When Fate Summons (a Dragon Age fanfiction)

Runaway

The midday sun beat down on the road. It was an unseasonably hot day for spring in Ferelden. Normally, 8-year-old Anawyn Aeducan would be rejoicing at a day like this after all the long winter months cooped up in the Vigil, home of the Grey Wardens, but today she wished for cooler weather. She'd been walking for only a few hours, but was already hot and sweating, her clothes dusty, and the water skin she'd filched from the kitchens mostly empty. Apparently her mother had been right, and it did take a long time to get to Denerim, as Anawyn, for all her walking, still hadn't reached the edge of the Arling of Amaranthine, where the Vigil was located.

Sighing heavily, Anawyn headed for a stand of trees just off the road, sitting down for a few minutes in the shade and eating a bit of the dried beef she'd brought along. She gave a thought to giving up and going home—if she snuck in, maybe no one would notice she had even left. Or she could throw herself on the mercy of Anders, one of her mother's lieutenants. He had a soft spot for the Commander's daughter and often stepped in to try and mitigate Anawyn's punishments, usually by making the Commander laugh. Anders was one of the few who could. Anawyn's mother was famed for her military bearing and no-nonsense attitude. Only Anawyn and a few close friends got to see her more fun-loving side. Although sometimes, when either Anawyn or Anders would say something funny, the Commander would sigh and look sad instead, saying they reminded her of someone she hadn't seen in a long time. Anawyn found this confusing, as the person she usually reminded people of was her father, the King of Ferelden, and he came to the keep at least every other month.

Long ago, during the Blight, Anawyn's mother and father had traveled together. They'd been the last two Grey Wardens in Ferelden, charged with ending the Blight, and along the way had fallen in love with each other. (This part they both stressed very hard, when they told Anawyn the story. That they had loved each other.) Anawyn's father had become king, and since her mother was a dwarf, they couldn't be together any longer. But by the time they parted, Anawyn was already on her way. She didn't quite understand the mechanics of all that—she'd watched the mabari in the kennels, so she had some idea of what breeding was about, but wasn't sure how it went with people.

Anawyn's life had been spent at the Vigil. She was taken to Denerim rarely—only twice that she could remember—so mostly she saw her father every month or so when he came to visit. Despite their protestations that they had loved each other once, her parents spent little time together when her father visited. Mostly, he played with Anawyn. Her father was always laughing and joking when Anawyn was around, and it took a lot to make him angry. But his smile would fade when her mother came in, and usually they would talk briefly of politics, or Warden affairs, or Anawyn herself, and then one of them would leave the room. She'd never once seen them touch each other. When she was younger, she remembered dimly that they used to joke more and acted more like friends, but they didn't do that anymore.

Her father had a wife, the queen, in Denerim, and a little boy named Duncan. He told Anawyn about Duncan a lot, but she had never met her half-brother. As a matter of fact, that's what she had been arguing with her mother about this morning.

It had all started over breakfast. Anawyn had been eating with Uncle Oghren's family. Oghren was the Commander's Second—he had been with Anawyn's parents during their journey to end the Blight, and had stayed on to become a Grey Warden when Amaranthine was overrun with darkspawn about a year after the Archdemon had been killed. Oghren and his wife Felsi had two children, Aeda and Rog, and Anawyn had been watching the two of them play while she ate breakfast. Sometimes it was lonely living in the Vigil. Oghren and Felsi lived in a little cottage on the grounds, so Anawyn was the only child in the keep itself.

When her mother came looking for her, Anawyn looked at her curiously. "Mother, are you going to get married so I can have a little brother who lives here with me? Father keeps saying he'll bring Duncan to see me, but he never does."