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Softly	By : chipperdyke Category: +A through F > Dragon Age (all) > Dragon Age (all) Views: 11471 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I bow to gods of BioWare and offer a humble tribute to the awesome. I don't own Dragon Age II, they do. I profit not, though my dildo perhaps does.

Chapter List
- 5
- 6
- 7
Note: This is a flashback!

6. Past Reflections

The wind in her hair, ocean spray in her face; Kirkwall at her back, and the Orlaisian heartlands before her, bathed in the light of the setting sun. Isabela was in her element, traveling this time as crew and not a passenger - or captain. Thus she cherished these few moments alone, at the prow of the ship. It felt as if the world was at her fingertips.

And perhaps it was. Crewmember was better than captive - or dead - or land-ridden! She once again berated herself for staying in Kirkwall. She had nothing in that Blighted city, except with every day a greater chance to be caught and killed by Castillon. She was a fool to have stayed, and ever more the fool to have returned. That damned Fereldan - or was she Rivainian? Isabela had never asked, but skin so dark, harsher features than her own, a stubborn jaw and eyes that knew more years than they should... such eyes!

She shook her head, expelling the thought. It didn't matter now. Isabela would never see Hawke again, and good riddance. That girl, with her bright piercing eyes, had done more to derail Isabela's life than Zevran and Lea combined. To think... I was on land, and happy to be. Preposterous! Following a child probably six years my junior... with enough coin to take me to Seheron and back, twice... Isabela shook her head again, wondering what exquisite madness had compelled her to stay after the Deep Roads disaster.

"Raven!" a man called from behind her. "Take care, lest you lean too far and take flight!"

She turned to grin at him. He was weighed down by a huge length of rope. "And perhaps I would prefer such, over the sight of your ugly face." She daintily took the end of the rope and started walking toward the mast with it.

"Loop around the - "

"I know!" she cut him off, not turning around. She could feel him unraveling it behind her, and found his obedience gratifying. And I'll have a ship again, she thought. When I get to Val Chevin.

*    *     *     *

Orlais. Truly she had seen the best and worst of it. Jonathan of the Silver Isle, Regent over the Serpent's Keep - she had seen the best and worst of him, too. But that was ten years ago. His father had been alive then, the bastard.

It hadn't been hard to find the mansion; she knew these streets like the back of her hand. She stood before it, struggling with herself, before finally stepping forward and pounding the huge metal knocker. She suddenly turned away, but before she'd taken a step the huge door opened ponderously.

She nervously smoothed her new black pants. "I come seeking Jonathan of the Serpent's Keep."

"We received no note." The servant looked her up and down. "Identify yourself."

She drew herself up, cursing silently and wishing she'd gotten the hang of noble speech. "He knows me by Raven."

The servant sniffed pompously, and then nodded. "I will inform the master." And then he shut the door in her face.

"That was rude," she muttered. But it wasn't long before the doors were opened again, and the servant led her to old Paul-Henri's study.

Jonathan was sitting at the desk with delight on his face. "Isabela!" he exclaimed, jumping up and enveloping her in a huge hug. "I never thought I'd see you again."

"You're an old man, Jonathan." That was a patent lie; he looked every inch like he was still twenty, lovestruck and gay.

"Does it become me?" He spun on his heels, looking up. "Had I any idea grey hairs would buy me such a pretty house, I would have done it sooner!"

"Indeed," she said, and relaxed into one of the plush chairs, putting her feet up irreverently.

His face fell. "And yourself? How has the world treated my drowned treasure?" Jonathan had found Isabela, left for dead in a dark alley, after Lea's mutiny. It was really too bad he'd loved her so.

"I should have come here five years ago," she said, her lip twisting involuntarily. "I've been in Kirkwall."

"The Free Marches?"

"The Siren's Call crashed on the Wounded Coast."

His eyes lit up. "You got her back?"

"I did." Her eyes became distant. "A man named Casivir found me a few months after I left you." She'd chosen her words carefully, pausing to let them sink in. "I suppose they did want the Deniver Chest, after all," she finished, satisfied that she'd put him off.

"But Lea had the maps and everything! You mean she truly couldn't piece it together?"

Isabela leaned in. "That's why you don't write down the truth, sweet thing."

He laughed nervously. "You could've taught my father a lesson or two about good business. Isabela, you know I adore your stories. Did you find the Chest?"

Isabela dismissed the question with her hand. "Enough about me. So the old man kicked the bucket, did he?"

"And left me all of his closets - and their skeletons, too," he said.

Just at that moment, a woman's voice called from the doorway. "Dear, with whom are you speaking?" She was redheaded, and sweetly beautiful.

Isabela stood to shake her hand. "Isabela," she said, introducing herself.

"I am Maria," she said shyly.

Jonathan put his arm over her shoulders. "My wife."

I didn't know he had a wife. Fortune smiles upon me. Isabela desperately tried to come up with something non-sexual to say. She managed, "Pleased to meet you," wondering if that qualified as non-sexual. Turning back to Jon, she said, "I have a business venture to propose."

*    *     *     *

Isabela slept the night with great satisfaction in her heart. Jon had sounded quite interested in her proposal - a merchant ship to collect rare and valuable spider silk from the South to use in his family's garment factories. Far cheaper than buying from freelancers or other suppliers, and she would captain the ship. A good deal for all involved.

She found Jon gone when she awoke, but undaunted she explored the city she'd once called home. It had changed not a little - but something that hadn't changed was the people's proclivity towards kidnapping and assassination.

It was brutal and quick. She woke again to a blinding headache, a wrenched shoulder, and manacles around hand and foot, and thanked the capricious Maker that it had not been assassination she was meant for. She was in a bright room, but her eyes refused to focus; she'd obviously been drugged. Biting down a curse, she tried to focus on listening, but suddenly the world swam and she found herself slamming into the ground, disoriented.

"Whore," a high voice said, as if the word were a salutation. Isabela's head snapped up, and she sneered fiercely in the direction of the voice. "You will never again have Jonathan." It's his wife, Isabela realized, and suddenly she was irritated.

She opened her mouth, only to have it stuffed with a gag, tied around her head. The last thing she heard before she passed out was Maria's voice again, commanding her cronies to beat Isabela senseless. This they did.

When she regained consciousness, the room was dark, but she could feel the floor moving - she was on a boat, or a pier. She lay still for a long time, suffering her bruises and trying to determine whether she was still drugged.

There was a sniffle near her, and later she heard someone shifting. A moan sounded.

Finally she identified the door, and struggled to her feet. But when she tried to take a step, a man grunted and her movement was halted by her manacles. She was chained to someone.

An icy fear filled her belly then. Val Chevin was known for one thing other than its fine embroidered shoes: its involvement in the slave trade.

*    *    *    *

Isabela wasn't one for long regrets, but spending a month and a half in a dank, dark room with fifteen other slaves brings out the contemplative side of even the most capricious brute. Wishing she'd been a bit more reluctant to sacrifice her pride on the altar of ambition was a marginally more pleasant exercise than meditating on the live bugs that seemed to inhabit every meal the slaves ate, after all. So she spent that time thinking.

One of her favorite exercises was imagining what Hawke was doing. At first she'd tried to defy the urge, recognizing in it the weakness that had driven her from Kirkwall, sent her fleeing for her immortal soul. There was no point in running and hiding if by doing so she only nurtured her sick fascination. But by the end of the journey, she was clinging to her fantasies of the warrior. It was like those stories the old man had told her, before her mother sold her. Serah Hawke, dashing between gallant adventures, saving countless, faceless men (never women) from brutal torture and rape. Hawke, raising an army to march on some enemy or another; one day it was darkspawn, and Hawke was suddenly a Grey Warden, and then it was a necromancer, and Hawke fought with an uncanny emerald fire in her eyes; once it was even the entire Tevinter Imperium, and Hawke was the head of a great host representing the Free Marches, Orlais, and Ferelden.

She saw Hawke clearly, swinging her great axe around in a deadly arc, muscles rippling under bronze skin and a perfect form, long limbs and a spare frame. Pert breasts splattered with the blood of a dragon; calves and a perfect thigh flexing as she lept upon it, driving a dagger through its eye and into its skull. The King of Ferelden would offer her a city in compensation, and Hawke would refuse it. Hawke would want only... and then the tears would flow, and Isabela would curse herself roundly and refuse to think of such things again.

Until the next day, when the image would sneak in slowly. Hawke, sweetly curled under silks belowdeck, in the captain's quarters. Sleeping, her dark hair splayed about her and those bright emerald eyes hooded for only as long as it took Isabela to slide into bed beside her. Then Hawke would wake and hold her. I've just been waiting for you, Hawke would say. I will always be here, for whatever you may desire.

And then Isabela would make her scream.

*     *     *     *

Why the slavers felt the need to transport the slaves out of Orlais was beyond her, but she suspected that they were tracking back her own journey, east past the Free Marches and landing probably in Antiva.

The slavers only opened the door during the day, when the light would blind them all, making any attempt at escape a feeble one indeed. The first week out, three big men had tried, and Isabela still had their caked blood on her hair.

But today was different. Instead of filling their bowls, the faceless shapes were shouting, rousing them. Isabela pulled the man on the other side of her chains up, to his great disgruntlement (the man reminded her of Aveline), and so they were among the first to take the stairs and feel the sun on their faces.

A breath of wind brought the scent of singed beef and coconut milk. Isabela didn't even try to fight the smile that lept onto her face. Slowly, her tired eyes were adjusting to the blinding light, and she kept them completely open though she could taste her own tears. She'd be damned if she stayed blind for a moment longer.

If this wasn't the port of Rialto, she was a suckling pig. The port was an utter mess of planks and incorporated ships, forming a massive maze that doubled as a marketplace.

There were only six slavers, but they were armed to the teeth. Isabela eyed their whips before deciding that trying to convince man-Aveline to make a run for it wouldn't be very fruitful.

Finally, she looked around at the other slaves. Half were elves, either violently reclaimed or having sold themselves back into slavery, as they'd already determined; but something that Isabela hadn't realized before was that every one of the slaves was almost stunningly beautiful, even through the grime and misery of the journey. That explained why they'd sailed here; slave brothels were unheard of in Orlais.

They were all marched to a port-warehouse, predictably not on solid ground. They were fed, and a man took their measurements. [[So we will be sold,]] Isabela realized.

A few days passed, and then they were all put through a rigorous cleaning and clothing process, and marched to the marketplace. Some of the slaves were dressed decently, but evidently the slavers wanted to appeal to a range of clientele; Isabela was nearly naked, with barely a loincloth and even less to hold her breasts together. She was sincerely torn between strutting defiantly and cowering like a virgin, and finally decided on a meek, oppressed attitude. It was difficult.

The selling had been advertised; probably fifty people crowded the small plaza. Each slave was unmanacled and brought to the stage, where they were auctioned (or kept, if the offer was too low).

Finally it was Isabela's turn, and she hid behind her hair before the auctioneer took her chin roughly and revealed her. Across the plaza, on a balcony, a man leaned forward. A man with a familiar face....

In that moment Isabela lept off the stage and plunged into the crowd, snatching an ornamental dagger on her way. There were four guards standing in the only exit, but she caught them by surprise, easily rolling and dodging their clumsy hands.

And then she took off, running in earnest now, There were shouts behind her, but they faded quickly in the bustling marketplace. Soon she adjusted her clothing-tie and slowed to a walk, slinking like a whore so that her dress was less remarkable.

She tried to orient herself. The damn place was constantly morphing, growing and deforming, but a core section hadn't changed in years, and Isabela headed in that direction, trying to recall the name of the owner of the pub. She didn't dare try the high-class whore house; Castillon undoubtedly had his dirty paws in the place. Why did it have to be Castillon? It might have been fun to be someone's pleasure slave for a few months. Easy, even.

But then she involuntarily shuddered. She had no desire to sleep with a stranger, even a very rich stranger who fed her actual food. This was an unfamiliar feeling for her, but she hadn't had that desire in a long time. Curiosity, yes, and of course her lukewarm interest hadn't actually stopped her from trying people out. But when it was over Isabela always wondered why she'd done it at all. It was silly, when it took only a walk to Hightown... she had a sudden flash of Hawke's lanky legs between hers, her eyes drawing Isabela in, drowning her, while her hands raked exquisite pain down her stomach and along her thighs.

She'd ask the barman if she could work the bar for the night; he wouldn't say no, considering the nice cut he'd get out of it. Then she'd buy clothes (she didn't want to risk imprisonment, which was the equivalent of handing herself to Castillon), and lift another dagger or two, maybe some jewelry, and sell it. That would only work after she had clothes, though; too bad these rich people were so good about their purses in this district. And she couldn't steal at the pub, the barman would never stand for that.

After that she had to get out, and quick. Castillon would already have his dogs looking, which meant she needed to stay as far away from the berthed ships as she could. Unfortunate, because sailing was one of the few things she could be paid to do.

That, and opening her legs.

Hey, maybe it wouldn't be that boring.
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