The night before, they had arrived at the Crossroads and met the "renowned" priestess, who assured them she would leave for Haven and get in touch with Leliana to facilitate an approach to the Chantry.
The truth was, Elentari didn't really care. She knew it should be a priority (or so the shem had told her), but her heart was broken. She had never witnessed such cruelty in all her life. And the worst part was, it had only just begun.
The emaciated child she had carried in her arms ended up in the hands of Corporal Vale, the one in charge of coordinating Inquisition operations in the area. She had feared for the boy's life during the entire trip... he had seemed so weak and malnourished. She had begged Mythal for mercy, for compassion... then questioned whether it was right to ask her gods for help, or if she should instead look to the Maker and demand answers.
Right now, she just wanted to cry and pretend this wasn't her life.
In about an hour, dawn would break, Elentari knew it (she had witnessed countless sunrises as her people moved in harmony to new lands).
The sowing season was approaching in the surrounding fields. The first rains had fallen, and the soil was soft. Birds had begun to build nests in the trees, and her eyes fixed on those hopeful little details to gather the strength this new day would demand.
Day by day, Elentari. Day by day. You can... you can handle all this...
The Herald was deeply affected. She longed for Desh's tight embrace, for her best friend Idril's laughter, for the nighttime chases with Thengal, when he taught her the secrets of stealth.
It was hard to recall her memories, the faces of her loved ones seemed distant, buried somewhere in her mind, and to reach them, she had to pull painful memories.
Because it hurt to be aware of what she had lost. Long before the explosion at the Conclave, but she wasn't ready to think about it. It hurt so much. Too much.
She had once had a family, love, security, and now she was alone. She had to accept it once and for all. She was afraid to honestly consider whether she would ever return to her clan… because this war, all this madness, seemed capable of devouring her. And even if she survived, would they take her back?
So she focused on the dew on the grass, soaking the leaves and drenching the ground. It was beautiful to see. It made her want to roll over it and pretend she was free and happy once more under the shelter of the elves... without the chains of the Chantry or the weight pressing down on her name.
Elentari looked down and saw ants on the ground carrying food to their tiny holes.
She smiled.
It was living nature, the hope of a tomorrow. Even though, in the distance, a war between two factions brewed, destroying everything in its path, sparing nothing.
And that same war was brewing inside her: the peaceful memory of her people, the part of her clinging to the dream of return, and the ceaseless death of this chaos and the green mark on her palm.
Her clan, Clan Lavellan, had been known for seeking peaceful coexistence. Deshanna had always taught respect (toward outsiders and kin alike) and that was the way Elentari had been raised. That might've been why, when she saw a young woman far off grabbing a machete with a frail hand to cut brush from a field, she decided to approach.
She could tell the woman wasn't doing it properly (not that she herself had ever done it better). In truth, Elentari had always been treated as if made of glass. But she had watched others work the fields countless times. Not because the Dalish had the privilege of settling in one place, but because her clan kept good relations with people who allowed them to camp near their fields during harvest seasons to help with trade.
When she got close, she noticed the woman's cautious demeanor. First, she couldn't seem to look away from Elentari's vallaslin of Ghilan'nain, the "savage" mark the shems so often feared. But then Elentari noticed the palms: skinned, swollen, covered in blisters. It made her eyebrows rise, and she wanted to heal them, though she'd been warned that humans feared magic and she shouldn't use it openly. Either way, she wasn't great at healing spells, but she did know the ingredients for strong medicinal ointments.
The farmer interrupted her thoughts.
- You're the one they call the Herald. - Elentari figured the young woman wasn't even twenty springs old.
She nodded but replied. - My name is Elentari. Nice to meet you.
The girl stared at her in silence and then chose to act like she wasn't there. Elentari had already noticed how, during times of war, people stopped trusting others, and all strangers became enemies. Especially Dalish ones.
Clumsily, the shem grabbed her tool and started hacking at a tree trunk to learn how to handle it. The act annoyed Elentari... the tree was becoming a victim of ignorance.
- Hey, stop. I can help you - said the Herald. The woman looked at her suspiciously. But when Elentari reached for the machete, she demonstrated how to cut through the underbrush. It was only then that she realized how difficult it truly was: the weight was crushing, and her hands weren't used to field labor either.
- By Mythal! - she muttered, then quickly regretted naming her goddess in front of followers of the priestess she was supposedly a herald of. Though, did humans even know who Mythal was? Probably not. - How do you do this job? - she asked, laughing kindly.
The shem seemed amused and smiled back.
- Were you here to help?
- I think I came to bother you - Elentari joked, and the woman laughed. They looked at each other with a spark of understanding, maybe the kind of trust two unfamiliar women share when trying to lend a helping hand.
- If you want to help, you could apply ointment and wrap my hands. What do you think?
The Herald nodded with a bit of enthusiasm, and just as the girl smiled, she glanced at Elentari's vallaslin and asked:
- Is it true the Dalish travel all the time?
- Yes. We can't stay in one place.
- Sounds... strange. But beautiful. - The shem's eyes lit with longing. - I'd love to see the whole world too... and travel everywhere. - Then she laughed freely, which drew a small smile from the elf. Elentari always felt more at ease talking to common folk, unimportant people... but never those pompous nobles she was expected to treat with respect, as the ambassador had warned her.
- You have roots in the earth. We have roots in the road. - confessed the Dalish. The girl laughed again. - It's not the same, but I suppose it's beautiful too, isn't it? - Then she crouched to pick up the tool again.
- You're right. Oh! Hold on a second, I'll go grab some bandages and ointment... my hands hurt.- She said it as if confessing a well-kept secret. - Will you help me? - She showed her hands, and the Herald nodded, this time not hiding the joy on her face.
Not long after, the young shem walked toward her house and a sound of shouting and clashing steel shattered the newborn morning.
The sun barely touched the horizon when a group of templars in heavy armor crossed the plot of land that had just been cleared. Two rebel mages ran ahead in fear. Or so the Herald thought, until one of them turned and threw himself against the templars, giving the other time to cast a spell.
There was no warning. Only the flash of flame in the rebel mage's hand. Elentari saw the fireball fly through the air in a moment that felt eternal, as if the world slowed down so she could watch (powerless) the disaster unfold.
The impact came too fast. Fire wrapped the farmer in a cruel embrace. The air exploded with a dry, voracious sound, like wood crackling in a bonfire. A scream tore through the dawn, an inhuman sound that pierced Elentari's bones. And then she felt it:
Heat.
A scorching wave hit her like a slap-thick, smothering, stealing her breath. The smell was worse. First, a sweet and bitter note, like skin roasting in the sun. Then, the sickening stench of burning flesh, the stench of singed hair, the acidic perfume of despair.
The farmer staggered. The machete slipped from her blackened fingers. Her screams turned to gasps, then whispers. And then she fell.
Elentari didn't move. The world had stopped.
The woman's skin twisted and blackened before her eyes, a nightmare she couldn't look away from. She wasn't a demon. She wasn't an enemy. She wasn't a soldier on the battlefield. She was a girl who had smiled at her minutes earlier, hoping someone would bandage her hands.
It was cruelty. It was injustice.
Later, Elentari's memories became vague images of Inquisition and Crossroads soldiers running after the troublemakers. She recognized her companions too and heard Cassandra arguing with Solas about who the real victims and culprits were in this war: mages or templars?
But for the Herald, the answer was clear. The victims were the innocent, the defenseless, the farmers, those unable to wield weapons and take lives. And in that moment, Elentari realized something terrifying:
She was a killer too.
Not because she had cast a fireball.
Not because she had swung a weapon.
But because she was the Herald of Andraste.
Because she was the only one who could close the Breach.
And she hadn't done it yet.
And as long as this chaos devoured everything, each lost life would weigh on her soul.
She was guilty too.