killedwithlove | PSL: Tevinter AU for Dorian.

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dorian,
psl

PSL: Tevinter AU for Dorian.

It didn't like House Pavus.

It was nicer than most places here, in Tevinter, but it was still something wrong, fresh pain and fear painting the hallways. The stones were hushed and the servants grieving, though no blood stained the air of this place.

Something remained terribly wrong. Wrong enough that though his bindings told him to obey, something deeper tugged at him, something that made stronger demands than Adralla's words engraved on his manacles and collar.

He moved through the house, then through a locked door that led into fine, cool chambers. Gilded cage, golden and glittering.

There. Despair. The familiar, heavy taste on his tongue, his knife in his hand without his decision to summon it.

He stood there, wondering if he would be seen. If this was one of his, calling him.

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He had to get out of here.

He just had no idea how.

Arms folded over his knees, as he sat crouched in the corner of his room. Glowering at the locked door - locked with magic and locking pins and all other kinds of nonsense that he could not escape. His jaw is tight, and he glowers at the bruises of his skin. Bastard retainers, every last one of them. Paid by his father's promises of gold and restitution for keeping him here, for keeping him from escaping this - this horrific thing.

And then, there was a young man.

Standing there, on the other side of the door that was locked. "Who the Maker's tits are you?"

He wore the typical clothes of a house slave, old, worn, functional. His feet were bare and his wrists and throat burned by the shackles that kept him.

They were glowing now, trying to force him back on task when everything in him demanded he be here.

"I'm... I don't know. Mercy." It was closer to his name than anything else. "I'm Mercy. You can see me."

He looked at the boy - slave boy, if he had to guess. Yet ... he had never seen shackles glow like that. As if they weren't really there to begin with. He frowned again, and winced as he pushed himself up from the ground.

His lip bled freely again as he smirked, "Of course I can see you, Mercy, but I'm not sure you're in the right place. There's no mercy here." He glowered at the door behind them, "Only idiocy. And fear."

A heavy sigh, "Most of it - my own." He glanced sharply at the young man, "Mercy, how much would I have to bribe you, to open that door?"

"Would it help you?"

He walked forward, silent. He should have left dust in his wake, but he didn't. The cool stone didn't show any sign of his passage.

"Most people don't see me unless they need me. You despair but... You're not ready to go. You still fight."

He looked back at the door. "I don't know if I can open the magic. I can unlock the door, though. But what happens then?"

"Oh, it would help me enormously ... "

He trails off, because yes, he did notice that the footsteps did not bring any dust, made no sound, nothing. He stared at his feet, then up at the young man with wide eyes. "I ... I will always fight. I will always fight, to be myself."

He stares still. "Then I -- escape." He gives the young man - whatever he is - a more keen look. "Do you need to escape?"

"Oh. If it would help, I can unlock the door. I'll just ask it nicely." He looks back at the door and then to the young prince, bubbling with familiar despair and other things.

"I don't know how to escape. They put the chant on me." He pointed at his neck.

"Ah, all right ... hasn't worked for me, but why don't you try?" He stated dryly, ever the prince even in his torn and dirtied clothes. Then his eyebrows rose.

"By the Maker's balls - you're a spirit, aren't you?"

Mercy looked at Dorian through the lank, long fringe. His eyes were softly glowing as the shadow went over them.

"I'm Mercy now. I don't want to be, but I am." He walked back to the door, kneeling down and whispering to the lock, coaxing the tumblers to fall into the right position.

Right. Yes. Trapped spirit, not a demon because demons did not look like young men who needed a haircut. Dorian walked over to the lock himself, smiling a little.

"No need to worry. I'm Dorian, and I'm a mage, and since I have always been both -- " He can feel the lock starting to turn under his manipulations. "I shall make us both free."

Mercy hummed absently, and the lock fell open, everything clicking into place. He stood up again, not daring to believe Dorian, not yet.

"I know you are. And you fear your father, his ritual, his desperate need to deny who you are. Perfect as you are, beautiful as you are, but why aren't you different?"

The glow increased and Mercy whimpered, trying to twist away from the metal. "They told me to end it, take your knife, make him look into your eyes."

"Oh, a mind reading spirit ... well, this will be a fun dash for our lives." Dorian sighed, before he eyed the chains about Mercy.

"I am different because I put my caring, where caring matters. For others. And for my hair, but that's besides the point." He put his hand where the mancles are, feeling out the edges of the spell, before he twists his wrists just so, to snap the spell.

"So do the ritual. The fuck I will."

Mercy gasps and promptly vanishes from sight.

He reappears moments later, eyes wide and face lighting up. "You freed me! You undid it!" He vanishes again and then he's right up in Dorian's space, chest to chest with him and virtually glowing. "Thank you! Thank you!"

And then he hugs Dorian.

Dorian blinks.

Then blinks again.

Then blinks one more time as Mercy is in his space and then he is hugging him. Tall, broad spirit man hugging him.

Well, he always wanted to save someone in a dramatic and heroic fashion. He just didn't imagine it would be while he was trying to break himself free. He hugged Mercy awkwardly, clearing his throat. "Ah. Yes. Fine. Shall we get out of here before they decide shackling and locking the door was too easy?"

He steps back without vanishing this time. The burns are still there, but he can feel the fade around him, tugging and curling and dancing across Dorian's skin.

"Yes. I can make them not see us! Mercy couldn't, but Compassion can."

Mercy could only offer release, but Compassion understood how to share.

"... so now you're Compassion? Well, you're free now so you can call yourself whatever you like, my slippery friend." Dorian smirks, before looking around. "We need to get my staff, my jewels, and then we need to - ah - cloak our way out of here."

He gestured for Cole to follow him down the hallway, towards where he knew the vault was.

"Yes! They made me be Mercy, but before I was Mercy, I was Compassion. And Cole. And Compassion." It makes sense to him.

He flickers to fall into step with Dorian, a little like an eager puppy. "I'm good at making people not see us. See me. Even spirit mages, if I know they're there, but I didn't know she was there, that was how they caught me. It hurt, a lot. The Old Woman had a staff, it burned red and black and blighted. She fought an Archdemon."

"You are a lot of people at the same time. Do you find that confusing?"

Dorian asked, eyeing his new companion from the side, and then blinked as he flickered into view. "Should I ask who the Old Woman is? And how did she fight an Archdemon?"

Because there had to be a Blight for that ... "Were you with the Hero of Fereldan?"

"Sometimes. I forgot what I was for a while, that was bad for everyone. I killed people to help them."

He hummed, flickering ahead of them to a junction and then raising his hand to stop Dorian speaking. He flickered back, taking Dorian's hand in his own and focusing, lips moving silently as a slave hurried down the crossing hallway, carrying a large bowl to the kitchens.

"No. Old Woman was. In the Fade, she brought the Archdemon to us. Stabbing it didn't slow it down."

And now, Dorian was going to speak - but he was cut off when Cole held his hand and the slave rushed by to the kitchen. He held his breath, waiting for the man to take note of them ... but he said nothing at all.

"...all right, first of all, why? Second of all, were you coming to kill me!?"

"Why what?" He blinked at the princeling, tilting his head. "No. Not for you. Go inside, listen, find us secrets, all the dirty things that they hide. If there's nothing worth knowing, kill the magister and return."

He copied accents with uncanny precision, repeating his instructions back in his owner's voice.

"Why did the old woman bring you the Archdemon in the Fade? Seems like a terribly stupid thing to do." He paused, then his mouth thinned. "Ah yes, it all begins to make sense now. He enslaved you to find the secrets of his enemies. Had you sneak into their houses - the nerve."

Disgust ran through his tone, as he started to move ahead once more, "Well, he's going to be dreadfully disappointed - almost as disappointed as my father. You're coming with me, Compassion."

"They did a spell to make everyone sleep and wake in the Fade. I was caught in it." He wasn't meant to be there, like everything else that had happened to him on this side of the Veil. "She dreams of the Archdemon, of fighting it, with the Hero."

He trotted along behind Dorian again, fingers rubbing over the inflamed skin of his wrist. "They just enslaved me because they could. When they realised I could be invisible, be unnoticed, read the hurts deep inside people... they started inviting people over. Making me read them during meals."

"I ... see. You've known some interesting people." Then he paused, and stared, "Wait, you mean -- the Hero of Fereldan? She was with the Hero of Fereldan!?"

Interesting, indeed.

Another shake of the head, jaw tightening with every word, and by the time they reached his rooms he slammed the door open and started going through all his secret stashes. "Those ... bastards! I'll fireball every single one of them myself."

"Yes. Old Woman was with the Hero of Fereldan." Her name slipped his mind, he thought of her as Old Woman Faith.

Dorian yelled and he did what came naturally. He vanished, pressing himself back into a corner and willing himself to stay unseen, uncaught, no rage, not on him, not again.

"... Really you did get around before you came here."

And now Dorian is just muttering to himself as he throws some clothes and jewels and money into a bag, grabbing his staff and - ah.

"Compassion? Where are you?"

"I don't want to be hurt. Raised voices, stupid boy, show some gratitude, you useless monster, Tranquil don't say no."

His voice echoes softly between the wall and mirror as he moved about.

Something in Dorian's gut tightens at that - voices heard? Where had he heard such things? He whispered quietly into the darkness, "But that's not going to happen here. I am not going to hurt you, and you always have a choice with me."

It takes another moment for him to reappear, looking a little more uncertain than he did.

"Shouting makes me nervous."

"Ah. I see. So I should ... no longer shout?"

That might not be a bad idea anyways - he doesn't want to alert the entire house to their escape.

"I won't tell you what to do." But he would like that, yes.

"Should I go and find anything else to take with us? Anything that will want to come?"

Dorian paused for a moment, and then his eyes narrowed in thought. "Yes ... yes do that."

Why shouldn't the slaves be freed, if blood magic might be in their future? Why not free all of them together - they were all trapped. And Compassion should know which ones were false and which were not.

"I'll go unlock the secret entrance through the cellar. Meet me there."

He looked at Dorian, reading the anger and hurt and then nodding. "Cellar. We'll be there."

He vanished again, going for a wander. Most of the slaves couldn't see him, but he could suggest, whisper to them, nudge them to gather their meagre belongings and go to the cellar to meet with Dorian.

When he did turn up down there, it was with a random assortment of items who also didn't want to stay. A couple of books, an old medallion that had seen enough blood.

He reappeared at Dorian's elbow. "That's everyone and everything that wants to leave." Not a lot of slaves, most were content to stay, figuring they'd sooner be slaves of House Pavus than runaways.

He himself made his way down to the cellar, and now without his invisible friend he had to keep to the shadows so he wasn't seen by anyone else. He moved to get the door open, his eyes closed. He focused on twisting the lock open.

He looked over at the young man, spirit, then at the slaves. "We are all getting out of here. Every last one of us. So follow me, and keep close." He nodded his head, before he opened the cellar door, and led them out into the darkened alley behind his home. He bit his lip, holding his hand so he could listen, but no one was out there.

He nodded to Compassion, and led them up into the street, and back into the alley.

"I can't hide this many people," Compassion whispered as they moved. "I can hide me, you, maybe a child, but it's too much, too obvious. But I can scout, tell me what to look for, I can look."

He flickered ahead briefly and back to Dorian. "Who do we need to watch for?"

"Then go scout ahead. I'll keep a barrier around these fine people." Which he did, a barrier shimmering over all of them. "Look for city guard, or military. We need to get to the outskirts of town in the next hour."

Compassion vanished again, willing and running, checking and tracing a path and then reappearing back with Dorian.

"Follow. I'll tell you when to stop, when to go. I might need to lead guards away from you."

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PSL: Tevinter AU for Dorian.

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