Chapter Text
I. Prologue: Drowning
The Weaver
I have never feared the sea. We fear the things we cannot understand. For the longest time, I had thought the sea to be the one thing I understood completely. All my life, she had been a companion to me. As any companion, the waters could be treacherous at times. They could erupt in anger, burying the little man-made wood constructions we used to travel the inscrutable depths. The waves could be gentle on some days, mischievous on others.
I had learned to run the ever-moving deck of a ship without stumbling, scouring the railings and climbing the masts. The sway of the waves had been to me what a mother’s hand is to a cradle, rocking me to sleep in the night. Singing me lullabies with the voice of the water. And I had always known we were connected, attuned to each other, our life-force humming in unison. It had never occurred to me that she might let me come to harm. Until the day I drowned.
The day I understood my folly. I remembered only torn bits, scraps of scenery flashing before my eyes as I sank into the deep. Our ship had gotten caught within a raging tempest. The storm had come out of nowhere. Lightning crackled across the blackened sky, the water churning beneath the hull like the body of a gargantuan beast. The sea reared, shuddering and tossing us around as if we were nothing more than tiny pests clinging to her skin.
Voices were everywhere around me, panicked screams of our sailors as they tried desperately to bring the ship under control. Wood groaned beneath my feet, and within the innards of our trusted Tidedancer, I heard things crack and splinter. The storm screeched above with such deafening volume, I had to shield my ears from the rising cacophony.
Without warning, a hand caught my arm in a painful grip, righting me from my protective crouch. Before I could react, a wave clashed against our broadside, spewing saltwater onto the entire deck. I was ripped from my feet, but strong arms shielded me against the impact.
“Why the fuck are we still drifting?” My ears still rang with the enraged yell when I was hauled upwards again. Next I knew, I was staring into my father’s merciless features. He looked more forbidding than I had ever seen him. The gale had taken his captain’s hat, whipping his silver-streaked hair into an utter mess. Lightning arced between the clouds, painting him as a picture of stark contrasts. White and black, shadow and light colliding on his face, making the long scar across his cheek look like a brutally slashed brushstroke.
“Where is Ariu?”, he barked at me, but before I could answer, he dragged me along the slippery deck towards the bowsprit. “And why are you not weaving?!”
“I don’t know –“, I gasped, panic rising in me even more swiftly than the tides. I was frightened out of my wits. I could not summon my magic. Something was terribly wrong.
“I can’t feel the water –“
My father stopped short abruptly as another violent lurch threatened to overturn our vessel, but he kept screaming orders at his men without relent. I saw one sailor lose his footing on the slick wooden beams. He’d been too close to the railing – and a second later he fell like a ragdoll into the depths below. I cried out in anguish, tears blurring my vision, but my father shook me so harshly I felt my bones rattle against each other.
“Pull yourself together, Selkie!”, he commanded in a voice that made chills travel down my spine. It was his captain’s voice, and the captain’s orders must always be obeyed. I gave a shaky nod.
“Captain! We have company!”, one of the men cried. My father’s head snapped up as though he’d been struck.
“Colours?”
“It’s fucking Tevinter! The shits came out of nowhere! Why would they follow us here –”
My father gave me a wild look then, and I doubted I would ever forget the fear written onto his face. It was unthinkable. He feared nothing. I felt as though my heart had switched places with my stomach. Our sailors kept yelling at each other above the storm’s thunderous roar.
“They’ll ram us!”
“Evade! Come about, damn it! Protect our broadside!”
One glimpse over the railing gave me a view of our attacker. It was a Tevinter battleship, huge in size. A design I had never seen before, because these vessels of destructive power rarely left their home waters. A great red dragon was painted onto its black sails, undulating with the fabric as it was lashed around by the tempest.
Lightning flashed again, and for a moment the thing looked alive, as if it might tear itself free to swoop down on our heads. Scorch the very flesh from our bones. Reduce us to cinders. I’d always known I would die by fire. It was my greatest fear. Nothing terrified me more.
The ship’s figurehead was no less intimidating, shaped into some chimaera creature between human and serpent. Forging its way relentlessly towards our portside. At this speed, it would split us in half –
“Haul wind! Brace! Get us the fuck out of reach!”, my father commanded, pulling me away from the railing.
“Matthias!” We both whirled when we heard Ariu’s voice. He hurtled towards us despite the constant tossing and turning, miraculously keeping his balance even though the entire ship teetered out of control. As soon as he arrived, my father pushed me into his arms as if handing over a doll to him. They shared a quick, intense look I could not decipher within all the chaos.
“Take her. Take a boat and get her as far away from here as you can.” The captain almost growled his order. Ariu’s smooth features were stricken, stunned. I moved to protest. I couldn’t leave them! The Tidedancer, the crew –
“Brace for impact!”
“Selkie –“
I felt my father’s hand on my face for a mere second. He had never touched me with such tenderness before, not even as a child. I felt Ariu grip my shoulders. And then the world burst apart. The Tevinter ship tore through us like a blade through tender flesh.
My ears exploded when the two ships clashed. I lost solid ground beneath my feet. The impact flung me into the air, and all I saw were pieces flying past me. The broken shards of a mirror. The shattered slivers of my life. No anchor to tether me. No qai from the sea below. No magic within me. I should have been able to save them. Get them out of the storm by weaving the tides. As my body soared and hit the cold water, I realized how powerless I was. Weak. I’d always been so damn weak.
The waves crashed over me, pulling me into the depths below. I opened my eyes even though they stung and burned, and watched as streaks of lightning lit up the darkness around me. It happened sluggishly, as though time stood still in these moments when everything I held dear disintegrated around me. As though cruel fate wanted me to experience it in full force. I saw bodies drift into the watery grave, pieces of the Tidedancer sinking slowly into the void, embraced by the sea. Then blackness descended again. My limbs grew heavy with cold. My lungs filled with chilling water.
I didn’t know why I opened my mouth, to whom I wanted to cry out. To my fathers, maybe, out of some childish wish for comfort, although I was much too old for such things. To the sea herself, demanding why she had betrayed me today. To the Maker, perhaps – a god I had never truly believed in, asking why my life should be ended by the very thing I had loved so dearly.
What did it matter? Words were meaningless now. I would die here, before I’d had a chance to truly live. Alone, cold, helpless. This was my time at the end of time. This was no time at all.
I thought I heard something answer me. I thought I felt the touch of something, a mind brushing over mine. But it was too late. The world darkened around me, going silent and still.