Many thanks to @BeaconHill for betareading.
Part 2: The Light of Sun and Star and Moon
Durin made camp in a hollow just a few dozen paces from the still water of Mirrormere. He had no bedroll, no blanket, no tent, and no food. This last he corrected while the sun still shone.
Using his dagger as a whittler's knife, he carved himself a crude spear. Then he walked along the stream, moving slowly and quietly until he encountered a snofleur drinking from the brook.
He carefully approached, staying low among the underbrush. When he judged himself to be near enough, he raised his makeshift javelin and threw it. It struck true. The snofleur squealed, stumbled, and fell, struggling weakly as it bled red onto the grass.
Durin approached, drawing his dagger. He quickly slit its throat before hefting it over his shoulders.
He brought it back to his makeshift camp and quickly found a shard of flint among the detritus of the mountain. He used this to kindle a small campfire, over which he raised a spit. Between careful tending to the burgeoning fire, Durin butchered the snofleur. It was a shame he had no salt—the meat would no longer be fit to eat in the morning if he did not cook it now, and even if he did it would not last more than a day or two. It was wasteful, but he had few options at this point.
It was Durin's first time eating snofleur—he had heard of the animal, seen it illustrated in imported books describing Orlesian cuisine, but never had it made its way onto the Aeducan table. And if the snofleur had existed in Middle-Earth, he had never seen nor heard of it.
As he sliced strips of meat with his dagger, using his buckler as a plate, he tried to sort through his memories. How long had it been? His last life had been as King in Khazad-dûm beneath the Misty Mountains. How had so much changed? How long had he been asleep?
And why was his resurrection so different, this time? In his previous returns, Durin had been sent back into the same body, granted new youth and new vitality and bidden to rise from his enchanted tomb to lead his people once more. Why had he been born afresh into a newly-made dwarrow's body, this time?
Could it be that his original body had been lost? He had been slain by one of the ancient Balrogs from the War of Wrath—had the monster destroyed his body so completely that he could not be returned to it?
Not for the first time, Durin wished he could remember what passed between his incarnations. He knew that in those intervening times he returned to Mahal's hall and dwelt there with the others of his kin, and with his six brothers. But in one of his very few conversations with Mahal while he yet lived, the Smith explained that he would never remember these in-between times when he returned to Middle-Earth.
For the Undying Lands are now sundered from Middle-Earth forever, Mahal had said, sorrow and shame in his voice,
and even word of them may not be brought back to those who yet remain here, not even by you.
But he was no longer
in Middle-Earth, was he? Thedas bore no resemblance to the lands he had once known. It was possible that they had shifted, whether due to another great war or calamity like the destruction of Beleriand or the sinking of Númenor, or due to natural drift over times so vast Durin could scarcely visualize them. He had once theorized that the minute shifts caused by earthquakes and eruptions might, over thousands of millennia, change the very shape of the world. Had it truly been so long since he had last been here?
But even that could not explain some of the other differences between the Thedas he had spent the past decades learning about and the Middle-Earth he had been acquainted with for millennia. What had happened to the Elves? The modern Dalish taught that they had once been immortal, but the elvhenan of their legends bore little resemblance to the great kingdoms of Nargothrond and Doriath, or even to the diminished realms of Lothlórien, Imladris, and the Greenwood.
It was possible that the passage of time had weathered these stories as it had weathered the languages of Middle-Earth's peoples. The dwarves had even forgotten khuzdul, the language Mahal had given them at the dawn of days. Could Arlathan be a bastardized name by which the Dalish remembered Gondolin or Rivendell?
But that still failed to explain much. Even in the days of Durin's sixth life, the Elves had begun their slow return over the Western seas to the Undying Lands. Why, then, were so many elves still here? And how had they lost the immortality with which Ilúvatar had graced His Firstborn people?
And there were more questions, questions whose answers he could not even begin to guess. Whence had come the qunari? How had dragons returned to the world a mere thirty years ago? What was the Blight, and why had it only apparently surfaced long after the days of Durin's previous lives?
He slept fitfully that night, curled in a crevasse on the edge of the valley as these questions circled ceaselessly in his mind.
-x-x-x-
Durin spent the next day prospecting.
He had ignored it the day before, but there was a singing in the rock. His ears could not hear it, but it made his heart leap. Something in the mountains was calling to him.
Hear us, O King, it seemed to be crying.
Hear us and reclaim us, for we have been forgotten!
Whatever providence had led the Darkspawn to ignore him as he escaped the Deep Roads seemed to have passed. When he entered the mine that had borne him from the realms beneath the mountains, he was soon accosted by the creatures, screeching and gnashing their teeth. They bore some passing resemblance to orcs or goblins, but only very vaguely. Like those accursed peoples, the darkspawn were twisted mockeries of other folk. But whatever had created these was not the same force or process that had created the old enemies of Dwarves and Elves.
He cut his way through a small patrol, reveling in the youthful strength of this body and the way he could apply centuries of training to it. He soon found for himself a pickaxe. Then he made his way to a rock face near to one of the sources of the song he could hear inside the mountain's roots, and began to chip away at the stone.
It came away easily, and soon he exposed a vein of brilliant silver-white ore. The song rose up in jubilation, then fell into a satisfied silence as he looked on in wonder.
Durin had found mithril, here in the Frostbacks around Orzammar. The modern dwarves seemed to have lost the wondrous metal entirely, though they still had vague myths which referenced it, and now he alone could find and mine it.
Slowly, a plan began to take shape. He still lacked much of what he would need, but a small stock of mithril would be able to buy him food and equipment enough to begin a mercantile venture. Perhaps he could find Gorim in Denerim? From there… well, he wasn't sure where he would go from there. His final goal would be a return to Orzammar, to the throne of his people who needed him. But he needed to find a way first to have his exile reversed, and while mithril would be instrumental in achieving that goal, he wasn't yet sure how to leverage it.
Still, no matter what happened, he would need it. He raised his pick and began to mine.
-x-x-x-
It took Durin nearly three months before he was able to make it to the nearest major hub of trade—which happened to be the gates of Orzammar itself. He had managed to acquire supplies in a Fereldan village near where he had awoken, and used their forges to produce for them equipment of iron and steel in payment. He was pleasantly surprised to find that, even though his new body had never worked a day in a forge, his old skills had not been forgotten. The villagers had been awed by his craftsmanship, even when all he was making for them were nails, ploughs, and shovels. They had even believed him when he told them that his work would last long enough to be passed down to their grandchildren, even if they were used every day. Their awe had been encouraging, in a way—it had lifted his flagging spirits, reminded him that his people had once been the envy of the world for their artisanry, and pushed him to return so that he might make them so again.
On his way to Orzammar, Durin gradually acquired some of the goods he would need to begin his work. Mules he had bought in another village in exchange for a week's work as a smith. A cart he had bought in a hamlet in the Frostback foothills. But it was only here, where trade was more common, that he was finally able to claim the last few items he needed to begin his journey to Denerim.
He had just finished packing his goods into barrels and loading them onto his cart, and was preparing to bed down for a night before beginning his journey in the morning, when he was forced to change his plans completely.
Durin looked up at the sound of voices, loud in the unhappy hush of the encampment. A group of travelers was crossing the stone bridge towards the great gate of Orzammar. His eyes widened as he took them in. Several humans, an elf, a qunari, and—unmistakably—a
golem.
His eyes followed them as they approached one of the groups huddled beneath a drooping cloth tent. He watched them challenge another man over something or other. He saw his cronies attack them and die ignominiously.
He stood up slowly and began his approach. One of the humans, a woman with hair red as fire and a longbow in her hand, glanced his way, then nudged their leader, a woman in heavy plate. She turned and regarded him. He knew who she was.
"You're the wandering Wardens," he observed. "The group that survived the battle at Ostagar."
"That we are," said the woman. Her voice was quiet, low for a woman's—though still higher than most dwarrowdams'—and somehow resonant. This was a woman accustomed to command. "Who might you be?"
"I am Prince Durin Aeducan," he said. "And I believe we can help one another."
"A dwarf prince on the surface?" The redhead asked, raising an eyebrow. "Surely you would have had to surrender your titles to come here, unless Orzammar's traditions have changed?"
Durin shrugged. "Technically, yes," he said. "Practically, however… well. It's a long story."
"We have time," said the leader, pulling off her helm and shaking out her shoulder-length brown hair. There was a long scar across her cheek, still angry red for its recent acquisition.
"Very well," Durin said. "Come, I have food. Sit by my fire, and we will talk."
They followed him back to his makeshift camp. He offered them what he had—he'd managed to cobble together bread based on a recipe he had once learned from traveling Men passing through Khazad-dûm, which they had called cram, and when served alongside the cheese and salted meat he'd bought, it was a surprisingly pleasant meal.
As they ate, he told them his story. "I was born a little under a century ago, in the Royal Palace of Orzammar, the second son of King Endrin Aeducan—may the Stone welcome him home."
"King Endrin is dead?" the other armored human, a young man with short blond hair, interrupted with a grimace.
Durin nodded sadly. He'd heard as much when he finally made his way back around the valleys and up here to the gate. By the time he arrived, his father had already passed. Grief, it was said. Durin believed it, but that didn't mitigate Bhelen's responsibility.
"That will make it difficult for the dwarves to respect the Wardens' treaty," said a woman in ragged, dark robes which did little to shelter her from the cold. Even so, she seemed unaffected, not leaning into his campfire for warmth.
"Indeed," Durin agreed. "Orzammar's gate is shut until such time as the Assembly elects a new King, although as Wardens you may be able to enter. Rumor has trickled up that the two contenders are Prince Bhelen Aeducan, my younger brother and the only remaining son to my late father, and Lord Pyral Harrowmont, my father's friend and closest confidante. I suspect it will be a few weeks, perhaps a month, before Bhelen finds a way to remove Lord Harrowmont as an obstacle."
"Assassination?" asked the only elf in the group in an Antivan accent.
"If he can manage it," said Durin. "Otherwise, simple bribery and blackmail of enough of the deshyrs to have him elected over Lord Harrowmont's protests. He's already pulled both tricks at least once in the past season alone."
"Sounds like a story," murmured the leader. "Go on, please."
So Durin did. "My father had two other children—the elder, Trian, was the heir until his recent, untimely death. The youngest, Bhelen, was always given to jealousy of his position—a wound which Trian was more than happy to let fester, with his posturing and arrogance." Durin sighed, shaking his head. "I should not speak ill of the dead. Trian was skilled, intelligent, and capable, but he was prone to pride, and it was that pride, I suspect, which caused his death.
"For most of my life, I was prone to…
daydreaming. I gained a reputation for slowness of wit. It was not accurate, but it is difficult to shake such rumors once they have taken hold. I had assumed that this reputation, and the accompanying status I gained as an outcast, would disqualify me from ever aspiring to high office. As it turned out, the exact reverse was true. It seems that there were ambitious deshyrs who might have sought to plant me upon the throne in the hopes of having a king who would be easily controlled. Given that Trian's blustering pride made him a dangerous choice, especially as the Shaperate believed a Blight might be approaching, I decided to use this opportunity. I resolved to court the Assembly in secret, allowing Trian to think he remained heir, and hopefully taking his place upon our father's death."
"Conniving of you," observed the Wardens' leader, her tone neutral.
"Not nearly conniving enough, as it turns out." Durin grimaced. "Bhelen had his own plans. On the night I received my first military commission as a commander of Orzammar's armies, Bhelen tried to convince me that Trian was jealous of my potential usurpation and intended to have me killed. I was unwilling to act first, so Bhelen took matters into his own hands.
"The next day, a great battle was fought against the darkspawn. I was sent with a small force into a long-lost thaig to retrieve the shield of the Paragon Aeducan himself. While I was there, Trian was lured into my path and murdered. I happened upon his body mere minutes before my father, led by Bhelen, happened upon us. I expect you can guess what happened next."
"Bhelen framed you for Trian's death," the blond man guessed.
Durin nodded. "He knew, however, that I would never simply give up and let him seize power. I was told that he pushed a vote to have me exiled immediately, without even the opportunity to defend myself before the Assembly. In defiance of all tradition, the vote passed—I suspect he bribed a large portion of the deshyrs, and blackmailed many more. I was sentenced to die in the Deep Roads that very day."
"Yet here you are," murmured an older woman—fifties or sixties, if he remembered how humans aged. "You must have escaped."
"In a manner of speaking," Durin said. "I
was sent into the Deep Roads, but I found my way out through a lost tunnel and reached the surface."
"You must have fought through hundreds of darkspawn to get there," observed the leader, though her tone gave nothing away of how likely she thought that was.
"You would be surprised," said Durin truthfully. "I had no light, navigated only by Stone sense, and somehow managed to slip past them mostly unnoticed. I only fought them once I had reached the surface."
"Impossible," muttered the blond man. "The Deep Roads are said to be
crawling with darkspawn."
"They were when I fought them to reach Paragon Aeducan's shield," said Durin. "I don't have any explanation for you, I'm afraid, save what I have said." Privately, he suspected that either Mahal or the one the Elves called Ilúvatar had been with him, down in the dark. But he didn't know.
"Understood," said the leader. "Go on."
Durin shrugged. "That's most of the tale. I scavenged enough ores and supplies from the upper Deep Roads to trade for food when I next reached a settlement, then made my way back up here to find Orzammar's gates already closed, and my father already dead."
"And now you want our help to reclaim your throne," said the woman in plate.
"I want your help to take Orzammar away from my dear brother," Durin corrected. "While I do not think Lord Harrowmont will make an excellent King, he will at least do little harm. Feel free to plant him on the throne if you do not trust me. I can still help you, even if you do not champion me."
"Why would you?" asked the blond man.
"In case you had somehow missed it," Durin said sardonically, "there's a Blight on. I expect the Legion of the Dead has been pressed back almost to Orzammar's very gates by now. Anything I can do to protect my city, and all of Thedas, I will do."
"Refreshing," murmured the leader. Then she nodded to herself, as if coming to a decision. "I am Elissa Cousland," she said, "one of the last two Grey Wardens in Ferelden, so far as any of us know. My companions are Warden Alistair, the mages Morrigan and Wynne, Zevran Aranai, the lay Sister Leliana, Sten of the Beresaad, and Shale."
Shale? Durin wondered, looking at the golem. He was suddenly startled when he noticed the intelligence in its—
their? Her?—gaze. He had always assumed golems were little more than advanced war-machines, but this creature was intelligent. How could that be? The dwarves had created golems. Even
Mahal could not create independent life.
The leader—Elissa—cleared her throat. Durin blinked, shaking off his thoughts, and looked back at her. "Apologies. Prince Durin Aeducan," he said.
Durin the Deathless, Seventh of His Name. "At your service."
-x-x-x-
There was a group of humans already arguing with the two dwarves at the gate when they entered the antechamber. Something about their king demanding Orzammar's allegiance? He suspected these were either uneducated charlatans or patsies sent to die, and resolved to pay them no mind.
The two guards seemed to feel the same way, turning towards his group and to Elissa at its head. They recognized him, of course—he might have been able to slip by unrecognized among servant-caste or casteless, or even among some of the middle castes, but these were Warrior Caste.
"Prince D—," one began, blinking rather rapidly, before the other elbowed him in the gut.
"Exile," the second growled. "You were to have died honorably in the Deep Roads. Are you so cowardly as to have fled?"
Durin considered the two for a moment. Before he could speak, Elissa moved slightly so that she was between him and the guards. "Prince Durin is with me," she said, holding out a scroll. "I am Warden Elissa Cousland, come to ask the Assembly to uphold Orzammar's ancient treaty in the face of the Fifth Blight."
Durin suddenly remembered where he had heard the name
Cousland. It was a Fereldan noble house. It made sense for a minor member to have been sent to the Wardens… except that Elissa did not hold herself like a
minor noble.
The leader of the other group of humans spluttered indignantly. "The Grey Wardens are traitors!" he exclaimed. "They led King Cailan to his death! They are sworn enemies of King Loghain."
"This is the royal seal," observed the second dwarven guard, who had taken the scroll from Elissa. He handed it back. "Only the Assembly, in the absence of a sitting King, has the authority to respond. You may pass, Warden." He looked grimly at Durin. "If you choose to bring this exile with you, it is within your right as a Warden—but know that his presence will win you few friends."
"I will keep it in mind," said Elissa.
"You're letting in a traitor and her pet exile!?" exclaimed the man. Durin had decided that, whatever else he was, he was clearly an idiot. "In the name of the King I demand you execute—"
"Please," Elissa said, her voice quiet and edged with ice. "Please, finish that sentence. I am begging you."
The man blinked at her. All the blood fled from his face. "I…" he swallowed, taking a step back, then seemed to rally. "You—you'll hear of this! King Loghain will—"
"Will what?" Elissa asked. Durin looked up at her and saw that her hand had gone to the hilt of the greatsword on her back.
The man was literally shaking as he turned away. "Enough! Come, men! We will report this to the King!" With that, at a pace that was barely shy of sprinting, he and his entourage fled.
Elissa took a deep breath and pulled her hand off her sword. Her other fist unclenched as she turned back to the gatekeepers. "Apologies," she said. "We surfacers are in the middle of our own succession crisis, as you may have heard—but as Grey Wardens, that is not our concern."
The gatekeeper shrugged. "So long as you don't bring further unrest into Orzammar, your surface issues are your own." He looked Durin up and down. "See that you
don't bring further unrest."
Durin just looked at him. "We will do our best," he lied.
-x-x-x-
"The guards did make a good point, Warden," Morrigan said in her low, silken voice as they descended into the mountain. "The dwarves are an exceedingly traditional people. Bringing an exile into their midst, mere months after his sentencing, is not the most diplomatic thing we could do."
"It'll win us enemies among Bhelen's supporters," Elissa said, eyes forward, "but friends among his enemies. I hope."
"And I do intend to provide any aid I can in my own right," said Durin, glancing at Morrigan. "I assure you, I'm not so accustomed to privilege that I can't do good work."
"What sort of work, I wonder?" Morrigan mused, looking him up and down with those liquid gold eyes. "You must be able to fight, if the accusation that you murdered your brother was believable, but we can all fight. Can you provide anything more specific? With your nobility stripped from you, what exactly can you offer?"
Durin met her eyes. "I know more about mining and smithing than anyone alive," he said, and it was no exaggeration. He knew exactly what Orzammar was capable of, and it paled in comparison to the glories of Khazad-dûm at its height. "Give me a day in the Deep Roads and I will find you veins of gold, silver, adamantine and silverite to make all of you wealthier than any king on the surface. Give me a week down there, and another in a smithy, and I will have arms and armor for each of you, lighter than cloth robes and harder than dragonbone. Give me lyrium, and I can weave magic into each piece to make it a marvel the like of which has not been seen in centuries."
"Bold claims indeed," said Zevran. He sounded amused, but also intrigued. "I wonder if you can back them up."
"Test me in any way you like," Durin challenged. "I am confident in my skills."
They reached the grand gate at the base of the steps. The party's escort pushed the metal doors open with a grinding sound.
"—the man who should be King!" The shout greeted them as they stepped through the gate, followed by the unmistakable sound of a blade sinking through armor into flesh. Durin tensed, pushing past Elissa to see…
His eyes met Bhelen's across the grand square. Bhelen went white as a sheet. Between them, Vartag Gavorn tugged his axe out of the chest of a fallen dwarrow in the colors of Clan Harrowmont. He turned back to Bhelen, then followed his gaze.
Durin found his fists were clenched hard enough that his nails were digging into his palms. He forced himself to relax as he met the murderer's gaze.
I can't do anything for that poor Khuzd, he told himself,
but by keeping silent now I may prevent a riot breaking out.
The killer scoffed, turning back to Bhelen, who seemed to shake himself out of whatever fit seeing Durin had put him in and turned to return to the Diamond Quarter as fast as he could without making it obvious that he was fleeing. The other group was more obvious, scattering away in the face of a man willing to kill in the very center of Orzammar.
Durin ignored the guard greeting Elissa and her crew. He walked past, approaching the fallen dwarrow, lying in a spreading pool of his own blood upon the flagstones. He knelt beside him, reached out, and gingerly closed his eyes. "Rest, brother," he whispered. "Go now to the halls of your fathers, where Mahal holds dominion, until the world is renewed."
He stood up and backed away as two members of the guard approached to remove the body, then turned and returned to Elissa and her group, thinking deeply.
Blood in the main square of the Orzammar market! This city was sick. His
people were sick. Sick with pride, with tradition, with fear.
But most of all, he thought, remembering the dilapidation he had traversed as he passed through the Deep Roads,
we are sick with loss. With grief.
And, as he came to that realization, the very first stirrings of an idea began to whisper in his brain. Not a plan—not yet—but a seed that might grow into one.
-x-x-x-
"Durin," Elissa asked quietly when they finally managed to extricate themselves from their escort. "Is it safe for us to split up in this city?"
"That depends on where in the city you wish to go," said Durin evenly, watching a merchant-caste woman peddle her wares—textiles of middling make, by the looks of them. "And how small the groups into which you will divide are to be."
"Can you provide details?" Elissa asked patiently.
Durin's lips pursed, eyes still on the merchant woman. He could practically hear the desperation in her voice, much as she tried to hide it, and he expected it was half of why she was having so little success.
All the wealth in this city, and still half our people go hungry. And it will be more if this stalemate over the throne goes on much longer. The stores must be dwindling while the city remains barred to surface merchants.
He shook off his thoughts. "Yes," he said. "Send no fewer than four at a time into Dust Town—that's the undercity, where the casteless and near-casteless are driven when they are no longer accepted by
polite society. Poverty breeds desperation, and desperation spurs foolishness. And send no one entirely alone anywhere in the city—there are too many taverns on the streets, and too much tension in the air."
"Clearly," muttered Alistair, "given we hadn't been here five seconds before someone was killed right in front of us."
Durin sighed. "We are a proud people," he said softly. "Once upon a time, we even deserved that pride. We long to return to those days. It consumes our thoughts." The merchant woman was hungry. He could see it in her face, her sunken eyes, the way she eyed the stalls of the nearby merchants selling nugmeat and mushrooms. He tore his eyes from her and faced Elissa.
"Every dwarrow in Orzammar is invested in our politics," he said quietly. "It's not a matter for only the nobles, although the nobility tends to make all the decisions. Even the casteless care who is king, though many would rather not. We all remember, down to our bones, the golden age that we have lost, when the empire stretched beneath the surface of Thedas from the Frostbacks to the Anderfels. It eats at us that we have been driven from being the greatest unified empire in the recorded history of the world to a single city and another distant colony in what many consider to be open rebellion." He shook his head. "And now that city has no king, and no clear successor to take the throne. If that absence is not corrected soon, I fear the mountain shall explode with violence and blood."
"And we will have no dwarven support against the Blight," said Elissa grimly. "Is there any way we can… hurry the succession crisis along? Whether by backing one of the candidates or by forcing the Assembly to come to a decision?"
"You could back one of the candidates," said Durin, "but it's difficult to predict exactly how that would affect the landscape. You are a Warden, which grants you some measure of respect—your order has always been honored here, where the Darkspawn are never far. But you are also a surfacer, and there will be those who take offense to your interference in our internal affairs, regardless of how stone-headed those affairs are. I can't advise you on what the best course of action is until I've had a few hours to get a feel for the mood in this city and listen to some of the gossip on the streets."
"Fine," said Elissa, nodding firmly. "I assume you won't be safe entirely on your own. Who would give you the least trouble to keep with you?"
"Either of you Wardens," said Durin. "As I said—your order is respected. More so than most surfacers."
Elissa nodded, eyes darting between her people, considering. "All right. Alistair, you're with Durin. Follow his lead, keep him safe, and learn what you can here in the Commons. Sten, you take Zevran, Leliana, and Shale down into Dust Town and see what you can find out about how the underclass feels about the election, and anything else that might be going on. Morrigan, Wynne, you two are with me—we're going up to the Diamond Quarter to see what we can learn from the nobility."
"Be careful in the Diamond Quarter," said Durin. "Nobles are an easily-offended lot who keep axes too close to hand and have too few reasons not to use them."
"I gathered that," said Elissa darkly. "I was a Lady before I was a Warden—I know how to deal with pompous assholes, even dangerous ones." She looked around the group. "Reconvene here in two hours," she ordered. "I want to have a plan of action by the time we find somewhere to bed down for the night."
-x-x-x-
Two hours later, Durin returned to the meeting place, an overhang just outside the central square, near one of the many long drops deeper into the earth. He and Alistair were the first to arrive.
"So, any advice on where we can spend the night?" Alistair asked, peering over the edge then looking away, shuddering slightly.
"Not much," Durin said. "I've never had to, nor desired to, stay the night in a public inn here in Orzammar. I always had a home to return to, before this."
"Oh, right," said Alistair, wincing. "I am… sorry about all that, by the way. I saw the looks everyone was giving you."
Durin shrugged. He'd had six lifetimes of respect; he could deal with scorn for a brief slice of his seventh. "It will be set right," he said simply. "One way or another, this will all be set right."
"You really think so?"
"I have faith."
Sten arrived next, leading his team. He gave Durin a curt nod before turning to Alistair. "These dwarves are sick," he said.
Alistair started. "What, is there a plague?"
"They are choking, drowning in their mad traditions," said Sten darkly.
"Ohhh.
Metaphorically sick." Alistair relaxed. "That's a relief."
"He tried to convert a woman to the Qun," Zevran reported, sounding amused. "She did not seem… especially receptive."
"She will learn," Sten said.
"Of course, my large friend, of course."
There was a clanking of metal plates as Elissa stomped in their direction from the gates to the Diamond Quarter. "Don't take this the wrong way," she said, glowering at Durin, "but I really do not like your caste system."
"We agree, then," said Sten.
"As do I," said Durin frankly. "It was not always this bad, but it has been steadily growing worse these several centuries."
"I've only been out of Highever, what, six months? And already I'm questioning the very existence of nobles as a concept." She sighed. "Anyway, we talked to Harrowmont's Second."
Durin nodded. "Harrowmont is a good man," he said. "He might even be a good King. Possibly."
"Well, he sure knows how to drive a bargain," said Elissa with a grimace. "He wants us to fight for him in the Proving in just a couple of hours."
"Against Bhelen, I assume?" Durin asked.
"Well, his champion," said Elissa. "I'm gathering that's as close as it gets down here." She snorted. "You speak through others, you fight through others, next you'll tell me your deshyrs even
vote through others."
"It is, in fact, possible to send a proxy to the Assembly to vote in one's stead," Durin told her.
"Maker damn it." Elissa sighed. "I couldn't find any way to break the Assembly stalemate without backing Harrowmont or Bhelen, and I already don't like Bhelen—and not just because of what you told us. So we're going to head down to the Proving arena, beat the shit out of a few dwarves, and see what doors that opens."
"Understood," said Alistair, rolling his shoulders. "Where's this Proving?"
"I can guide you," said Durin. "Follow me."
-x-x-x-
Elissa, Alistair, Zevran, and Wynne emerged from the Proving bloodied but victorious. "Well," Alistair said with false cheer as they rejoined the rest. "That was… fun. I like to make a habit of killing people whenever I visit a new city."
"We do seem to be making something of a tradition, don't we?" Wynne murmured ruefully, looking down at her stained robes. "Are there any reputable launderers in Orzammar?"
"There are," said Durin.
"That can wait," growled Elissa, storming past them towards the exit. "I just killed eight people and I still don't have the dwarves' support. Forender said he'd meet us at the tavern down the road and I am
not waiting."
They hurried after her, Durin giving quick directions to Wynne to the nearest launderer's he knew of. Their troupe filed into Tapsters, into a private room.
It was not Dulin Forender who greeted them.
"Warden," said Harrowmont, turning from the heating magma fountain. His eyes caught on Durin, and softened. "Lord Aeducan."
"Lord Harrowmont," Durin responded with a nod. "It has been too long."
"Nearly five months," agreed Harrowmont. "I am sorry you could not be here when your father passed. For, as you might guess, multiple reasons."
"As am I," agreed Durin.
"You can catch up later," said Elissa flatly. "Lord Harrowmont, your people have a treaty with the Grey Wardens, and I am tired of having to jump through hoops to get your people to honor it."
Harrowmont sighed. "I wish I could help you at once—truly, I do," he said. "But it is more complicated than that. In the absence of a King, it is the Assembly which decides where the army of Orzammar goes, and right now the Assembly is paralyzed with arguing over the succession."
"Which I just helped you with," said Elissa flatly.
"Not enough, I'm afraid," said Harrowmont. "You have tipped the balance—you may even have secured my victory—but unless more is done, the election will drag on for months more."
Elissa made a frustrated sound before answering. "Fine. How can we get you on the throne more quickly?"
Harrowmont clasped his hands behind the small of his back. "A Carta leader in Dust Town named Jarvia has been terrorizing the citizens of Orzammar for years," he said. "If you help me remove her, it will show the Assembly that I can protect and lead this city where Bhelen cannot."
"Fine," growled Elissa. "I'll take out this Carta for you, and you get an army for me."
Harrowmont nodded. "You have my word." He glanced at Durin. "Lord Aeducan—unless you intend to aid in this assault, I would be honored if you stayed. We have much to discuss."
Durin glanced at Elissa. "Do you wish my aid?"
Elissa shook her head sharply. "No need," she said, turning to her team. "Alistair, Leliana, Morrigan—you three are with me. The rest of you, find us somewhere to stay."
The Wardens and their entourage filed out of the room. Once they were gone, Harrowmont sighed, slumping slightly. "A forceful woman, that one," he said.
"Exceedingly," agreed Durin. "But that is most likely what is needed, in these dark times."
"During a Blight? Absolutely," said Harrowmont. He met Durin's eyes. "But what do you think is necessary for Orzammar?"
Durin took a deep breath. "Do you wish me to be honest?"
"Of course," said Harrowmont.
"Me," said Durin.
Harrowmont chuckled. "Direct of you." He looked at Durin with sad eyes. "I never expected to even be in consideration for the throne," he said. "Now that I am, however…"
"Why not you?" Durin asked.
"If I might know," Harrowmont said.
"You are too traditional," said Durin. "You live, like so many of our people, in the past. You long for the days of the old empire, but do not look forward to find a path to reclaim it. You have lived too long in toleration of the problems in this city. I have been outside it, now—I have seen more, learned more. We must
change, Lord Harrowmont. What happened to Trian has happened hundreds of times, and it must not happen again."
Harrowmont considered him. "You have been to the surface," he said quietly. "By law, your caste has been stripped. How do you propose to circumvent this?"
Durin was silent for a moment. "Are we safe from prying ears?" he asked.
"We are. I swear it on the honor of my house."
Durin nodded. "I have made a discovery," he said, "which will be enough, if properly leveraged, for the Assembly to have no choice but to name me a Paragon."
Whatever Harrowmont had been expecting, it was not that. He staggered back. "
What?"
"I have rediscovered mithril," said Durin softly. "There are veins of it in the Deep Roads. I can find these veins, and I can smith their bounty."
He had a cache of mithril ore already mined on the surface. He had originally been planning to hire a wagon to take him to Denerim, then start forging mithril there. Once word spread to Orzammar, he would return triumphant.
Now… he had another idea. One that would, hopefully, achieve the throne far more quickly than having to wait for his father's successor to die.
"That… is certainly a Paragon-worthy achievement," said Harrowmont, blinking at him. "But even if it is true, the Assembly will no more confer Paragon status on you than lend an army to the Warden, until the election is already settled. How do you propose to become King without having already become a Paragon?"
Durin smiled. "You remember the Paragon Branka?"
Harrowmont frowned. "You intend to seek her out, get her support? She is most likely long dead."
"I intend to go down into the Deep Roads to look for her," said Durin. "But if she
is dead, then while I am down there I myself shall forge a crown for the new King—one of mithril, like the crowns of the first Kings beneath the Stone. Then I shall emerge and bring it before the Assembly."
Harrowmont considered. "It may work. The Assembly is difficult to predict."
"If they refuse to accept me as King, you shall have the new crown," said Durin. "I swear it on the blood of my forefathers."
Harrowmont grimaced. "I do not like that this should be so convincing," he said. "I never thought of myself as ambitious. Very well—I shall back you in the Assembly when you return. You have my word."
)
