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Loghain sat at a desk writing out his report for Weisshaupt. It would be best to have everything written down before he set out for the distant, ancient fortress. A precaution, as minds were wont to misremember, though even at his age Loghain’s mind remained blessedly sharp. His body had not been as kind. Each day he awoke with new and worsening pains, swollen fingers and stiff knees, but he pushed on as he always had, as he would continue to do until the Maker stopped playing this game with him.
For now he was happy to be somewhere secure and comfortable, courtesy of the Inquisitor, though there was still much to do. Warden Blackwall, who Loghain knew was neither Blackwall nor even a Warden, had disappeared after the return from Adamant. The man was a credit to his name, no matter who he might truly be. As the last Senior Warden in the south, however, Loghain’s own concerns were focused on preparing his people for transfer to the Inquisitor’s command.
His attention drifted, gaze alighting on the chalice on the nearby table. The Inquisitor had judged a passel of prisoners recently, all of whom were related to the Order. The magister was remanded to the Warden’s custody and Loghain took particular pleasure in beheading him, though he knew it was a tad hypocritical of him. Ser Ruth was doing community service in the settlement below Skyhold, something Loghain hoped would counteract her self-flagellation. There was just one more matter to attend before his departure: that of the new recruit, Gregory Dedrick.
The memory of Crestwood came back to him, the town nestled in a valley in West Hill. Loghain was sorry he hadn’t been able to stop and help, forced to watch from a distance as the villagers held off undead while he hid from his fellow Wardens. With the corpses appearing from a lake harboring a Fade rift and bandits holding Caer Bronach, Loghain had cursed Bann Franderel for ignoring the needs of his people. The pompous cad certainly hadn’t been too busy to demand ownership of the keep back after the Inquisition did his job for him.
It was well past midnight when there came a knock at the door. The Joining had to be performed in the dark, when the fortress was at rest, to better conceal the Wardens' activities. They had precious few things to call their own these days and it was paramount that this ritual remain one of them.
Dedrick was barely younger than himself, though his hair was entirely grey where Loghain’s was jet black. He was a few inches shorter, his thin frame -obviously unused to weapons or battle- adorned with a grey tunic and brown belt. There was no confidence in the way he held himself, a man weighed down with the regret of a decision made long ago.
“You must be Dedrick,” said Loghain.
Dedrick paled and bowed his head. "I...yes, Commander. Gregory Dedrick."
"Loghain Mac Tir, and ‘Ser’ will suffice."
He stepped aside and beckoned Dedrick in, gesturing to his now empty seat. The sound of the door locking made the former mayor stare anxiously at him.
“We can’t have someone walking in on Warden business,” said Loghain. He walked over to the table that held the chalice, a cloth covering it.
Once made the potion never spoiled, giving Loghain the opportunity to prepare it beforehand. Now though he grabbed a bottle of Ferelden ale and two glasses, Dedrick’s gaze on him as he filled the glasses and handed one off. He felt as if he was peering into a mirror, the striking Fereldan face lined with the memories of years gone by, blue eyes dull with fatigue.
“Drink,” urged Loghain, sitting on the edge of the nearby bed. “We will begin in due time. Though you look like you have a question...or several, perhaps.”
Dedrick glanced away. “I was only wondering...I thought the Hero of Ferelden would be here.”
“Certainly not.” He amended his answer at the other man’s surprise, “She would never have allowed Clarel to fall for that magister’s ploy. Indeed, she’d have quelled the panic that overtook the Wardens and we wouldn’t be in our current predicament.”
“Yes, of course,” said Dedrick. His glass was half-empty already, fingers fidgeting along the glass designs. “She's a shining example for us all. To be considered for a place in the same Order...I don’t deserve the honor.”
“You’re mistaken,” replied Loghain, setting aside his ale. “This isn’t an honor. It’s a duty, one that very few choose for themselves, and is often a punishment or reprieve. That’s not to say honor can’t be found within it.”
Dedrick gave him a curious look. “Have you?”
Loghain gave his question honest thought. After Weisshaupt sent him to Makerdamned Orlais, he’d spent a few years doing grunt work, hardly better than a glorified laborer. The Wardens hated him, for good reason, and he took his punishment silently. Then Clarel was promoted when Commander Fontaine departed to her Calling and Loghain was allowed to become a true Warden.
He proved his value to them as a trainer, tactician, and team leader. There were significantly fewer deaths on his missions and he was always fair to those under his command. It ultimately meant nothing when Erimond came along, filling Clarel’s head with lies to fuel the fear they all felt hearing the Calling. Loghain protested and as quickly as before he was branded a traitor and his allies turned against him.
Now here he sat, the last living Senior Warden in the South, his dedication to the Wardens proven to be unwavering. The others looked at him differently, even the few remaining Fereldans -damn Clarel’s rituals and her insistence on equality over equity- deferring to him without fuss. Had he found honor here?
“I like to think so,” said Loghain.
There was a moment's silence as Dedrick finished his drink. Setting aside the glass, he asked quietly, "Do you regret it?"
Loghain met his eyes again, ready to see the accusation there he'd become so used to. He’d spoken to very few people about the Blight, refused to when the choice was his. When one's mistakes and wrong-doings were public everyone expected an apology, even when they weren’t owed one.
There was only an honest question here, a desire for connection. Two disgraced men who’d done what they believed was necessary to save those that could be. For once, the former Teryn was glad to answer.
"Every day," said Loghain. "You ask yourself constantly where everything went wrong, what you could have done differently. It's like a song at the back of your mind." And it never goes away.
"I couldn't save them all. There were so many who were sick." Dedrick was clearly trying to convince himself as much, if not more, than Loghain. "If I hadn't...everyone wasn't going to survive."
“You don’t have to explain yourself to me. They will never thank you and may very well hate you, but they have their lives, their futures. Many more can't say that. In Blights past, we’ve had to destroy entire towns and cities or abandon them to the darkspawn. Your decision is exactly what makes a Grey Warden."
Clearly Dedrick didn’t know how to feel about these reassurances coming from a man like him. He didn’t blame him. Hadn’t he stood in the Landsmeet all those years ago and preached the importance of necessary evils and the costs of war, even at the expense of others’ freedom? This, however, wasn’t a civil war and these people couldn’t ignore the threats at their backs. Their fight was forever, their enemy untiring and all-consuming, and Loghain found purpose in that. He was a man born of conflict, one who operated best when there was a line, clearly drawn; there was nothing clearer than the need to destroy darkspawn.
"We must be prepared," Loghain continued, "to do anything in the face of total annihilation, so that we may fight another day. That includes the Joining."
It was time. He stood, bidding Dedrick to do the same, and walked back over to the chalice.
“I am curious,” said Dedrick, “what the Joining is. No one would tell me.”
“No, they wouldn’t.” Loghain uncovered the chalice and picked it up. He remembered his own Joining, administered by Riordan, vividly recalling the foul taste of it, the burning sensation as it went down his throat and into his stomach, and the whispers right as he blacked out. There was also the archdemon, but Dedrick wouldn't have to suffer that vision. “It’s the Warden’s most closely guarded secret, the source of our power. Wardens aren’t just specially trained soldiers. We’re made by drinking the blood of darkspawn.”
Dedrick’s face lost all color. “Darksp- I...s-surely not…”
“Every one of us has,” said Loghain. “From Commander Surana to King Alistair, back to the first Wardens. We become immune to the Taint and able to sense it in the darkspawn. That’s how we fight them so effectively."
There was a long pause, Dedrick alternating between his face, searching for a lie or jest, to the warm viscous liquid awaiting him. “I…see. If that’s what I must do then so be it.”
Loghain nodded, glad that he wouldn’t need to put a knife in the man’s kidney if he tried to escape. “As tradition dictates, I’ll recite our oath:
“Join us, brothers and sisters. Join us in the shadows where we stand vigilant. Join us as we carry the duty that can not be forsworn. And should you perish, know that your sacrifice will not be forgotten. And that one day we shall join you.”
He held the chalice out to Dedrick, who took it with shaking hands. The air seemed suddenly heavy, pressing in as the chalice met the man’s lips. Dedrick drank his fill, his nose wrinkling as the taste filled his senses. He coughed and shook his head slightly. Perhaps…?
Dedrick coughed again and again, doubling over as he grasped at his throat. The coughs quickly became gagging and Loghain felt that familiar dread settle in his stomach, a coldness settling around it like a threadbare blanket.
He made to step back when Dedrick’s hand shot out, clutching at his arm with raw desperation. Instinctively, Loghain gripped his arm back and held fast as he began to vomit, the elixir and his final dinner spilling over their boots. Dedrick clung to him as if his life depended on it, as if the comfort of another person might abate the vomiting and fear and…
“I’m sorry, brother,” said Loghain right before Dedrick slumped lifelessly to the ground. Blue eyes, so like his own, stared as a lake on a windless night, black veins of Blight standing out like a testament in the sclera. A single tear dripped into the blood and sick he’d fallen into. If Loghain didn’t know better, he’d think the pain in his chest was his heart breaking. But that couldn’t be.
He’d left his heart in Ferelden a long time ago.
The Wardens stationed outside for just this reason were called in. They worked swiftly wrapping the body and spirited Dedrick away to prepare for the burning. A bucket and rags sat beside the door and Loghain pulled it in quickly, lest someone wander past and glance inside. The stones were harsh against his knees, the cleaning solution and rags as unforgiving against his hands as anything had been or would ever be again.
The first time Loghain saw a failed Joining, he’d gone back and forth on whether he felt lucky that he’d escaped such a fate or angry that not even the Blight would end him. After being spared at the Landsmeet, surviving the Joining, being convinced to make a child with the bog witch to escape the Archdemon’s curse, and now walking away from certain death again in exchange for a man half his age, Loghain felt lost, despondent. He wasn’t the sort of man to lie about and wait for the end but hadn’t planned on becoming the ghost of the man he’d once been: unwelcome in the only home he’d ever known, ever wanted to know, trudging through an empty existence until age or darkspawn took him.
It wasn’t fair. But neither was it fair for his mother, violated and murdered by a chevalier, for his father killed by Orlesians protecting their bandit camp, for Rowan to waste away at a young age, for Celia, not even fifty and hardier than any woman he’d ever known, or for Maric… wherever he lay. It wasn’t fair to Cailan and the army at Ostagar, to the lives destroyed by a civil war that need not have happened had he listened to Anora, nor to the elves left to die of Blight sickness in the Alienage and sold into enslavement.
“You destroy everything you touch.”
“Nothing I haven’t said to myself,” Loghain reiterated, though the Nightmare was far away now. Physically. Nightmares were the one thing the old soldier had when all else faded away. He wondered if the Maker would forgive him at the end or if the Nightmare would be there, laughing and wearing the face of his mother’s killer.
There was a knock at the door. It was time to burn Dedrick’s pyre. He strode to his desk, wiping his hands carelessly on his trousers. Pushing aside an unfinished letter to Anora, he made an addendum to his report to Weisshaupt:
Gregory Dedrick
Status: Recruited
Joining: 27 Firstfall 9:41.
Perished.