#and then marethari is explaining all that and she goes...wait-

[thewardenisonthecase]

The idea of elizabeth connecting the dots and figuring out she's a dreamer as marethari explains what is a dreamer is way too funny for me to pass up

[lairofdragonagelore]

Merril and the Eluvian (Merril’s Quest)

This post has a purpose to place all the miscellaneous details said along the game to keep the exact words accessible in case there is some foreshadowing content not easily noticeable. 

When we first meet Merril in Act 1, we are informed all what I specified in detail in the Marethari post: the clan has been purposely placed here by Maretheri to wait for Hawke and obtain the amulet . Once they have the amulet, they need to perform a ritual in an altar.

As we talk to Merril, we obtain more pieces of Dalish “lore” and Dalish knowledge

Dalish think that all elvhen had magic once, but it was lost [DAI tells us it’s true].

Demons can possess Dalish mages, and when that happens, the Clan hunts them down and kills them.

The Chantry knows about these apostates in the Dalish clans, so this is the reason why Dalish always stay far away from cities and towns, permanently moving: to avoid their templars.

We discover she is a blood mage who has dealt with demons, claiming to know how to defend herself.

She thinks her interest in magic and history made her unpopular [we later know this is not true, since these are the interests of any First to the Keeper. The unpopular aspect comes from her use of blood magic, which is weird considering that Dalish see it as another kind of magic, dangerous as any other school. But we also know that Marethari has been telling them that Merril is dangerous by her own]

During Act 2, if we bring her to the Fade, she will show how worried about the consequences of using blood magic she is now, since she was unable to oppose the demon's offer.

She talks a bit more in detail about the technique she uses to protect herself from the demons: believe only in yourself, everything in the Fade is a lie, a trick or a trap.

She also explains in detail what Marethari said to Hawke when returning from the Fade: no one is immune to a demon's offer.

Merril knew she didn't have to accept the offer of the demon, but it spoke pulling her heart, and despite not wanting to believe it, she felt the obligation of believing it.  It is implied this weakness comes from the progressive ”corruption” that blood magic causes in the mage.

She also explains us what we know if we play a Dalish Warden in DAO, summarising it as

Tamlen, one of her clan, found this mirror in the Brecilian Forest.

He was never found again [we know from DAO that he is a darkspawn now, who can be still alive if we don’t play a Dalish Warden], she only found a shattered pieces of the eluvian.

She took a piece of the mirror and started to recover it. Her first motivation was to find Tamlen. Now, since she assumes he is dead, she restores the mirror to recover a part of her heritage.

Marethari told her to destroy the piece of mirror, that their ancestors wanted this eluvian to be forgotten.

Merril also gives us our first-hand information about Eluvians:

Merril seems to know a lot more about eluvians that Ariane [DLC Witch Hunt]. It makes sense since she was meant to be a Keeper eventually. Ariane was just a warrior.

Merril knows that every city in the long-reaching ancient elven  kingdom had an eluvian, used to communicate across their empire. She seems to have the same information that Finn  [DLC Witch Hunt] had: they are unaware that these mirrors allow travelling, not only communication. [This info is first confirmed by Felassan in the book The Masked Empire]

The mirror, despite Merril's restoration with blood magic, is not responsive. She thinks that a finishing tool is needed, so she goes to her clan to ask for it.

To avoid the Keeper's refutation, she invokes the Vir Sulevanan: Dalish individuals seem to have access to community relics exchanging a service to the clan.

The Arulin'holm is a carving toll used by wood shapers, passed down for generations, old as Arlathan. So, what I infer is that Merril is thinking about reshaping the frame of the mirror to activate it: it's not a process on the glass surface, but on its peculiar frame.

As a task, Marethari asks them to slay a Varterral.

This should sound so strange for them: a creature that, according to their Dalish tales, is meant to protect their people [we know from the DLC Witch Hunt that this is not the case, and Ariane was in shock to see this creature was attacking her too] . This Varterral has killed 3 Dalish already. And Marethari has no problem in asking to kill this protector of the mountain. Again, Marethari gives such vibes that imply she knows more than what she says or simply cares little about her Dalish clan.

I like that this strange appearance of a Varterral is slightly in-game-explained by Merril in banter: she assumes that Marethari sent these hunters to recover artefacts protected by the creature, which is their function.

This place is, of course, filled with spiders and undead. The undead can be related to the ancient evil present in the top of the mountain [the Strange Idol] but the spiders make no much sense in my opinion, but we all know how difficult and in such rush this game was done. The joke of fighting too many spiders here even turned into a joke [said by Hawke] in the Fade of DAI.

Finally, we find the Varterral

Here we can see better its shape: many legs, two of them look like Profane limbs but made of bark instead of stone. It has 5 [in game], 6 or 8 limbs [concept-art: depending on how you see the hanging “humanoid” legs that protrude from its core]. I think it’s good to remember, and almost see the foreshadowing, that this creature has many “fused” legs, making us remember Xenon, and also some murals of multi-limbered animals in DAI. The pattern is there.

It's a mixture of a spider and a mantis [maybe that’s the reason why we find so many spider here, they are a bit of a kin]. The three back legs have a kind of sting. The Varterral seems to have 3 red eyes.

The survivor of the group of people sent to look for these supposed artefacts flees into the Varterral when he sees Merril, and of course, he dies. It’s clear that something is too wrong in the way the clan sees Merril, so she wants answers.

When she speaks to Marethari, the Keeper explains that she has informed the clan that Merril's potential restoration of the mirror can bring back the corruption [or something worse]. This clan is terrified of course, since they suffered the loss of Tamlen and Mahariel because that mirror.

Once more we see Marethari disregard ancient Dalish artefacts [she has a point with the mirror though] and, instead of keeping the Arulin'holm, she prefers to give it to Hawke. I'm so surprised of this attitude: first, Marethari gives a book about dreamers to Hawke, now she offers Hawke the Arulin'holm, trusting them that they will return it to her [and I'm not mentioning the fact that how this may be breaking rules and causing inner frictions: something so dear to the Dalish, that belongs to all of them, is borrowed to a shemlen just like that, specially a clan that may feel uncomfortable with humans if the Warden was Dalish]

Later we can ask for clarification about how the mirror led Merril into blood magic. We see once more that Marethari prefers to abandon ancient artefacts that belonged to the Dalish. It's true this mirror is not a simply Dalish artefact since it's corrupted, but apparently or Marethari cares little for any Dalish relics, or she knows where all this will lead.

What we learn about Merril's choices are:

She wanted to cleanse the mirror. Marethari refused to help her, saying it was an artefact meant to be abandoned.

Merril looked for help in a spirit, a demon.

She speaks of purification via blood magic. So far she explains later, she seems to use it to magnify her spells. This process could be done the same with big amounts of lyrium [which in a sense, it's also blood: of titans]. Note aside:  this makes us think that all magic involving lyrium is blood magic too. And if we can restore and cleanse with lyrium, we could do the same with blood?

She is ready to pay whatever cost if it restores a bit of the past of the Elves.

In the end, the mirror is not fixed despite the use of the Arulin'holm.

We start the Third Act with Merril telling us about how she saw Tamlen out of the corner of her eye. I don’t think we need to read into this too much. It’s a mere narrative resource to tell us she is thinking in Tamlen as she works in this mirror. She never had visions or communication with dead people, so I think we should not read much into it.

Returning to the topic of the mirror, she informs Hawke that her plan did not work [it makes sense to me if the tool she used was applied to the wooden frame, instead of the surface of the mirror] and needs to talk with the demon that made her start all this.

She doesn't know the motivations of the demon for helping her. She thinks she is smarter than him, though.

She understands that dealing with this demon is dangerous.

She can sense the power of the mirror, sleeping. [After reading The Masked Empire or after playing DAI and listening to Morrigan, I think it's clear that what Merril needs is the key to activate it. Each Eluvian has a key or/and a password in order to be activated. However, we see in DAI that Kieran can activate it and force it to go to the Fade, to which Morrigan explains it’s only possible for very powerful mages. So power can override eluvian keys. Later, in Tresspasser, after accepting Mythal’s soul, Solas took control of the whole Eluvian network too, overriding its keys.]

She claims that the eluvian was lost before the fall of Arlathan, which I'm not so sure how she knows this. It’s true that Merril’s eluvian has a unique over-intricate frame that we never saw before, but we also know she picked a shard of the mirror, not the whole mirror itself [which we saw in DAO and had 2 Tevinter men at the sides implying this was a stolen and co-opted Eluvian]. So the frame is purely a decision of Merril. What I never understood is how this frame can be in other places [In DAI we found it below the Deep Roads [The descent] and in the Crossroads] I assume it was a careless detail during development. 

The only creatures with knowledge about eluvians are Fade creatures.

She fears being tricked and ending up possessed.

She is so relentless that she is willingly to risk possession to recover a piece of the Elvhenan past.

When we return to Sundermount, Merril is surprised that the clan is still there. That's abnormal.

Marethari claims that the clan has still business to attend to. However, the Dalish have been overstaying for more than three years.

Then, when Marethari answers this question, she explicitly says “we will stay until MY business is done”. The clan has not more business here, it's hers.  We remember that she brought the clan here to fulfil a promise to Flemeth, yet, she stays because there is more to fulfil. Considering how lightly she has been given Dalish relics to Hawke, it made me wonder if Marethari always knew that she would not leave this place alive, and her clan would perish as well? [two out of the three options at he end of Merril’s quest cause the clan extermination, so is Bioware canon to extinguish this clan?] I suppose that, in the beginning, she stayed because of the promise to Flemeth, but then, before the end of Act 2, it was the demon and how she had turned into its prison. However, she is always waiting for Merril to come back. Considering how much she loves her, it makes little sense to insist her to return if she knows the clan is doomed. Unless she hoped for Merril to return, kill her because the possession, and let her lead the Clan. Sadly, all this is pure speculation.

Here, she provides a nice piece of lore that we obtained in the book Asunder [but also it was hinted in DAO with Connor's quest]: even if a possession can be undone, the soul gets scarred and does not recover, becoming a beacon that attracts more demons. The only cure to possession is death. 

Marethari claims that the mirror has stolen life [Tamlen’s and Mahariel’s] and promises from her clan [because it took her First away from the Dalish path]. Merril accuses Marethari of fearing the past.

In our way to the place where the demon resides, we climb the mountain and fight shadows that look like elvhenan shadow sentinels, like Abelas in DAI. They are protecting where the elders go to Uthenera [we see that this is their function in the Temple of Mythal as well]. Then, the game shows that this is a sacred elven place through those pots with green fire and the altar of Mythal where Flemeth can be summoned after a ritual of Uthenera.

In this instance, we realise that the altar where we summoned Flemeth was Mythal's.

Details said by Merril that are interesting but unreliable like so many of the Dalish tales:

Mythal saved the Dalish from the “darkness” [more darkness concept that could be the same one related to previous games, or not].

Merril explains the story: Elgar'nan defeated the Sun, so the Earth was submerged in darkness. Mythal calmed Elgar'nan and restored the Sun to the heavens. [I personally think this is an image that could, potentially, be related with the mural where Mythal extracts a titan's heart, which is depicted like a star/sun.]

Mythal put the moon in the sky

Mythal helps her people, but if you anger her, you will feel her wrath. [This aspect, so more related to Elgar’nan, can be explained later in DAI with the murals of  the Temple of Mythal: Mythal, knowing the violent fury of Elgar’nan, asked him permission to impart Justice. So she took most of the time Elgar’nan’s role to avoid his fury for mundane problems]

Finally, when we enter to Pride's End [the name of the cave], we see a configuration quite similar to the ruins we visited in Sebastian's personal quest about the Harimann [which was related to a demon as well]. We find these three Strange Skull-Dragon totems too. 

These Strange Skull-Dragon totems were also found in the mine where Hawke fought a high dragon, and in the Vimmark Mountains, during Legacy DLC where you can summon Malvenis.

The place has this mysterious Strange Idol which motivated me to do this blog. This statue is found not only in this quest, but also in Legacy, inside a small temple of Dumat as well as in Sebastian's personal quest, when we explore the ruins below the mansion of the Harimanns. In DAI, we find this statue, several times, in the ruined temple of the Emerald Knights in Emerald Graves, and during trespasser DLC, on Solas’ mural about the Vallaslin removal. Another statue of these can be found in a small cave in the Western Approach too. Details of this will be done in a post focused only on this statue in DAI.

Here, it's called Strange Idol and, to give us a better hint of what's to come, we find a Felandaris beside it. If we read the plant’s codex, we realise they appear where the Veil is thin, so the presence of demons and/or blood magic in this place is unquestionable.

A much curious detail about this plant as well, is that it's used by Qunari in Vitaars [their war paint that gives them boons]. The description of the Vitaar using this plant is more than curious:

This strange Qunari face paint is created from deadly poison—fatal when applied to anyone other than a Qunari, whose unique physiology somehow not only neutralizes its effect but also allows the paint's magic to harden the flesh and provide other protections.

This plant is poisonous, and for a mysterious reason, it's not on Qunari. I smell a strongly lore detail incoming.

As a colourful note, the description of the plant resembles two icons in the lore:

 It's a twisted, wicked-looking shrub with long, thorny shoots, and no leaves: a skeletal hand, reaching out from an unmarked grave.

The recurrent image of thorny vines that we see in the presentations, which always represents darkspawn or Taint; or the not so recurrent but still important design of the Vallaslin of Elgar'nan.

There is no more information to relate any of these elements, but I personally think that it’s expected to, considering how these kind of narrations work. This has been a symbol too repetitive along the series.

At the sides of the idol, we see some windows and small altars with more pots that contain a green flame.

Details that are worthy to notice in this  idol

It has many limbs: two legs, four arms

Its face is monkey-like or a bit toad-like

Its chest and stomach have swirls. 

Its limbs have long carvings, like canals from which blood drips. It's very subtle, but the red lines in them have been present in both designs [in DA2 and DAI]

One can associate swirls all over the games with lyrium or, in DAI, with Veilfire and therefore elvhenan gods: the dragon statue that represents Myhtal as well as the howling wolf statue that represents Fen’harel both have swirls along their body. I would risk saying that this idol is elven: creatures with many limbs and curly swirls are common on elven aesthetics.

Here is where a lot of information is released in an implicit way:

The spirit was bound to this statue. Since Merril says that it can't move around freely, it implies that she started to work on the restoration of the mirror using this spirit quite recently: as soon as her clan settled in the Sundermount.

This place was, in the time of Arlathan, an elven grave. Back then, the elves went into Uthenera instead of dying. So, considering this hinted piece of information, if in this place ancient elves were resting, it makes sense the Varterral was defending the zone.

In this place, after Arlathan fell, Elvhenan [Merril is not  specific here] fought Tevinter in a last stand fight.

Fenris added what he probably heard from a Magister’s point of view: The Tevinter unleashed chaos to teach elves that resistance was futile.

One of the two sides bind the demon to the statue, and it has been living there since that war.

Only powerful magic could free him, so much power that would require to do something terrible.

Here is where Marethari appears, saying that she released the demon, allowing him to possess her.  

She also informs that an Eluvian can be linked to the Fade, something that we saw in DAI happening: Kieran can go to the Fade and meet Flemeth via the mirror which only went to the Crossroads.

Marethari explains that she could not fight this demon in the Fade, because it was trapped, and could not banish it without making it stronger. [More details about all the implications of this in the post of Marethari]

During the fight we find spirits or echoes of regret? I'm not sure who they are, it's always hard to see when fighting, but they shout things that seem to fit the hunters that were killed by the Varterral.

I personally like this comment from the demon: Merril has always sinned with her pride, the Dalish pride and the pride of being capable of bringing a piece of history of the Elvhenan. That pride grew weak over time as she saw the consequences of her actions, but during all those years, she fed the demon.

When the demon is defeated, Marethari recovers her form, and the demon tries to trick them. Merril ends up stabbing and killing her Keeper.

Of course, Hawke can blame Merril and avoid exterminating her clan, or, by using any of the other two options, end up in a massacre. You have more chances to kill them all than not, so I feel  like the game is more inclined to follow the path where the clan goes extinct.

[Index page of Dragon Age Lore ]

[wardencommanderrodimiss]

Did someone say... bad future Redcliffe? Because you know... Orlais is destroyed. Do you think Morrigan got out in time? Does Avrian know? Does he hope that she comes back to him? Is he afraid she'll come back to him the way Tamlen did?

FUCK THE HELL I PLAYED MYSELF.

Morrigan is smart, and clever, and cunning, and she knows that she will be blamed for Celene’s assassination if she does not uncover the threat first - but alone, she cannot quite do enough. Celene is dead, and Gaspard blames Briala, and Briala blames Gaspard, and half of the court blames Briala because she’s an elf and the other half blames Gaspard because they’re in one or two different alliances against him. Gaspard’s own sister blames Gaspard.

Morrigan sees the blood on the floor and the writing on the wall and goes to find Kieran. She knows it looks suspicious, for her to disappear. She doesn’t care. What they think of her is irrelevant now. This is war, and she will survive. She always survives.

-

Morrigan could be the last woman standing in the ashes of the world, but what good would that do her? 

The Inquisition, she hears, used to be able to do something about the rifts. A prophetess, they used to have in their ranks. Morrigan laughs. Gods were invented by people; prophets, too. Magic beyond their understanding does not mean gods. 

She should find out what it was, though. That magic. She knows things that others don't. So does Kieran. They could help.

They weave their way through the Orlesian civil war. This is not her fight - but then. But then.

There are Grey Wardens, and there are demons, and this, this is her fight. She has never taken the wardens for more than fools - but even Avrian and Alistair were not such fools as these. (She searches the faces of the wardens she kills looking for Alistair before she realizes that they are all mages. She looks then for an elf woman, blonde with vallaslin on her face and probably a snarl, Avrian's friend from Amaranthine. She can guess what happened to the wardens who are not mages. She does not want to guess where Alistair might be.)

There are so many demons.

-

Kieran knows how to open the eluvians. Kieran knows how to survive on his own - he has never had to, but he knows, because Morrigan has always prepared for every outcome. "Go," she says. "Go to the Crossroads. I will follow when they are all dead."

Kieran knows his mother will follow him. Kieran knows she will not abandon him.

Kieran closes the eluvian behind him, and between worlds, waits.

-

There are so many demons.

-

West of the Anderfels, west of the mountains and the supposed border of Thedas, Avrian hears that the sky has fallen and the world is tearing itself apart. He goes back. Of course he goes back. 

He finds Adamant Fortress full of the dead, wardens slaughtered but with no sign of a fight, summoning circles etched into the stone, half erased by the blood spilled over them.

He finds eastern Orlais full of the dead, soldiers who slaughtered each other, their own countrymen, for loyalty to a noble that doesn't give a damn about them, that is dead now. He finds warden bodies mixed in with them. He finds Halamshiral was long ago enveloped by flames. He treads the empty ashen halls of the Winter Palace, sees skeletons still clad in gowns and masks. He can see the blood on the floor and the writing on the wall. It has been months.

He wears the ring that he always wears, that he has not taken off since he was given it. He has always hated that it does not go two ways. He cannot find her.Morrigan would have found him if she could.

He knows where she kept the mirror.

It is gone.

-

Kirkwall is half eaten up by red lyrium, but the advantage to being a city already destroyed is that it is not yet a target for the demons tearing through Ferelden and up toward the Anderfels and Nevarra. Avrian finds many of its residents already dead, and the other half packed into spaces too small. The first elf he asks, "Do you know Merrill?" and immediately he is taken to her. They all know her, the brilliant Dalish mage who stands between them and oblivion and owns a mirror that shows no reflection.

It killed Tamlen. It killed Marethari. Avrian stands before it while Merrill babbles about how she can't get it to work, and he explains everything he has learned, that there is always a passcode, a key, and he awakens the mirror that killed his brother and steps through to find his son.

"She said she would follow," Kieran says, and Avrian holds him close and says yes, yes, she meant to. She would have.

-

He is sickly grateful that it was demons they were attacked by, not the darkspawn that have begun again to crawl up from beneath the ashen earth. Demons merely kill. Darkspawn corrupt, taint, into ghouls or worse, so much worse - 

First day they come, and catch everyone.

He can't keep Kieran far enough away from the darkspawn and their blood. He tries to keep Merrill even further away. He explains about ghouls, turns over the body of one and says, "That used to be someone." He does not say what happens to some women. 

Now she does feast, for she's become the beast.

He is glad it was demons.

-

The sky turns green, a vast abyss raining demons down. They say it was the sky where the Dread Wolf imprisoned the Creators, but the prison doors have opened and nothing but death spills out. The Forgotten Ones, if anything.

More likely, Avrian thinks now, there are no gods at all.

-

No one is left in Amaranthine.

That isn't true. It is still full of people, residents and so many others who have fled from western Ferelden ahead of the demons. But no one that matters to Avrian is left in Amaranthine.

He doesn’t think he wants to know.

-

Of course it's Redcliffe. Where else?

The remains of the Inquisition and the royal army both reside outside the village, up the lakeside. "We have laid siege to the castle several times," the queen tells Avrian, "to no avail."

The Inquisition's commander stares at him and Merrill both like he is staring at ghosts. "Warden Mahariel," he says, his voice catching, and then to Merrill, "You're the blood mage - Hawke's friend. Varric's friend."

She has told him about Varric.

He was here, in Redcliffe. He went into the castle with the so-called Herald of Andraste. She died, and he never came back out. Neither did Leliana. "You - and she - may have successfully taken back the castle during the blight," Cullen says, "but this is different. This is not a fight we can win."

Avrian hopes. Avrian has always hoped, and Avrian has always followed the people he loves into hell.

Morrigan did not follow. He can't leave Kieran alone - but Leliana - but Kieran - 

"Leliana is in there?" Kieran repeats. He has heard that name many times before, in Avrian's stories. He knows that is the name of one of his father's dearest friends. Avrian fluffs Kieran's dirty hair and stares across the darkening lake at the red stone that lights up bloody red with the sunset. "You want to go save her."

Avrian's father died and his mother followed, disappearing, leaving behind her son. Kieran's mother is dead and his father - he should not follow. Not for Leliana, not even for Morrigan. For Kieran, he should stay.

-

The world is ending, the entire sky a tear in the Veil like the tiny ones in the Blackmarsh so long ago, and there is a screaming dark song in Avrian's head, calling him. Come to me, it urges. Come die. Come down and down and join me and die.

He knows why the wardens at Adamant did as they did. They listened when the taint said, follow.

If he follows, he will die, or worse than. If he does not - he will die. He is a dead man. He has always been. It is finally catching up to him. It was why he went west - so he could live to see Kieran grow up, so he could stay with Morrigan, so that he could do a thousand things that this broken world and ripped sky will not allow.

Redcliffe Castle, dark and looming and full of demons and ghouls and corrupted lyrium-addled mages and Templars, seems a lot like the Deep Roads. Go down and down to die and kill as much of the enemy as you can before they take you. Something is calling. Follow.

"I'll come back to you if I kill them all," he tells Kieran, and he hugs Merrill, and he wonders if this screaming in his head and aching in his blood and bones is how Tamlen felt. He wonders how Leliana feels, what they have done to her, if she lives. Cullen thinks she might. She knows too much.

Avrian goes in through the tunnel like he did years ago, but then, Alistair was at his side, and Morrigan, and Leliana. Of the four of them then, maybe one can live now.