Dragon Age: Shadow of the Inquisitor

Chapter One - The Place She Once Belonged

The wind moved differently through the Free Marches than Regalia remembered.

It did not sing here. It scraped.

Dry grass bent in restless waves beneath a pale afternoon sky, and the trees — thin, stubborn things — rattled their leaves like old bones. Five years ago, she could have walked these hills blindfolded and known every rise, every hidden path worn into the earth by generations of Lavellan hunters.

Now even the air felt unfamiliar.

Or perhaps, she thought, it was simply that she was.

Her horse slowed as the aravel came into view between the trees — tall, curved wood catching the light, its painted symbols faded but proud. Smaller wagons circled it like quiet sentinels. Smoke curled lazily upward from a low fire somewhere beyond her sightline.

Home.

The word did not settle inside her the way it once had.

A pair of hunters spotted her first. She saw the exact moment recognition struck — shoulders stiffening, one whispering sharply to the other. Neither waved.

Neither smiled.

Of course they wouldn't.

You do not greet a woman who closed the Breach as if she were merely returning from a long hunt.

Regalia swung down from her horse with practiced ease, landing lightly despite the uneven ground. Her cloak shifted with the motion, the empty sleeve pinned neatly at her side stirring in the wind before falling still again.

One of the hunters looked at it.

Then quickly looked away.

Good, she thought. Let them stare now. Better than later.

"I seek Keeper Deshanna," she called calmly.

Her voice carried — still commanding without effort. Years of leadership did not leave a person simply because the title had.

The younger hunter blinked. "She... knows you are coming."

Regalia allowed herself the smallest breath of amusement.

Of course she does.

Keepers always knew things before they were spoken.

She passed beneath the edge of the aravel's shadow, and memory struck her with unexpected force — the smell of halla leather, crushed elfroot, woodsmoke clinging to fabric. For a fragile moment, she was young again. Unmarked by war. Unchanged by ancient magic.

Whole.

Then someone gasped.

The sound snapped the illusion cleanly in two.

An elder stood near the fire, staring openly now — not at her missing arm, but at her face.

At her bare face.

No vallaslin marked her skin.

Whispers spread quickly after that.

She felt them like insects crawling across her shoulders.

Why was it removed?
Was she ashamed?
Was it taken?

If only the truth were simple enough for whispers.

Regalia kept walking.

The Keeper emerged before she reached the central fire.

Deshanna looked older — time carved deeper lines beside her mouth, threaded more silver through her dark hair — but her gaze remained sharp as a drawn blade.