bethen avilla ; the circle mage (bethe) wrote in thedas,
One after another...they were falling. Chillingly, Bethen realized that she was the last of the Circle magi still alive. First poor Emrys, then Byron -- and she didn't know what to make of that whole scenario. After the warrior from Denerim had flown into a rage against Mona, who was frighteningly unflinching in the face of everything, Beth wasn't sure who had been in the right. She knew Byron wasn't normally violent or dangerous, but she also knew that he had just witnessed his best friend die, and how could she expect him to be talked down from that? Maddock had no patience for any signs of insurgency. He had done his job. This was how it worked in the Circle, and with the Chantry -- Beth knew it, and reluctantly accepted it as fact. She felt absolutely terrible when Brannan had not withstood his test, but not nearly as bad as the moment that she saw Lirana collapse. This was the girl she'd shared two rooms with for over a decade, and even if they had not always had an amicable relationship, she had never held any ill-will toward the elf. Beth thought of her something like a sister, even if one estranged. Her heart ached for Trevan. She didn't know him quite as well, but she felt for him, and for Lirana. They would not be forgotten.
There was at least some sort of silver lining to all of this -- Alderic had lived (and she had expected him to, she never doubted anything about him before, and wasn't going to start now), as had Coan. She didn't know some of the others quite as well, but she was glad to see that almost as many people had survived the process as had perished. Beth hadn't even begun to think about what it would be like when it was her turn to step forward; though it had saddened her to see so much suffering and death, she was not at all deterred from taking her turn. Quite the opposite, she was now even more certain that she needed to see this through. If not for herself and being able to aid the Grey Wardens in any way possible, then for her friends and for the Circle.
"Ser Voss." A tall man bearing the emblem of Highever on his armor left his place in the dwindling line and took the chalice with pride. From the corner of her eye, she caught one of the other Wardens making another hand gesture to the other. She didn't know what those signals meant, but they had been doing it back and forth the entire ceremony. It was distracting. The short-haired one caught her puzzled stare and winked at her, even as he was moving Trevan aside to where the other bodies had been laid out. When she looked back at the knight, feeling flustered and perturbed, he had doubled over already and was clutching at his gut. After he gave a whimper and was declared dead, she heard the Warden on the other side of the room mumble something that sounded like a curse.
"Bethen Avilla."
The mage had been utterly calm up until that moment. It was the same way before she had to take an exam -- she would be focused and relaxed the entire way, up until the last few minutes before she was set to begin putting her quill to the parchment. But there was no going back, no time to waste. If this was how her story ended, at least she had seen the outside world one last time, even if her adventure was over prematurely. She had tried to do something good, and that was worth the sacrifice. She inhaled sharply before taking the chalice from the Warden-Commander, smiling at him politely as if she were accepting a cup of tea instead of a goblet of blood and Maker knew what else. Beth tried to hold her nose to avoid the smell and block out some of the flavors, bitter, salty and rotten, and...something else, perhaps traces of a lyrium potion. But this concoction had the opposite effect that downing one of those blue vials had on her.