The Book (Dragon Age II)

Illustrations

People were staring.

Correction: They were staring more than usual.

Fenris could feel their eyes on him as he went about his business; buying food from a vendor, inspecting the new weapons in High Town, glaring at the Circle mages whenever they ventured out into the streets. Everywhere he went, everywhere he looked, someone was glancing quickly away from him.

He tried to ignore it. It was probably his imagination, anyway. His rampant paranoia that someone, some day, would point at him, scream "SLAVE!", and bring the fury of the Tevinter Imperium down on his head.

Eventually, though, after hours of their itching stares, he snapped.

He turned a corner and there was an elven woman, a peasant, a mere few paces away. Their eyes met. She blushed a deep red, covered her mouth, and then leaned to the side to whisper to her female companion. The two of them looked back up at the Tevinter, laughed, blushed more, and then averted their stares toward the dusty Lowtown street. They started to hurry away.

"What?!" he exclaimed. He leapt to intercept them, gauntleted hands extended in a gesture of pleading. "What is it?! Why do you people keep staring at me?!"

The two women jumped and their amusement vanished, their features paling in fear. "Um," said one. "S-sorry, serah. Are you Fesnir?"

"Fesnir?" he repeated. "What is a Fesnir?"

"I told you it weren't him," said the second woman. "His shoulders ain't broad enough."

"Broad enough for what?" he asked dangerously. None of the demons he had slaughtered ever had cause to complain about his shoulders, other than, perhaps, that they were wielding the sword that divested them of their heads.

"Fesnir is a fugitive," explained the first hurriedly. "And the pictures look a little bit like you."

The horror and rage growing in Fenris was like a storm coming in off the Waking Sea. "Pictures?" he said, trying to force a smile, but maybe showing thirteen too many teeth. "What pictures?"

The women tittered and backed away a little, like they might from a wild predator. "They're... They're going around, you see. There's this story, 'Fugitive From Your Flames,' but you can only find it in pieces. You have to collect them all. And there are illustrations to go with it. Great pictures of Fesnir, the fugitive, and Sandre, the apostate mage."

Fenris choked down the urge to kill, though the edges of his vision went a little fuzzy and red. With exacting control, he managed to ask, "Do you have any of these illustrations?"

"Um." The elf started to shake her head, but the terror in her face told him otherwise.

"Give it to me," he commanded.

"But... It took me weeks to find it. And it was expensive--"

"Here!" He pulled out a handful of coins, he didn't even check to see what they were, and dumped them in her hands. "Give me the picture!"

"Do it," her friend urged.

The elf woman fumbled in her long skirts, tucking away the money and finally pulling out a piece of folded parchment. At first sight, it looked rough, well-used and well-travelled.

"Here." She passed it over with a sad pout.

Fenris snatched it up, unfolded the ragged parchment and stared, aghast, at the charcoal illustration.

There was a dark-skinned male elf with white hair. There was a blond human man. There was a hint of clothing and weaponry scattered about in the foreground, a hint of pillows in the background, and much, much more than a hint in the action between the two figures.