Chapter Text
Green. Green, green – darker green. Lime green. Breach green, rift green, apple green, slime green.
“I already hate this decision,” Varric said, looking around.
The place was a study in monochrome. If a first-rate painter had stepped up to a canvas and said, “Make it green!” he might have stepped away from a canvas that looked roughly like this. Varric wrinkled his nose. This place smelled wrong, too. It even felt wrong. The stone beneath his feet felt empty. Hollow. Gross. Some of them even floated in the sky, apparently so hollow they were lighter than air. Until they fell, at which point they would probably squish him even shorter.
He looked up at Cassandra. The woman had been here before. The colors – or lack thereof – didn’t seem to faze her in the slightest. No surprise there. Nothing fazed the Seeker.
“You know what? I’m actually surprised I can even get in here.” That got her attention. She quirked a long, aristocratic eyebrow down at him. “A dwarf in the Fade? Come on. You’re not even a little impressed.”
She snorted, dismissing both the conversation and probably also him with that single sound. “The Fade is apparently a physical place. Which means even you can walk within it.”
“Even people like me, huh? Talking down about dwarves, huh?” He grinned at the startled look she sent him, the way her mouth actually opened to apologize. She caught his grin and scowled. “What? Don’t blame me for the pun. Blame…” His words stopped short. Right. He caught himself making puns because his best friend happened to have a horrible sense of humor. His best friend who was in a very, very bad place right now. (Not to mention how drowned in green his vision had to be after so much time in this shithole.)
Cassandra seemed to understand where his mind had gone, because she lifted her chin. “Come on,” she said. They’d made it through the rift just a few seconds after Lucky and Chuckles had flown the coop, but the rift had dwindled to nothing within that short period of time, nearly chopping Bianca in two. He looked back at the space they’d come through. Nothing but more Fade. No rift. Great. So much for Inquisition back-up. “We should get a lay of the land, at the very least.”
“Sure.” He pointed to their right. “Green rocks.” Left. “Green rocks with water falling from literally nowhere.” Straight ahead. “Green rocks. More water.”
She shot him a look. “If all you’re going to do is complain, Varric, then you could have stayed behind.”
“And refuse you the pleasure of my company?” He shook his head. “I would never.” She made a disgusted noise. He pointed just over her shoulder. “Hey, look.”
“Yes, Varric. It’s green. It’s the Fade. It tends to be green.”
“Even its demons, huh?”
Cassandra’s eyes widened. She turned. Before them approached a small army of what looked like spiders, all of them tall enough to bring imminent danger to his private bits. He readied Bianca as they crawled closer, tagged in by floating demons with enough legs to be a spider-person. That one, he recognized. He’d fought a couple of them when closing rifts with the Inquisitor. He smirked up at Cassandra as she drew out her sword and shield. “Bet you’re glad I’m here now.”
“Ugh. Shut up, Varric.”
“No promises.”
“Hawke!”
Fenris lurched forward. Cole grabbed his arm, skidding on the heels of his feet for nearly a foot before he managed to halt Fenris’ progress. Fenris turned on him with a roar. “Let go of me!”
For once, Cole’s hat did not get in the way of Fenris’ gaze. He caught the light blue of the boy’s eyes as they widened. “Teasing, taunting, torturing. Faking, feinting – a fib to fool and frighten. Feel the fear and you feed them.”
“Let go of me, spirit!” He yanked on the hands holding him. Hawke lay still. The puddle slowly trickled wider. It had just happened. If he went to Hawke’s body, he was certain it would still be warm.
The spirit boy grunted; as much as he tried, he was not strong enough to hold Fenris back. Fenris scraped them both forward. “Masks. They’re masks. It’s…” The boy thought for a moment. Fenris tugged closer. The way Hawke stared out into nothing told him he was already too late. Yet the need to be next to him, to try… “It a lie!” Cole said, his voice jubilant for a moment, as if he’d discovered a secret, before returning to the quiet, urgent tone from before. “It’s fake. It’s not real. You can feel it, can’t you?”
Feel it? He could feel all right. Pain. Anguish. Horror. Fenris turned on the spirit again, ready to rip it off of him if that was what it took.
Then he stopped. Because he could. He could feel something.
He looked away from Hawke, away from his lifeless body, and toward the feeling resonating within him. He didn’t have a word for it – just that it reminded him of when Faith had fed off of him moments ago, or when Hawke had desperately sipped from his power when they’d nearly died as they’d tried to escape Kirkwall all those years ago. Yet his lyrium wasn’t even activated? It wasn’t–
The connection. He’d been told to forge one, that it might lead them to Hawke. Was the magic still in effect? Could he use it to find his way to Hawke’s side?
He looked back. The image before him had no changed. Yet now, he could finally notice more than just Hawke’s blank, empty face. For all that Hawke looked like Hawke, he also looked… younger. His hair was slightly shorter, his face less wrinkled. And he was wearing, not his armor which had become his namesake, but his old robe. The dark navy, patterned with gold thread, wound its way down, covering Hawke’s legs in a way he hadn’t seen in years.
He stopped pulling against the spirit’s hold and stared.
A… a trick. He gasped in a breath, hardly able to believe it. He’d just fallen for a demon’s trick. Just because he hadn’t used his eyes.
He scuttled back as the earth twisted before him. Azzan’s body flickered; his arms stretched out, his skin withered and melted into green. His head twisted and turned, meshing into something grotesquely inhuman. The demon rose to its feet, its head tilted back and arms out as if inhaling some enticing scent.
Fenris snarled. This creature. This thing. Had dared show him one of his greatest fears. Just to prey upon him. To feast upon him. “That is going to be your last meal,” he said, his voice rumbling with his fury. The creature lowered its head. It had no mouth, only a strange, thick fold of skin covering its false face. Eyes peered from within two holes. He pulled out his sword.
“Good,” Cole said. He moved beside Fenris, no longer trying to hold him. The spirit held two daggers. “It shouldn’t be allowed to hurt anyone.” He disappeared from sight.
Fenris grunted. Well. If the spirit thought that, then it certainly wasn’t all bad.
The demon slipped into the ground, its body hunching as it disappeared in a ring of green. Without having to look, Fenris knew exactly where it was going to pop up. He waited a beat, then stabbed into the rock beneath his feet. On a scream, the demon stilled. Its body formed beneath him. He stepped on its chest and removed his sword.
“Any other to show me such things will receive the same reward,” he said. Cole reappeared, the spirit’s pale eyes blinking up at him.
“You’re scary.”
Fenris grinned. “Good.”
“I should have known.”
Solas cocked his head. Kios had turned at Solas’ explanation of how they’d arrived here, only to leap away as if seeing something. Now his gaze bore into Solas’, his lips pulled into a snarl. I should have known, he’d said, just before he’d grabbed the hilts of his daggers and unsheathed them, brandishing them and the foci within their pommels – toward him.
I should have known, he’d said. Solas’ brows lowered. He raised his hands. “Whatever you believe you are seeing,” he said slowly, “it is an illusion.”
He looked around. The path was filled with jagged rocks and twisting routes, each embedded with the remnants of what had been lost – stone staircases and shining statues. They led through the dips and curves of the Fade’s desolate surface, allowing for many places large enough for a demon to hide. The ground was pockmarked with rocks, as well, forming walls or blockades between one path and another. More than one demon could hide behind those.
“An illusion?” Kios’ voice dripped with disdain. The odd emotionality called Solas’ attention back to him. “Perhaps. But I don’t think so.” That upper lip, larger than the lower and scarred at its left corner, curled. Solas had never seen such an expression on Kios’ usually reserved face. Perhaps he was the one seeing the illusion. Kios began slowly circling him. Solas had to abandon his search for the demon in order to keep himself carefully stationed across from Kios. Slowly, he pulled out his staff and held it before him. “I knew you would attack me, after all.”
Solas’ mind stilled. His eyes widened. In that split second, he stumbled. “What?”
Kios attacked.
Kios was speed and maneuverability when he fought; he moved in close, just like lightning, moving in a jagged rhythm and closing the distance between them in a split second. Solas pulled his staff up to block an attack and found himself facing rock as Kios slid to his side. He was forced to use the powers of the Fade to grab Kios and throw him back. Kios tumbled as Solas’ magic let go of him, rolling through the dirt of the Fade. Solas moved to help him back up, only to watch Kios catch his feet, even as he skidded still. He balanced himself, slowly using the momentum of Solas’ throw to pull himself back into a standing position. The moment the momentum began to wear off, Kios bent his knees and charged back.
“You’re wrong,” Solas tried. He held up his staff. He could frozen Kios in place. He hesitated. I knew you would attack me. “I would never attack you, vhenan–”
“Don’t you dare!” Kios dodged back and forth once again, making up for his inability to focus his gaze by seeing where Solas stood in relation to everything else. Solas knew, after so many battles together, exactly how Kios moved. He knew every muscle, every micro-expression on that face. He knew, before he even realized he knew, that the way Kios ducked and tilted his shoulder that he was aiming for his neck. A quick, clean kill. Kios was serious. Solas’ eyes narrowed. He focused on his own foci, gathering the power of the winter’s chill to his staff. If this was how Kios was going to react, then he would stop his movement. They could speak while Kios was held up.
He threw his magic toward Kios just as he got near, just around the area Kios’ vision had the hardest trouble, nearly able to focus but not yet close enough to do so. Yet just as he did, Kios ducked low, rolled, and kicked out. One foot landed squarely on Solas’ knee. He fell with a gasp to the ground. Kios kneed him in the stomach and put one dagger against Solas’ throat. He stilled. “I knew,” Kios gasped, “because I know everything. Everything you’ve been trying to hide." Solas reeled back, bumping his head against the rocky ground. He sucked in a breath. His reaction had Kios laughing. It was a dry, empty sound. As empty as those rare eyes as they stared down at him. “I knew it. You’ve fooled no one but yourself.”
Solas’ eyes widened.
“Just run, idiot!”
Varric scowled. “If you hadn’t noticed, Seeker, my legs are a tiny bit shorter than yours!”
Somehow, even as they ran for their lives from a horde of Nightmare’s most persistent demons, Cassandra still had the breath left to make a disgusted noise at him. Good on her. Congrats on having so much stamina. Lucky, long-legged human.
The worst part about the Fade was how much everything looked the same. They’d started running the instant they realized that no amount of amazing crossbow and sword-swinging action was going to make those numbers disappear. According to Cassandra – right before she’d booked it for the dubious safety of more craggy ground – they’d likely been called over by the formation of the rift and had found themselves in the delicious presence of two people who may or may not be able to be possessed. He was a dwarf, so he held on to the flimsy hope that he couldn’t be taken over. (He also had no desire to test it.) The Seeker had gone through her weird ritual where she’d been saved from self-inflicted Tranquility by a spirit, so what could happen to her was also up in the air. But sticking around to learn had seemed unwise.
“There,” Cassandra said as a Fear demon nearly helped Varric to fly, “those sharp rocks. We’ll lead them in there. The open ground should get a little thinner in there.”
Great for her; she still had the breath to talk. Varric pushed himself a little faster, his legs pumping at twice the speed of Cassandra’s just to keep up. Heading to those giant spires certainly sounded like a good plan – for her, specifically. Bianca worked best out in the open. And the fear demons certainly knew how to pop in and out everywhere. But they were large and gangly, and if they all mindlessly tried to jump on Cassandra and Varric while inside that confined space, they would be easy pickings. So sure, he would go with it.
Anything to end the running.
The spires were encircled on their sides by water; the Fade still had those creepy rocks floating in the sky, looking a bit too much like the mystical ‘stone’ those Orzammar dwarves went on and on about. Water spilled from several of them, coming from who knew where and landing in giant lakes on either side of the rocks. If they entered, there would be no leaving save back where they came and straight ahead.
Well, if they ever found Hawke in this disaster of a place, the road back to here would be easy to follow, at least.
The thought of Hawke was what got him that last bit of energy to stumble up to the entrance to that rock-infested labyrinth. He managed to run around the first tinier spikes – still large enough to sail over his head, of course – before having to run a near quarter-circle around the first large one. The moment they entered the place, everything got darker. Whatever created a source of light in this hellscape, access to it was cut off in here.
“Perfect,” the Seeker said, and on a dime, she turned, sword and shield out before her. Varric managed two more steps, carefully situating himself behind her and her shield, before pulling Bianca off his back once more.
“I think I’m seeing spots,” he said.
“Come now, Varric. A little run and you’re already done in?”
He glared at her human legs. Little run indeed.
He hefted Bianca up and shot blindly out toward the demons. With how many there had been, the entrance to this place would already be crammed full. Sure enough, he heard the wailing of some angry creature. “This city dwarf is out of his natural habitat,” he said, and shot again, using the wailing to guide him. It stopped. “And quite frankly, the sooner I can return to my natural habitat, the better.”
The demons crawled through. As Varric had hoped, the frontliners were the fear demons, all of them jostling to get in first. He watched their long limbs tangle up together in glee. “For once, Varric,” Cassandra said, “you and I are in agreement.”
Well. That was one miracle. He guessed it was a good sign; they just needed a couple more to get Marshmallow and Lucky out alive.
Lucky had managed miracles before. Surely he could manage this one, too.
Kios pressed the dagger closer, close enough to nick Solas’ skin. Kios saw his fingers tremble, saw the dagger shiver in reaction. He couldn’t make himself push down that last inch. He couldn’t even face Solas’ gaze; his own slipped somewhere slightly above Solas’ head, to the uneven surface of the green-tinged rock beneath them. He couldn’t find enough air to breathe. He gritted his teeth. He could do this. He could. He’d just faced Solas’ betrayal. It was happening. Why couldn’t he fight back?
Kill him. Kill him. Stop hesitating!
Solas grinned. Kios froze. Froze. So many battles leading up to this point, and he froze.
A large fist formed by Solas’ side and punched Kios in the gut. Solas’ staff shoved Kios’ dagger away even as he flew back. He hit the ground shoulder blades first, flipping over his head and neck before landing on his chest on the ground. Pain soared up his neck and down his shoulders up into his head. He winced.
Fight back!
He forced himself to look up, only to freeze. A rock. The memory of the last time he’d had elves throwing rocks sprung to the forefront of his mind. The threw up his hands like the child he’d been then. With a snarl, he created a barrier. The rocks crashed against the lines of his magic, beat a pounding rhythm against the wall he’d barely erected in time. He cursed. In long range, Solas held all the advantages. He needed to get in close again.
Solas. Kios couldn’t see him well from this distance; he was an indistinct figure, blurred into a near double image of skin and cloth by the incessant movement of his eyes. But he knew that stance. Solas was preparing another attack. He readied himself, focused on his hearing and sense of touch, and moved.
He felt the change in the wind more than he was able to see anything; the sound of something whistling warned him that Solas’ weapons had gotten smaller, hoping to bypass his sight entirely. He saw the things as they approached; smaller rocks, even the glowing crystals, had been sacrificed to the assault. He barely managed to figure out which blurry figure was the correct one by paying attention to the wind.
Each step was slow, his movements spent mostly in bends and twists, his knees taking on the strain of quick, jerky steps and deep bends as he ducked and sometimes rolled, forced to cede ground as he came too close to getting boxed in by the rock walls surrounding them. He nearly bumped into one and had to launch himself away from it with a kick. He heard several of Solas’ projectiles crash against the surface of the rock and spill to the ground. Thankfully, his kick got him a few feet closer, and when he managed to get his feet back under him, he found himself close enough to make out Solas’ face despite his poor vision.
Solas hadn’t said anything since he’d last dared try to use that term of endearment on Kios. Kios hadn’t thought anything of it, save to accept that Solas was serious. That Kios would have to be, too. He hadn’t expected Solas to be grinning like that still. Even in the middle of the fight, Kios nearly started screaming. Started crying. He found himself faltering all over again, wanting to ask why. Wanting an answer, for once.
Unlike him, however, Solas did not hesitate. Solas slammed his staff in the ground, ready to attack Kios again – but now, finally, Kios’ own magic trumped Solas’. Solas’ staff fell into a hole Kios had covered up back when he’d first attacked Solas. The sudden dip left Solas stumbling, and instead of using his magic, Solas spent those scant seconds adjusting his stance and pulling up his staff. Kios raced forward.
He put fire to his daggers, let the foci generate the heat and curled the magic over the blades. His initial strike nearly landed, only for Solas’ barrier to form just in the nick of time. He tsked and went low, sweeping his leg out. Solas stumbled, not quite fast enough to avoid his strike. Instead of going for Solas’ skin again, he flashed the fire out beneath Solas’ feet. It roared out and exploded as Kios rolled away. He sent a second fireball to meet the first, then dodged in close again as the flames soared.
The flames were hot, hot enough to scorch his skin, bright enough to make his eyes tear up. He squinted the tears back. He wouldn’t show weakness. Even if the tears were from the light, he still wouldn’t give Solas the satisfaction. He moved in close, choosing speed over acrobatics – and found himself pulled back. He gritted his teeth, his heart slamming up to his throat. So even on this side, Solas could open up small rifts and pull his enemies toward it.
Without his speed, without his mobility, Solas could – and he did, moving away, taking away Kios’ advantage of close quarters fighting and forcing Kios’ poor vision to contend once more with distance. Solas raised his staff. Dragged back, there was nothing more Kios could do. Solas’ foci sparkled white-blue. Kios felt the cold before the ice even formed. He no longer moved toward Solas’ rift. He no longer moved at all. His entire body stood trapped in ice.
Slowly, without a word, Solas stepped closer. This, too, brought back memories – of them being in Kios’ room in Skyhold, Solas standing over him as he knelt, body nearly trembling in suppressed rage and anxiety, not yet understanding what it needed. He remembered Solas teaching him. Quietly, kindly guiding, when Kios had desperately needed to allow himself to be led. When Kios had needed to let himself trust and hand himself over to another.
Step by step, Solas came close enough for Kios to see him without impediment despite his wiggling eyes. On Solas’ face, he saw… nothing. No love. No regret. No shame. Nothing. That was how much Kios mattered – not even a spark of emotion. Pure apathy at the thought of his death. He’d been such a fool. He should have known. Gods, he should have known. It had been such a mistake to trust. He had known better.
Solas raised his staff. On the bottom was a blade – a blade Kios himself had commissioned to have put on there, all to help Solas focus his attacks better. From the beginning to the end, he had helped Solas kill him. He laughed. “Finish it,” he said. His voice scratched, wrung raw by the memories. “Do it. Finish what you started.”
He gripped his daggers tight. The foci on them were smaller than the one on Solas’ staff, but they still did their jobs. He often used them and manipulated light and air. His greatest defense against those who weren’t used to their senses of sight betraying them.
He did the same as he spoke, forming his magic into an image of himself, trapped in Solas’ ice. But this time, he also used them to heat the ice. His fire rose around it, magic fighting magic. It was slow; Solas’ magic was always of a precision that made Kios envious. It took him several seconds to get even his arms moving; thankfully, his words gave him the time he needed to break his arms free; he swung out just as Solas moved to strike. Solas jumped back.
Kios’ brows scrunched. Solas should not have been able to see his strike. What…
For an insane instant, he thought it might have been a demon. Perhaps he was merely sleeping, and all of this was a nightmare. Then Solas smiled. “As if I don’t know you,” he said, with the same voice Kios had heard whisper soft praise into his ear. His heart stuttered. And as he watched, Solas raised his hands to the green sky. Two of the giant rocks above them shattered into pieces. Solas’ magic ignited, so strongly Kios felt it raise goosebumps on his skin. The green sky lit with Solas’ flames. Kios felt the ice finally weaken around him. Just in time for the sky to rain down upon him.
“Fenedhis,” he breathed, and ran.
The sky tore apart before him; all he saw in his poor vision was fire; it burned so bright the headache just behind his eyes warped into a beast that clawed at every part of his skull. He dodged away from the first slam of rock upon the ground. The heat singed the hairs on his arms. The flames crackled like thunder. Rock after rock chased him across the jagged field, crashing so heavily to the ground that he nearly lost his balance over and over again. He skittered against a wall, pushed into it by the shaking ground. He threw out another barrier and covered his face. A boulder slammed against the barrier, and just like that, the magic could not sustain itself. Fire licked at his arms and legs. He cursed.
Solas was truly trying to kill him.
The ground shook. He bent low, his knees and thighs beginning to burn under the strain, matching the heat licking against his skin and heating his leather armor. He had to turn his face away from the craggy field around him, the fire too bright for him to handle. The pain in his skull reached a fever pitch. He forced himself to keep moving, to slide away from the rocky wall and move to more open territory. His steps were slower than before, sluggish from pain and vertigo. He prepared himself for the worst just as the rocks finally stopped pummeling the earth. He took in a shaky breath, listened to the Beyond slowly settle once more, and looked around.
If he’d thought the ground jagged before, it was nothing compared to now. Rubble and debris cast the ground into hazardous terrain. Since Solas needn’t move too much, it would only prove an impediment to him. He stumbled out toward the flattest terrain, only to stop. He looked around again.
He couldn’t see Solas.
There were countless places for him to hide. Countless ways in which he could use the distance he’d almost certainly gained during his assault to hurt Kios. Kios would have to give up on getting close and try his best at ranged attacks.
Who was he kidding? He couldn’t see distance properly. He would never win.
He took a defensive position against one long rock, just up a flight of shining gold steps and beside what it had crushed – an old statue of what looked to be a griffon. He tensed, tilting his head slightly. Nothing. His hands gripped the hilts of his daggers hard enough to hurt his palms. “Where are you?!” he shouted. His chest heaved as he struggled to calm himself long enough to listen. His hands shook. Countless seconds passed. “Just fight me!” he tried again, but of course, nothing he said could sway Solas from his logic. He would attack when it suited him. When he had the distinct advantage. Until then, it only benefited him to toy with Kios.
He spent several seconds forcing himself to calm. He tip-toed around the edge of his rock, checking more to see if Solas would strike than anything else; any attack would at least show him which direction Solas had chosen to hide himself in. Of course, nothing came.
Was this fun for Solas? The two of them here, where Solas was strongest, completely alone? Kios, without his allies, without his garrison and fortress, trapped helpessly waiting for Solas’ next choice – trapped, he realized, like he’d been when they’d been together in his bedroom, Solas giving him orders and Kios obeying. That same feeling came over him here – helpless, lost. Only now, Solas did not catch him. Solas did not shore him up and show him what to do. Instead the one Kios had let control him was hurting him. His lips quivered. “Ir enfenim,” he whispered, speaking the words he’d chosen when Solas had asked him to choose something to say to make him stop. His hand twitched at the sound of his own voice; the blade of his dagger scraped against the rock, making him jump.
This was what Solas wanted. He wanted Kios paranoid, or tired, or unprepared. He wanted Kios to become his own enemy. To do the work for him.
Solas did not stop. He did not call out his usual answer. The fear did not cease. Kios bit his lip until he tasted the metallic tang of blood. This was reality. Everything they’d been had come down to this.
He had to do this. This was the end.
This was their fall.