congrekate | dragon age au!

dragon age au!

The rumor mill is still going on as to why Jonathan Strange fled the circle to become an apostate mage. Some say that it's as simple as an argument with his former tutor. Others say that the man never really recovered from his actions in the Mage-Templar War. The most likely answer is that something snapped after the death of his beloved. The one thing everyone can agree on is that it's really a shame someone with such potential threw it all away. He could have easily made his way up the social ladder, working at a court somewhere!

To which Strange would respond that he was doing perfectly fine right now, thank you very much, even if he was currently living in a shack that leaked when it rained, he had not even half of the books he was used to, and he heard people whisper behind his back, calling him the 'mad mage of the Dales'. So be it. His plan was probably a bit mad to begin with: Jonathan Strange planned to summon a god.

Not just any god, of course. He had gone through the various pantheons, trying to find the perfect one to grant him what he wanted (power, mostly, a way to take the tools and trade of necromancy and make it more solid, to raise the dead instead of raising spirits.) And eventually, Strange settled on Fen'Harel. He could draw upon the power of the location of the Dales as well as his status as an outsider himself to appeal to the god. The ritual itself was the most complex part, but modified necromancy bindings and a few of his own additions should suffice.

And so, Strange performs the magic. And poor Solas is probably just damn confused as to what he sees when he's forcibly woken up from his nap. The shack is small, covered head to toe with knick-knacks and trinkets, some of magical significance, others not. Dried herbs cover a table and books cover almost any other flat surface. Good luck trying to find where Strange sleeps as the bed has also become storage space. The mage himself looks wild: a middle aged human with scruff and hair that looks like it hasn't seen a brush in years, clothes ragged and dirty. And he just regards Solas with sheer confusion.

"I thought the wolf part was literal."

This is an elf. This isn't a dog. Did he make a mistake in the summoning? And if he didn't summon a god, then who the hell did he summon?

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Solas immediately makes a face at that. Not only is the human yelling at him, he's hearing it in Common. Something about the tongue always sounded harsh and ugly and hearing it yelled only worsens the effect. It was a shame he couldn't count on Strange to know anything besides it though what would be lost if he forced the man to deal with him speaking in only Elvhen?

With a shake of his head, he emerges from the cellar and eyes Strange's bag with skepticism. The man had injured himself recently after all. "You can carry all of that?" Because Solas was not going to help one bit.

"Of course I can," Strange remarks, with a roll of his eyes. He most certainly cannot. This is going to end up with Strange just selling some of his stuff at the first town they come across because wow, the bag's heavy, he has poor constitution thanks to magic and poison, and god knows Mr. Hotshot Ex-Circle Mage isn't very good at things like 'lots of walking' and 'long journeys.'

"You're the one who wants us to leave, so let's go."

He shakes his head and steps towards the doorway. "So long as you do not question my direction." Or else this would be a very long journey of bickering. Not that Solas has high expectations given how their talking has gone so far.

Hands resting behind his back and head held high, the elf intends to start this journey with long strides and a steady pace. Please keep up, Strange.

Strange actually manages to keep up fairly well. The problem here is that Strange is the sort of person who if he wants to talk, will happily continue talking through the silence and through the other person's annoyance.

So Solas gets about ten minutes of peace and quiet before the aggravating questions start.

"What were you doing before I summoned you anyway?"

For a long moment, Solas thought he might have peace as he played pathfinder. That hope goes out the window the moment Strange opens his mouth. It had been nice while it lasted.

"Frolicking in the forest with the fey folk," he answers in the driest tone he can muster and keeps his gaze forward. "What would you expect Fen'harel to be doing?"

"That's the problem--I don't have any expectations." What do gods do? Strange just doesn't know. One would assume they would talk with each other and be godly and look down on mortals and do things like that, but this is Fen'harel. He's not exactly the most popular of gods, and for a good reason.

"I especially don't have any expectations considering that most of the stories I've heard involve gods interacting with mortals. Of course, there's an obvious problem in that, what with your betrayal and all." There's a pause, as Strange thinks to himself for a moment. "When was the last time you had an actual conversation with someone?"

That question does force Solas to pause as he tries to legitimately think of when that was. There had been his attempts at conversations with the Dalish in the Fade which wouldn't count and he'd been sleeping for well over a thousand years. Was Strange truly the first person he's had a conversation with in that long? He eyes the human with trepidation. He'd say there were worst ways to break such a dry spell, but he sees no reason to lie to himself.

"You chose to summon Fen'harel," he starts. "You must have heard something that would make you choose him over others."

Strange continues walking, but he pauses the conversation for a moment, mulling things over before he decides to speak.

"It was the older stories that got my attention--the arrow one and the king's daughter, for example. Fen'harel's methods were unconventional, often dangerous and occasionally thoughtless...but they worked." And having exhausted all other methods he could think of, unconventional and dangerous were the only options left for Strange. He was desperate. He wasn't going to accept the fact that she had died.

"Thoughtless?" His eyes narrow as he regards the other man and withholds a string of unflattering elvhen. He could save the grumbling to himself in another language for the next leg of their journey.

"Those are twisted still, altered from what remained and was passed along." Skewed in most parts and fitting whatever narrative the clan telling it needed to have filled. Fen'harel had become the evil used frequently in cautionary tales. "You heard these from the Dalish or...?" Somewhere else. The source was as important as the information.

"Mostly the Dalish, occasionally city elves. I'm certain they're twisted and changed around, but they're at least something."

Unsurprisingly, it's a bit hard to find information on a treacherous god that isn't old wives' tales, folklore, or other muddled bits of campfire storytelling. Strange knows his sources might not be a hundred percent accurate. But they were accurate enough for him to try.

Groups of elves Solas did not have the highest opinion of. At least, from what he saw and interacted of them in the Fade. Some of their stories were rooted in that, he knew, when he had tried to speak to them only for it to be skewed. His People had lost far too much in the years since the Veil's creation and the ones remaining did not resemble what he once knew.

"You can imagine I spent much of my time wandering the Fade and hounding unsuspecting elves." Pun intended and said with the straightest face.

Did the Dread Wolf just pun at him? It's an odd feeling to be talking to an elven god. It's an even odder feeling when he makes a pun at you. Strange pauses for a moment, thinking things over, before he decides to pun right back.

"Tasks that you took up with dogged determination, I'd imagine." Unlike Solas, he can't help but smile, wry expression on his face.

There were moments in his life that made him wonder what he was doing. But he was tired and bound to a damn human mage, there had to be allowances for that. He'd plead temporary insanity if this were ever mentioned again.

"Yes, though I had hoped for more pawsitive results." He waits a beat before he continues, "You heard those stories and still summoned me. What were your plans if you failed your binding?"

Strange is already coming up with something about how ruff it would be if the results swayed a different direction buuut then Solas asks a question and he's got to shift focuses. It's a shame, though. It was a damn good pun.

"I suppose that all depends on what you would have done had I failed my binding. You don't seem like the smiting and striking down sort, but it's certainly a possibility."

Fun fact: he had no plan. His plan would be come up with a new plan because like hell Strange was going to ever give up.

"I would have long since left." That much he'll tell the man since it's obvious, at least to Solas. Without the binding keeping him in place and how odd it felt walking Thedas, awake and farther from the Fade than he ever wanted to be. If he had his focus everything would be different.

Rather than let Strange continue a line of questioning about him, Solas asks , "Have you spent all your time far from others and practicing magic?" Solas does not reflect on just who else that sounds like.

"I have," Strange admits, knowing full well how sort of creepy and mal-adjusted that makes him seem. After all, what sort of weirdo takes a house in the middle of the woods away from civilization to practice magic?

"My beloved and I lived in a small town after I fled the Circle. Once she passed, I saw no need to stay there."

Solas can at least respect that Strange is self-aware. The elf may be angry from being woken and dragged out here, but he knows the devastation he caused by the death of someone close to him. There had been other reasons, building and pulling at him over time, but the final straw had been the loss of Mythal. He had a chance to undo that now once he cleared up this mess.

"Was she from the Circle?"

"She wasn't. Truth be told, she has no magical talent whatsoever."

Aaand that right there explains why Strange turned tail and abandoned the Circle. What sort of Circle mage falls in love with someone who isn't from the Circle, nevermind someone who doesn't have any magical talent whatsoever? Still, he's talking about Arabella with nothing but love and kindness in his voice.

That the man had fallen in love with someone with no magical abilities is... Unfathomable to Solas, but he is from a time where magic was far more prevalent. How anyone survived modern Thedas without it was beyond him.

"How did you even meet?" The woman must have worked with the Circle mages in some capacity. The inner workings of every prison used to keep mages in line escaped him.

"We met when we were children." As he talks, it becomes more and more obvious that Strange is still just straight up in love with Arabella despite the fact that she passed. "I was trained at the White Spire which...thankfully was much more liberal with the treatment of the mages than Kirkwall. I was allowed to return home first for the death of my mother and then, a few years later, for the death of my father. Well, at that point I certainly didn't want to return to the White Spire but that business with the phylacteries meant that I couldn't escape even if I wanted to. So, Arabella moved to Val Royeaux instead."

Strange just continues talking no matter whether Solas wants to listen or not. "It wasn't ideal, but we managed to make it work. During that massacre at the conclave, I decided that phylacteries or not, I wasn't going to stay there a moment longer. We fled to the countryside. We had just gotten everything settled and our life together started when..."

When she died. Strange stops walking for a moment, partly to catch his breath, partly to try and shake the memories out of his head.

Fortunately Solas is listening. If there's one thing he wants right now, it's to know what he's dealing with. He knew Strange was grief-stricken, obsessed with the passing of a loved one, but now he had a better idea of how much this was the case. When Strange stops walking, Solas only pauses for a brief second to make sure the man wasn't about to fall over and die before he keeps going. They had ground to cover and the man had said he was fit for travel. It was time to make good on that.

"How did she die?" He saw no visible markings on the corpse, no maiming. He would hazard a guess at disease.

Having taken a brief moment to regain his composure, Strange keeps going as well. "It was a chill, of all things," he bitterly responded. "She had to go out one evening, fell ill, and got worse from there."

He laughs, a short, harsh laugh. "I tried healing remedies, of course. I tried every spell at my disposal. But in the end, none of them kept her alive. Can you believe that? One of the greatest mages the Circle's ever produced and I can't do anything about a damn cold!"

Illness as he had suspected. The only part of Strange's story he takes issue with is the 'greatest mage' part and for the first time in their conversation together, Solas decides not to immediately bring this up and bites his tongue.

"You are not worried she will be sick if she is resurrected?" A big 'if.' Solas may be guiding Strange on a quest, but he has no real intentions of helping him in such a foolhardy mission. He had his own to work on.

Strange looks over at Solas as if this is the most obvious thing ever and the elf's a bit of an idiot for not getting this.

"She'd be alive. That's what matters the most." Duh, Solas. "If she is sick, I'll just find a way to cure it myself. After all, I've already eliminated a good number of options."

Because of course that's something he can do. Why wouldn't he?

"Yes, sick with something you failed to cure in time previously," he replies dryly and stares at Strange. Did the man truly not see a problem with that? Or did he really think he simply needed another day, another hour to solve what ailed his loved one?

With what he's seen, Solas imagines that is the case. He may have found the one person more deluded than he is.

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we are playing fast and loose with canon and even faster and looser with lore

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