Chapter Text
I shall not be left to wander the drifting roads of the Fade
For there is no darkness, nor death either, in the Maker's Light
And nothing that He has wrought shall be lost.
-Trials 1:14
There's a glimmer of green over the edge of the hill to their right and Cassandra must hold back a sigh at the sight. They are on their way to Redcliffe to answer a royal summons. Although the king is understanding – fighting a Blight brings a certain level of patience for necessary delay – a rift is no welcome distraction.
Hera Adaar glances around at each of the party in turn before disappearing in a cloud of smoke. They've faced rifts before; it will be no trouble now. Bull charges fist, Cole on his heels as they go together against a wraith. The creature is half dead by the time Hera springs seemingly from nowhere and poisons its neighbor. Cass finishes the poisoned creature off and spins into the next opponent, cutting it down in time to take a collective breath with the rest of her team. The rift resettles, but they know more Fade-dwellers will attempt to break through.
It's only moments before strands of green touch down and twin Terrors and a despair demon materialize. Bull is ecstatic, rushing the demon and leaving Hera and Cass to the remainders. Cole finds his way behind Cass's target, and the giant green creature is dead on his arrival. Bull works hard on another lighting-born wretch. The addition of his companions’ three blades makes him smirk; he makes quick work of his foe. In a moment the opposition shrinks to two demons and a Terror. Hera wears the confident smirk that means the rift doesn't have much time left in it. She and Bull trade banter over a demon while Cass handles the other and Cole slices into the remaining terror. The Qunari pair’s opponent dissipates with a small puff and only Bull joins Cass against her own.
“Brace,” Hera screams. Her three companions give a wide berth, preemptively dodging the lighting that will close the rift. Bull slams his demon toward Cass, and its staggering form reels awkwardly in her direction. She knows he wants her to drop it, let it flip. She meets the demon’s throat with her sword instead. It leaks then bursts green, bright enough to match the lightning bolt stretching from rift to palm, bright enough to light the silhouette of a Terror shrouded half in shadow. Half in the shadow of one standing tall and distracted.
"HERA!"
She jerks her head up at her bellowed name, confusion clear on her face at his outstretched hand. She doesn't reach back to him. Instead she hisses, surprise and pain, as the creature's claws connect with her back. As the connection to the rift shatters, but the rift remains open. As she tumbles forward.
Bull's foot lands thunderously beside Cassandra, the noise drowned out by his scream of anguish. She's moving too, boots pounding the earth in a desperate bid for one already gone.
"Stay," Cole says, his voice behind her, aimed not at her. Meaningless. "Protect the rift." Bull doesn’t want to stay. Cassandra doesn’t have to look behind her to know he’s pitched forward, ready to follow her. She knows too that he will do whatever it takes to ensure Hera’s safe return.
"Bring her back, Seeker. Bring her back!" Cassandra doesn't answer him. She runs into the rift instead.
•
She expected it to feel like running into a wall. A lightning storm, perhaps. But it feels like running into nothing. One moment She is standing on the ground in a bog, with all the humidity and malleability of mud that plagues such a place, and the next she's on solid ground, surrounded by green. If there is a difference in temperature between herself, her clothes, the air, she cannot feel it. Her armor is suddenly lighter than she ever remembers, light enough to almost not exist. The air, on the other hand, presses down around her with the full force of her heaviest training weights. Giving Bull a ride on her shoulders would not be so strenuous, she thinks. She must be holding up the sky.
There's rock everywhere, green rock, uncertain rock. Under her feet, in the distance, in the air. The forms are fuzzy, hazy. The more she looks at the ground beneath her feet, tries to bring it into focus, into solidity, the more it blurs out of comprehension. She's beginning to feel as though she might be standing on a cloud. She's beginning to feel as though she might not be real.
"Cassandra."
It's a quiet voice. She's gone so long without hearing it, she almost doesn't recognize it. But as she turns she knows what she will see. He is just as she has remembered him, as he looks in the tiny portrait in the locket around her neck. He has the same long hair, the same brown eyes lighter than her own. He hasn't aged a day.
"Anthony?" It's a question of wonderment and it brings a smile to his face.
"Cassie! Still the same sharp mind, I see." She has to bite back the shut up that comes as quick to her lips now as it did twenty years ago. As it did when they lived together – when he was still alive. She looks to his neck and is surprised to find it unmarred. "Looking for a scar?" He's still smirking at her.
"No." Her too-quick retort should widen his smirk into a smile. Instead his face goes wary.
"You shouldn't lie here, little sister. Not in the Fade." His endearment jars her. How can she still be his little sister when she stands before him a full-fledged Seeker, Right Hand of the Divine, a woman who has lived her life and has the scars to prove it while he remains...a child. He died. It should – show. He died and she didn't and he's here now, stuck, trapped in the Fade and if she doesn't act now the Inquisitor might meet the same fate. She needs to find her. She opens her mouth to speak, finds a look built half of affection and half longing on Anthony's face. She cannot recall seeing it when he breathed. "I can lead you to her," he says softly. An apology that she can neither understand nor accept.
"We need her to save the realm. So that no more innocents die."
"You don't have to justify yourself to me," he says with laughter in his voice. She finds her own smile spreading in response, even as he lifts his finger to point her way toward duty.
She follows his gesture with her eyes before her feet, watching cobblestones spread under his outstretched arm where a moment before had been only a vague idea of ground. She trusts Anthony, but this shifting green landscape will take some getting used to. They take several steps in silence before she voices her questions.
“This leads to the Inquisitor?”
“I cannot lead you directly to her. You must understand, Cassandra, there will be trials. It is no easy thing to pull someone out of here. Even if she is the Inquisitor.” She had thought as much, but hearing it from Anthony, from the mouth of one ensnared for so long, it makes her restless. She must succeed. To fail would be unthinkable. And so she walks the green path, pretending not to notice that Anthony’s feet blend into the stones at the corner of her eye, for what feels like ages. Like far too long. Like failure.
“Can we not go a shorter way?” He shoots her a look too close to sympathy for comfort.
“We have to follow the path. I’m sorry.” He shouldn’t be. She does not tell him this. She should be, really. Not once had she thought to come looking for him, to send a mage for him, to ask Solas if he had seen her beloved brother. But here she stands in pursuit of another. They walk on in silence.
The road had seemed long, impossibly long, when he had pointed it out. But it ends abruptly a moment later at a simple wooden door. It stands nearly in front of a small cottage, attached but not. The cottage smears into the horizon while the door remains jarringly clear.
“She is here?” She can’t hide her hope from him. He spills forth sympathy.
“She is, but Cassandra –” She turns back to him with her hand still poised over the knob. She does not want to delay. She does not want to fail. “Truth is subjective. Hers may be different from yours.” And now she is perplexed.
“No it isn’t.” He smirks.
“Of course, Seeker. Just know that while you will recognize her, she may not do the same.”
Cassandra shoulders the door open.