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[fleurdesel]

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Adelaide

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[pinprick]

"But Connor was saved by going into the Fade and killing the demon. And yet the demon was in our world enough to have control of his body, to talk and move and raise the dead."

[fleurdesel]

"He was possessed, not an abomination. Not in full. He might have been had the Hero of Fereldan not completed that ritual. The semantics of this are...complicated mostly due to there being many theories, few opportunities for actual research, and a distinct inability of mages to make up their minds with or without the Chantr's input. The demon in Redcliffe likely channeled it's power through Connor much as I would channel Compassion's power in healing."

[pinprick]

"There is another precedent I read about, a more recent one. Pharamond, a former Tranquil who was possessed. Enchanter Wynne performed the same ritual to save him."

[fleurdesel]

Here her lips thin, voice growing clipped. It wasn't the whole of the issue, those names- but they'd had weight enough to make a fire spread wildly. "There is no cure for Tranquility, and a Tranquil cannot be possessed. There is no connection they have to the fade to be used in such a manner."

[pinprick]

"Then was he Tranquil at all?" Nathaniel sounds somewhat disappointed. "I...thought only to ask about the ritual."

[fleurdesel]

"Alleged Tranquil, rumored ritual, with no documentation or proof to support the notion. Even if there were- the means have been lost with the slaughter at the Spire and the deaths of those at the Conclave." A beat passes, her eyes narrow. "Why is this of such interest to you?"

[pinprick]

Damn. He's pursued this too far.

"I'd rather learn than speculate. Now that mages are free, I want to learn what I can about the people I'll be dealing with more often, starting with these possessions which are said to be dangerous to me."

[fleurdesel]

"Bullshit." No, Councilors don't swear- but he'd pressed a nerve and that strains her patience. "You could speak to any mage about such things. You wrote me, specifically."

[pinprick]

"I can't speak to any mage. I used to be nobility. I'm accustomed to a certain standard of education. And since it costs precisely as much to speak with a learned scholar as it costs to speak to an apprentice, I found a scholar. And already, you've proven why. You clearly have the ability to distinguish between known fact and unproven rumor, something I would risk losing by walking into the tavern and asking the first person in robes I see."

[fleurdesel]

"Used to be- ah. That Howe." Fereldan politics aren't something she's spent much of her time on but even that stuck out to her. "Fair enough, I suppose."

[pinprick]

"That Howe," Nathaniel confirms. "Or rather, his son."

[fleurdesel]

"I'd say it costs you more. I actually have standards when it comes to wine." A predictable and ultimately harmless quip, or so she hopes.

[pinprick]

Nice. No awkward questions. He does give a chuckle there.

"So do I. I wouldn't buy swill for someone if I have a choice." Speaking of, he tops off her glass.

"So possession is permanent, except when it isn't. What would you say is the difference between someone who is possessed and an abomination? The Chantry had me thinking they're the same thing, but you've said otherwise."

[fleurdesel]

"Definitions and language varies from circle to circle- and on occasion mage to mage. My personal opinion is a possession is wherein anyone has their body made a puppet by an entity on the other side of the veil, their will channeled through them for better or for worse. An Abomination when an entity slips through the veil and inhabits the skin of a mage." She sips her wine and lets the worst of the chill drop from her eyes. It is no fault of his that it's a touchy subject.

[pinprick]

Which would make Anders an abomination, by that definition. Nathaniel wishes he could dismiss this woman and find another scholar with opinions that are more like what he wants to hear, but that's pointless.

"What happens to a mage who becomes an abomination, then? How would I know one when I see one?"

[fleurdesel]

"The horrific rending of flesh and monstrous form is clue enough. Demonic abominations are very hard to miss." Spirit Abominations are...well she only knows of the one.

[pinprick]

That doesn't describe Anders either. And Nathaniel can't lead her in that direction without raising her suspicions again.

"So it's unlikely that one will sneak up on me in a crowd. And...perhaps the rending of flesh is why everyone assumes there is no way to reverse possession. Or however you call it."

[fleurdesel]

"There were...rumors of Senior Enchanter Wynne being some manner of spiritual abomination, but no one that I knew could ever prove the point. It is an assumption that follows many spirit healers, that we are possessed." She cannot speak to the truth of them. "In theory were a spirit to slip through the Fade and into a willing body it might be different. A large part of why demons become so twisted upon entering a mage's body is that this side of the veil is too much, too real for them."

[pinprick]

"I knew a spirit that inhabited a corpse." This much is not really a secret, though very few probably know about it. "I wouldn't have said he took it well, but perhaps I'll revise my opinion. He took it much better than the demons you describe."

[fleurdesel]

"You- what?" That- that isn't- in theory that is what creates the shambling undead but those spirits are often confused. "And it wasn't mad?"

[pinprick]

"By my standards, he was a little mad. By yours, very probably not. He spoke intelligently, he understood his surroundings, and he wanted to right wrongs in any way he could." Nathaniel rubs his lips, thinking. "He said that spirits try to embody certain virtues they see in our world. I didn't realize at the time that they didn't necessarily know anything about any virtue besides their chosen one."

[fleurdesel]

"...what manner of spirit was this, and how did he come to inhabit a body?" She could take a guess at the how, fell through somewhere thin in the veil, a mistaken summoning- a spirit healer calling for aid that perished mid cast but-

That would be a guess. Specificity is required.

[pinprick]

Welp. Now for this story.

"We were in the Blackmarsh in Ferelden, tracking down a stray Warden from the Anderfels. Kristoff was his name. We found his body there. This was..."

Oh Maker, how does he explain the talking darkspawn and the...whatever. Whatever, he'll take shortcuts.

"The Blackmarsh has a bad history--an entire town, subjected to a blood mage baroness, had vanished many years before. You could see the Veil in places. Or maybe those were tears. We wound up trapped in the Fade, and there we found a spirit rallying the long-dead townsfolk into rebellion against the Baroness. She took the fight to the waking world, and when we woke up, the spirit was inhabiting Kristoff's corpse."

[fleurdesel]

"That is...entirely unprecedented. Being pulled into a fade dream by a strong demonic presence- that has happened before but to wake and pull a spirit through with you?" That is- there is nothing that she knows of or has read, not even a whisper of a rumor of anything even remotely like this and she's been digging through the subject for the better part of a month. "There was no ritual, no rift such as those that we have seen- you simply woke and he woke with you?"

[pinprick]

"The Baroness. She pulled us all back of her own volition, and he was somehow caught up in it."