunately cannot simply use Domination to force you into compliance, I am fully capable of killing you.

"I suggest that you speak more politely in the future."

Alistair just nodded his head in assent, too exhausted to speak.

"Good," Tremere said, apparently satisfied, "know your place in the future human. Besides, there is no reason to be upset by my plans to permit the Camarilla to take over your homeland. Your nation would be conquered even if the Camarilla were to do nothing."

What could he possibly mean by that? Did he mean the darkspawn? Other than them, there weren't any other forces that could threaten Ferelden at the moment. Not with the Orlesians busy with a Sabbat led peasant revolt.

Alistair's confusion must have shown on his face as Tremere answered his unspoken question.

"The Sabbat in Orlais have completed a similar ritual to the one I wish you to perform. A passageway has been opened between Orlais and a Sabbat stronghold in Brazil, and the forces of the Sabbat are already pouring through. Orlais will fall soon, and unless the Sabbat is stopped Ferelden will soon follow."

"What! How? How could they . . ." Alistair stuttered out, before quickly shutting his mouth once he remembered who he was speaking to.

He really didn't want to be tortured again.

"You may ask your questions." Tremere said. "As long as you remain polite."

"Right. How is it possible for Orlais of all places to be conquered? Even if the Sabbat had the forces to pull it off it would still take forever. Orlais is huge, with a vast population and massive armies. It would take years at least."

"You underestimate the effectiveness of modern weaponry. But your point is not without substance." Tremere answered. "Except that this invasion is being assisted by Gratiano de Veronese, one of the very few beings currently in existence who might be considered to be my equal.

"Since arriving he has . . . well, I think it would be better to show you."

Tremere snapped his fingers, and the world began to change.

The formerly baren landscape around them warped and shifted and soon Alistair found himself in the streets of what looked to be a fairly large city.

The architecture looked vaguely Orlesian, though that didn't mean much considering that most of southern Thedas had been controlled by Orlais at one time or another. What did make the city stand out was that the streets were filled with human corpses.

Though oddly enough none of the bodies showed any signs of a violent death. Instead, they looked leathery and dried out, as if most of the moisture had somehow been sucked out of them. Alistair even noticed a few dead animals that appeared to have died in the same way.

"Where is this? What happened here?" Alistair asked, hoping desperately that this poor city wasn't located in Ferelden.

"This is the city of Halamshiral. The largest city in eastern Orlais." Tremere answered. "And all of its inhabitants have been killed by Gratiano de Veronese. You saw his work yourself while traveling to the Circle of Magi. That pillar of shadow you saw on the road was a vast working of Obtenebration with which Gratiano consumed the blood of every being in the city."

"The entire city? Everyone?"

"Yes. Everyone." Tremere confirmed. "And that is even worse than first appears. The Empress Celene was hosting a gathering of the Orlesian nobility in Halamshiral to decide on how best to deal with the Sabbat and the general peasant unrest. Her political opponents took the opportunity to try to unseat her by blaming her incompetence for the Sabbat revolt. Naturally every Orlesian noble with any real power or ambition was there. And now they are all dead.

"And that is not the end of it. The appearance of the Sabbat in Orlais has created some difficult theological issues for the Chantry, as well as worsening relations between the mages and the templars. The Divine therefore decided that a conclave of prominent figures in the Chantry, mages, and templars would be gathered to handle these issues. And that Halamshiral would be the perfect place for such a gathering. While almost none of the foreign delegates had arrived yet when Gratiano destroyed the city, most of the Orlesian ones had. Thus, leaving the Orlesian Chantry, mages, and templars leaderless."

"How?" Alistair asked quietly as he stared in horror at the dead streets of Halamshiral. "How could one person do all this?"

"Gratiano is far more than just a person. He is one of the few beings in existence whose power can almost approach my own."

This was catastrophic. Even Alistair, with his extremely limited knowledge of Orlesian politics, knew that this was the end of the Orlesian Empire. It would probably collapse even if the Sabbat were to immediately return to their mysterious homeland. With the deaths of the Divine and her closest followers this might even be the end of a unified southern Chantry.

Even worse, with a creature as powerful as Gratiano leading the Sabbat the Kingdom of Ferelden was almost certainly doomed. Even if Ferelden could create an army powerful enough to stop the Sabbat it didn't matter if Gratiano could just destroy it on his own.

Still, there was something about this that seemed off to Alistair. If this Gratiano was capable of such destruction, why had the Sabbat not conquered the Camarilla long ago? On the rare occasion that Jack spoke of the Sabbat the Gangrel was clear that the two factions were at least roughly equivalent in power.

Then again, Tremere did claim to be even more powerful than Gratiano.

"I know this is a bit off topic," Alistair asked hesitantly, still warry of offending the monster's wrath, "but have you been protecting the Camarilla from Gratiano de Veronese?"

"From a certain point of view." Tremere responded. "He and I, as well as . . . a few beings of equivalent power have a gentlemen's agreement not to attack each other's assets personally. For the sake of this agreement the Camarilla does count as one of my assets."

"And if the Camarilla were to conquer Ferelden, would Ferelden be protected from Gratiano by this agreement?"

"It would."

Alistair still wasn't sure that all this wasn't some sort of elaborate trick. Once he was back in the waking world he would talk to Jack and Morrigan to see if all this was plausible. Maybe even Flemeth or Roy if he had the opportunity.

Hopefully all of this was just some elaborate fantasy dreamed up by a crazy mage and Alistair could safely ignore everything he had just seen.

But if Tremere was telling the truth, then Ferelden would be conquered and nothing that he or anyone else did would change that.

But Alistair did seemingly have a chance to influence whether the Sabbat or the Camarilla would rule afterwards.

And from what Jack had said of both groups the correct choice seemed obvious. While Alistair thought that Camarilla sounded like a bunch of tyrannical thugs, the Sabbat somehow seemed to be even worse.

Maker help him. He was going to do it.

"I," Alistair said, feeling like a traitor all the while, "accept your deal. I will go to Soldier's Peak and preform your ritual."

"Good." Tremere answered. "But be sure not to take too long, or I might decide that Antiva or Nevarra would be a better location to carry out my research.

"Now, wake up."

____________________________________________________

Alistair's first sight on awaking was a strangely peaceful Mage's Tower. Instead of rampaging demons, abominations, and blood mages he was greeted to some templars with buckets and mops trying to clean bloodstains from off the floor.

"He's finally awake." One of the templars said when they noticed that Alistair had gotten up. "One of you, go and fetch the other one."

One of the other templars hurried out of the room and returned a few minutes later with Jack Tanner following closely behind.

"Well, look who finally decided to wake up." Jack greeted Alistair. "Everyone else is already awake and recuperating downstairs. Hopefully now we can leave just as soon as I finish sorting things out with the Knight-Commander."

"What happened? Did we win?" Alistair asked, somewhat confused as to what was going on.

"Well yeah, apparently." Jack answered. "When you and the rest of the group got put to sleep by that demon, I was left all by myself. Fortunately for me, the thing ended up dying on its own for some reason."

"What?"

"Yeah, I hardly believe it myself. One second, I was fighting that ugly demon thing, and then it just dropped dead. When I started looking around, it turned out that all the other demons and abominations had just died too."

"All of them?"

Jack nodded. "I know it sounds crazy, none of the templars believed me either when I told them. Fortunately, some of the mages were still alive and their leader was able to convince Greagoir that everything was fine."

The Cainite took a moment to look around the room before continuing in a quiet voice. "Honestly, I'm really glad you woke up when you did. Nobody can figure out what happened and it's making the templars really jumpy. Some of them are saying that this is some sort of trick and that the demons are just waiting until their guards are down. Considering how suspicious this is I'm not even sure that I disagree with them. So, I would rather get out of here before the demons come back or the templars turn on us."

Jack may not have known what had happened, but Alistair thought that he might. Tremere had said that if Alistair agreed to his deal, then he would cleanse the Circle of demons. Apparently, he had followed through.

Not that Alistair could tell the templars that. But Jack needed to be told. He might know enough about this Tremere person to decide whether going through with this deal that Alistair had made was a good idea or not.

"Jack, I have something to tell you, but I think we should go somewhere more private first . . ."
 
Prince 3.4

TyrantTriumphant

Well-known member
Although the Gangrel and Tremere clans have had a difficult relationship for most of their history, Jack Tanner was an exception to that rule.

While he was aware of the ancient grudges that set the two clans apart Jack had always been of the opinion that such things had little relevance to the present.

Within a month of his embrace Jack found himself working on and off for the local Tremere Regent, Gavin McIntyre. And while Jack eventually turned against Gavin when he learned that the Regent was plotting a coup against Prince Roy, Jack still maintained friendly relations with some of Gavin's former subordinates.

This connection turned out to be very profitable for both clans in New York.

With the local Tremere gutted by Gavin's failed coup Jack had decided to approach the new Tremere Regent, Dieter Mach, with a deal. Jack would reach out to his fellow Gangrel in the area and persuade them to come to New York City to act as muscle for the Tremere and as soldiers in the war against the Sabbat. In return, the Tremere would provide these newcomers with hefty paychecks and political support. Dieter accepted Jack's offer and against all expectations, the alliance was a huge success.

The Gangrel, usually poor and politically adrift now that many of them had decided to leave the Camarilla, found a source of steady funding and a place where they could have some small say in governance rather than getting treated like cannon fodder. The Tremere, now saved from annihilation at the hands of the Sabbat, maintained and even expanded their influence in the city as the other clans continued to lose members in the fighting.

By the time of Jack's . . . unexpected trip to Thedas the Tremere-Gangrel power bloc had become the dominant force in NYC. With most of the Ventrue leadership dead in the war or executed for treason and all of the other clans except for the Malkavians shattered, there was simply no one left to oppose them.

Suffice to say Jack was not an enemy of the Tremere clan.

That did not, however, mean that he was overly pleased when Alistair told him that he had been visited in the fade by the Tremere founder himself.

One of the first things that Jack's sire had taught him was that methuselahs were to be avoided if all possible. Creatures that old and alien inevitably came to see those younger than them as insects. Made worse by the inclination of ancient Cainites to develop a thirst for the blood of their descendants.

Moreover, while many of Jack's detractors within his own clan called him a Tremere bootlicker and sellout, the truth was he did not trust the Tremere clan in the slightest.

While Jack trusted Dieter, at least to an extent, he was well aware that most Tremere tended to be a bunch of sociopathic elitists. A tendency that became more likely to be true the higher ranked a Tremere was.

It would have been bad enough if this was just some high-ranking Tremere instead of the Tremere founder himself. The being who had eaten an antediluvian, exterminated a whole clan, and hunted the Grangrel clan like animals to use their body parts as magical reagents.

And as much as he wanted to, Jack could not disobey Tremere's orders. Partly because it would be suicidal, but also because Tremere was apparently the only one strong enough to stop the army of Sabbat led by Gratiano do Veronese who were currently destroying Orlais.

It was an absurd situation.

And yet somehow, this was not the worst of Jack's current problems. In the past, whenever Roy had possessed Jack, the dead prince had always faded back into the Gangrel's subconsciousness afterwords. Awake, but unable to do anything.

No longer.

After he had regained control of his body from Roy in the mage's tower Jack had been shocked to hear the voice of Roy speaking to him from within his own mind. While Roy was fortunately still incapable of influencing Jack's actions, who knew how long that would last.

Not long at all if I have anything to say about it. Roy's voice echoed through Jack's head. My control grows stronger with every day. Soon I will return in full, and you will be nothing but a voice in my head.

Unless Jack could stop him first. Fortunately, Tremere's bargain with Alistair provided him options to deal with this possession problem.

Though Jack had previously made a deal with Flemeth to defeat the darkspawn in exchange for quieting Roy's spirit, he had never truly had much hope that Flemeth would follow through on her part of the bargain.

Even if Flemeth was capable of what she claimed, which the Gangrel doubted, there was a strong possibility that the witch would simply eliminate him once his usefulness was over. The only reason that Jack had even agreed to Flemeth's bargain was that at the time he had no better options.

As for the Tremere, while Jack didn't trust the warlocks, he certainly trusted them more than Flemeth. And he also figured that they, who had studied the Cainite condition for centuries, were more likely to be able to cure his condition than some swamp witch who's only knowledge of Cainites came from old legends.

But of course, for that to matter Jack had to get Alistair to Soldier's Peak to preform Tremere's ritual. And there was a slight problem in the way of that.

"So," Jack asked Alistair, "how are we going to convince the rest of the party to go along with this?"

"Hmm?" Alistair raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

"I mean that it might be a bit difficult to get everyone else to agree that this is a good idea. If we tell them that we're planning to summon an army of Cainite blood mages who want to take over Ferelden they are not going to be happy. To be honest I'm surprised that you of all people are willing to agree to something like this.

Don't be. Roy whispered. While Tremere claimed that he was not able to use his mind-altering powers in the fade I don't believe a word of it. Alistair is undoubtedly under Tremere's mental influence. Do not trust anything that he says or does.

While Jack hated to admit it, in this case Roy was probably correct. It was for good reason that the Camarilla judged anyone who even spoke to a methuselah to be compromised, and Tremere was far more than a mere methuselah.

He'd definitely be keeping a close eye on Alistair in the future.

"You have a point." Alistair conceded. "The others are going to object. Although . . . I think a may have an idea about that. I'm somewhat familiar with this place Tremere wants us to go to since it's an old Grey Warden fortress and it's located right off of the northern imperial highway.

"We should tell them that our plan is to travel to the capital in Denerim which should be believable since that was my plan before I met Tremere. Once we're close I'll suggest that it since it used to be used by the Grey Wardens it might contain something we could use against the arch-demon.

"Once we're inside we'll do the ritual and then it will be too late for them to do anything about it." Alistair's face twisted like he had just bitten down on a lemon. "While I'm not really happy with this I think it's the best way to prevent something unfortunate from happening. Once it's over I'm sure they'll understand if we explain it to them."

Jack took a minute to consider and then answered. "That's a good plan, if surprisingly devious coming from you. And though I have my doubts that the others will forgive us after everything is said and done, it doesn't really matter. Once the portal is open and the Camarilla is pouring into Ferelden then their opinions will become irrelevant. They can either move with the changing times or get crushed by them."

A look of anger passed over Alistair's face before being replaced by one of deep weariness. "Whatever." He spat bitterly. "Let's just get out of here. I'm sick of this place."

_________________________________________________________

Soon afterwords the group arrived at the tower exit, all of them thoroughly ready to be done with this place.

As they were about to leave, they were intercepted by the Knight-Commander and several mages, one of whom Jack recognized as that annoying Wynne woman.

"Warden Tanner." Commander Greagoir greeted in a somewhat muted tone. "I wanted to thank you again for your assistance. Though we are still unsure as to what exactly happened it has seemingly worked out for the best. Many more templars and mages alike would have died if not for your intervention."

"Your thanks are appreciated." Jack responded. "But I get the feeling that you're not just here to show your gratitude."

"That is correct." Greagoir said, looking rather uncomfortable. "I know that I promised to lend the mages to your cause after the Circle was saved, but unfortunately, I will not be able to fulfill my oath. At least for the moment."

"You're doing WHAT!?" Alistair bellowed, his face red with anger. "We fought through a whole tower full of demons and abominations and now you're betraying us? Even after the promises you make and the treaties you signed? This is treason!"

Sten said nothing but glared at Greagoir in clear disdain.

Greagoir pursed his lips. "I don't want to do this. But I have no other options. The Chantry has declared Cainites to be anathema. I cannot serve under one, even a Grey Warden, without being declared a heretic."

"If that is the case," Sten sneered, "then you should have told us this before you promised to aid us in exchange for our help."

While under normal circumstances Jack would share his companion's understandable anger, the imminent arrival of the Camarilla dulled his rage into a feeling of mild annoyance.

Because once Tremere and the Camarilla entered Thedas the mages that Gregoir had promised him would become completely irrelevant. The darkspawn would be destroyed by the power of thaumaturgy and modern weaponry and the mages would probably end up either conscripted or used as test subjects by clan Tremere.

Even though the issue was pointless, Jack still decided to at least pretend to be upset. Otherwise, he might alert Sten or the Templars to the fact that he was up to something.

Then again, there might be a way to resolve this.

"Knight-Commander, are you saying that your problem is not in fighting the darkspawn, but in doing so on behalf of myself or the Grey Wardens."

"That is correct, or at least for the Ferleden branch of the Grey Wardens."

"Right, but what if instead of fighting against the darkspawn for the Wardens, you did the same but for some other group?"

"What do you mean?" Greagoir inquired.

"I was always planning to ask other groups for assistance as well." Jack explained. "No offense, but you aren't enough to stop the blight all on your own. But if I were to ask one of the other groups I'm planning to recruit, like the Dwarves or one of the local Arls to request your assistance against the blight would you grant it? Working with an ally of mine is functionally the same as working with me, but without technically violating your orders."

"That . . . might actually work." Greagoir said, becoming more animated as he talked. "If we were to combat the blight at the behest of some other group who by coincidence was also working with you then the Chantry would have no grounds to sanction us. I believe the dwarves would work especially well for this role. While the Chantry would be upset with them, they will have no way to respond other than with an Exalted March, which they cannot do without diverting forces away from fighting the Sabbat."

"I take it you'll work with us then?"

"Only if you can convince the Dwarves to agree to your scheme. But assuming that, yes." Greagoir answered, relief clear in his voice.

"While I admit that I had my doubts about working with a creature like you, you have fulfilled your part of the bargain, and now I shall fulfill mine as best I can." The man frowned deeply before continuing. "You should be aware that despite your actions here the Chantry will likely seek to destroy you after the Blight is defeated. For what it's worth, I am willing to speak on your behalf once that time comes, though I doubt it will convince them."

While Jack appreciated the sentiment, it was ultimately irrelevant. Though Greagoir didn't know it, all of the Chantry's leadership was either dead or was about to be. Still, Jack had to keep up the charade until the Camarilla were summoned to Ferelden.

"I'll keep that in mind." The Gangrel responded evenly. "Now I really must be on my way."

"Of course. Good luck on your journey Grey Warden." With this Greagoir gave Jack a nod and left the entryway followed by the mages with him. Though jack did note Wynne giving him a suspicious glare as she retreated.

"Good job Jack." Alistair said once the mages had left earshot. "I'm surprised you managed to pull that off. Of course, their cooperation depends on having the dwarves on our side, which we don't have at the moment."

"We shouldn't need to." Sten growled. "It is their duty to support the Wardens against the Blight. Even if you can convince the dwarves to play along with your scheme who is to say that Greagoir won't change his mind again?"

"I get the feeling he won't." Jack responded. "But there's no point worrying about something we can't change. For now, we should head back to the village and check up with Leliana and Morrigan. They're probably starting to get worried."

Despite the circumstances, Jack was feeling pretty good about the current situation. After months of dealing with this miserable planet, he was finally within reach of escape. All he had to do was make it to Soldier's Peak and he could leave this place behind and see to getting the spirit of Roy removed from his head.

He could practically taste freedom. After all, there was nothing between him and his goal but a week's travel along the northern highway.

What could possibly go wrong now?

_______________________________________________________

Meanwhile, in Eastern Orlais

One might be forgiven for believing that with the arrival of Gratiano de Veronese the Sabbat's conquest of Orlais would be easy.

Unfortunately for Arthur Dawson, this could not be further from the truth.

From the start, Gratiano had been clear that while he would defend his followers from foreign invasions or from powerful monsters such as the Archdemon and its darkspawn, they would have no help in conquering Orlais.

The Sabbat was on its own.

Though Dawson wasn't particularly happy about that decision, he still felt it was the right choice. If Gratiano fought all of the Sabbat's battles for it, then the Sect would quickly become dependent on him. It would become weak.

If the Sabbat in Thedas was too weak to conquer Orlais with the advantages that Gratiano had already given them then they didn't deserve to have it.

Weakness was unforgivable.

The road ahead would be hard. While the Sabbat was receiving supplies and recruits from Earth, circumstances limited how much support could be sent.

The most important of which was that they did not have the support of the entire Sabbat, only its Ultra-Conservative faction. And considering that their current plan was to launch a coup against the current leadership of the mainline Sabbat once Orlais was pacified, it was vital to keep the rest of the Sect in the dark about Thedas.

Which was not turning out to be easy. Regent Melinda Galbraith may be a loathsome infernalist but she wasn't stupid. Charles Delmare had already had to fend off several inquiries as to where supplies diverted to Thedas had gone.

Old tactics were no longer possible. Both for reasons of logistics and of scale. Though it galled many, the conquest would have to be fought mainly by humans. The new Sabbat would live or die on local support. On human support.

Still, the mission ahead of the true Sabbat was not impossible. With the Empire of Orlais now beginning to collapse after the near total destruction of its leadership, dissatisfied peasants and serfs were flocking to the Sabbat cause. But that would all change if Cainites started to abuse the local humans as was common on Earth.

This was why instead of leading from the front lines or training his troops Dawson found himself in an makeshift office doing paperwork. To survive, the Sabbat would need to transition from a Sect into a government, a nation, one that provided not only for Cainites under its rule but humans as well.

Currently, the Lasombra was drafting a proposal for new laws dictating under what circumstances Sabbat could feed off of locals. It included exemptions from feeding for certain groups, such as children and the sick, and leveled penalties against those who permanently damaged mortals through overfeeding. Naturally these protections would only apply to mortals formally under Sabbat rule. Criminals and those from areas not yet conquered would not be protected.

Though it would not be popular with those who had gotten used to feeding on whoever they wanted, whenever they wanted, Charles Delmare would likely approve the proposal. Inevitably some objectors would have to be purged, but such was the price of a better future.

Though the path ahead was fraught with danger, with the blessings of God and Caine the Sabbat would see it though. The Sect would finally be cleansed of the degeneracy and heresy that had infected it for over a century.

Dawson's musings were interrupted as a man, one of the new Cainites from Earth, burst into his office waving a stack of papers.

"Archbishop Dawson!" the Cainite announced, "I have an urgent report."

"Let me hear it then." Dawson responded. "This had better be worth barging into my office unannounced."

"It is sir, we've just received a report from a scouting team in Ferelden. They say that there is a previously unknown Cainite operating in that country."

Dawson frowned. "That seems hard to believe." He said. "None of the new fledglings I have sired are unaccounted for, and I know for certain that all of the new arrivals are still in the Emerald Graves."

"This isn't one of ours sir. He's apparently a member of Clan Gangrel by the name of Jack Tanner. The name and description perfectly match a known member of the Camarilla from New York City."

Dawson barely kept his jaw from dropping as he heard the news. It surely couldn't be possible for any other Cainite to arrive here as he did, much less a member of the impious Camarilla.

Then again, did the details of it really matter? If this information was true, then decisive action needed to be taken. Only the chosen few of the true Sabbat could be allowed to dwell in the promised land of Thedas. If a member of the Camarilla was here, then they must be eliminated at once.

"You were right to bring this to me." Dawson told the man before him. "Send a messenger to Earth with orders to bring back any information the Sabbat has on this Jack Tanner. And tell Bishop Auguste to put together a strike team.

"I know our stockpiles are low right now, but I'm authorizing him to requisition modern firearms for this mission."

"I will see it done immediately my lord."
 

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