Rom had to remind himself that he wasn't here to torture anyone.
He was here as the Lord Inquisitor, and the Lord Inquisitor wasn't allowed to torture anyone. Even high-ranking Venatori that wanted them all dead. They did things differently than their enemies. They tried to be better.
It didn't change the fact that Amalia, Cyrus, Lia, and Rilien had brought back a woman in chains, and deposited her in a dark room of the Skyhold dungeons, and that Rom among other people would be going in to speak with her. She had much to answer for, including an attempted assassination on Cyrus back when she'd been an infiltrator in their ranks. But right now she needed to give them information about her master and the Venatori, information that could give the Inquisition the confrontation they sought. A chance to destroy their enemies before any more harm could be done.
He found Amalia, Ithilian, and Lia outside the dungeons, speaking amonst themselves. He imagined this was a big moment for them. Perhaps too big for any of them to risk setting foot in the room with Leta. Rom gave them a respectful nod as he made his way down the stairs to the dungeons. They followed him inside soon after.
The others awaited him at the bottom, in the entryway of the dungeons. Leon was present, looking better and stronger by the day. With him were Lady Marceline, and Cyrus, who knew their prisoner the best. Between them, they'd have to find a way to get Leta to divulge something valuable. And trustworthy enough to act upon.
"What's her mindset?" Rom asked, directing the question to Cyrus. "Anything we can take advantage of?"
Cyrus offered a half-smile, the expression almost slightly pained. He'd been looking especially happy since the return of his magic, but that was gone now, masked by the dark circles under his eyes and the uncomfortable way he held his shoulders. “She hates me." He shrugged, clearly trying to downplay the fact that this did not sit especially well with him. “And I don't mean she considers me a rival or wants to punch me in the face. I mean she went out of her way to kill me in a manner that could have jeopardized her mission—just about the most painful way she could think of, I might add. When it didn't work, she at least had the consolation of knowing I didn't have my magic anymore. And now she knows even that didn't stick. There's probably an advantage in how angry that makes her, but... I don't know. I'm not sure it would be a good idea for me to be in there. Not unless nothing else works." Reminding her of just how much she wanted to resist them, after all, was not likely the best way to secure her cooperation.
“More generally... it's hard to say. I knew her so long ago. We were both different people then. I wouldn't be surprised if she was devoted to Marcus. There weren't a lot of chances for someone like her, and he gave her one. Might be tough to drive a wedge in there, but powerful if you can."
"All right." He wondered what form that devotion would take, if indeed her loyalty to Marcus could be described that way. Not likely earned from love, he thought. He turned and stepped to the side, allowing Amalia, Ithilian, and Lia into the circle. "And what about Marcus? Do you think he would even take her back under his wing, after we've captured her?" The last Venatori they'd captured had led them into a difficult trap to escape from, after all. As it turned out, he'd been disposed of to begin with, and he didn't even know it. Somehow Rom was willing to guess this situation was different. Leta had fought at Marcus's side that day, after all. Not a small honor.
Amalia contemplated that for a while, arms crossed. "Maybe," she said at last, sounding dissatisfied with her own answer. "Marcus is cold enough to discard that which is no longer useful to him. But his personality is also... obsessive. He tends to sink much of his effort into relatively few things. Training an apprentice to this degree would have had to be one of those things. Relinquishing her is not a sacrifice he would make easily. But also not one I think he'd be unwilling to make if he felt he had to." Her brows knit. "You might get somewhere, if you remind her of that. She strikes me as someone who has her own aims, ultimately. Devoted or not, there is a breaking point somewhere. A place where her own ambitions could unmoor her from his."
Rom nodded, considering that. Leta's aims were undoubtedly not going to be the Inquisition's aims, but if they were separate from Marcus's, they could potentially pull them apart that way. He looked to Marceline next. "If it comes to it, how much would we be willing to offer her? We can't let her go, obviously, but there must still be some flexibility in her fate here."
Lady Marceline thought for a moment, her arms crossed and her chin resting on the ball of her first. When she spoke, her hand moved away from her face, "We can take execution and hard labor off of the table, but like you said, her freedom is out of the question," she agreed, though even she didn't seem convinced the effect these would have on her. "Moving on, we could also offer her better living conditions than a dank prison," she continued to offer, though like the others, this one still didn't seem to convince her.
Rom doubted it would enough to sway her much, but it was something. Leta had to be thinking, too. She would know that if she didn't cooperate at all, she'd be spending a very long time rotting in a cell. Perhaps she was willing to face that. There was only one way to find out.
"Let's see what she has to say, then. Maybe just Leon, Marceline, and myself to start." Others could always enter if they needed a change of pace.
Leta was considerably smaller than some of the other people who'd sat in that chair, but perhaps no less proud. The last few days imprisoned hadn't worn on her in any way she was allowing herself to show. Though her hair was unwashed, she'd pinned it up meticulously, and the dirt on her robes was minimal. A healing abrasion remained on her cheek where Amalia had planted her in the dirt, as the story went, but it didn't look to be bothering her. She sat with straight-backed posture, wary dark eyes tracking them as they entered. Her face gave away little by way of clues to her thoughts—it remained hard and impassive even as they took up their places in front of her.
Leon spoke first, adopting what Rom now recognized easily as his preferred opening tack in interrogations: courtesy. "I understand you're a captain within the Venatori. Captain Leta, I am Commander Albrecht, and this is Lord Inquisitor Romulus, and Lady Marceline Benoît, though I suspect you knew all of that already." Leon pulled out one of the chairs across the table from where Leta was chained and sat in it, bracing his forearms on the edge of the wood. "We've no intention of insulting your intelligence. You already know what we will—and won't—do to get the information we need. And you have a better sense than we do how far you're willing to go to keep your silence. This doesn't have to be any more antagonistic than it already has been."
From the way Leta's eyes came to rest on him, she was listening, but the silence after Leon spoke stretched much too long for the exchange to remain polite. Her face remained stony. She flicked her eyes to Lady Marceline next, as though anticipating the next words to come from her.
Unwilling to disappoint, she spoke. "We are willing to offer you a number of concessions for your aid," she began. She stood still and calm by Leon's side, her arms still crossed and her face impassive. It appeared that she was going to continue with his polite method. "We will help you, but only if you help us," she stated.
"Concessions?" Leta's lip curled, but she smoothed her expression back out quickly. "And what would those be?"
"We will take hard labor rebuilding what this war has destroyed off of the table, for one," she started, putting a subtle emphasis on 'destroyed.' "We will also ensure that you remain more comfortable than the cold hard stones of our dungeons would offer. Depending on what you tell us, we may even be able to work out something more." she added. The girl wasn't foolish however, and she had to have known that the Inquisition would not simply offer her freedom back to her.
The chains dangling from the cuffs on Leta's wrists clinked as she raised her hand, just enough to run the pad of her thumb over her lower lip. "Or... I could endure your dungeons for the mere weeks it will take this castle to be overrun by my master, and taste freedom once more without having given you a damn thing." Her tone was a mockery of the civility both Marceline and Leon had used, light with false humor.
Leon's brows furrowed, though probably not because she was mocking them. "Your master," he repeated flatly. "Marcus. Not Corypheus." If that was true, it had to mean that Marcus was alarmingly close to his goal of overthrowing the darkspawn Magister—but then again, they had no particular reason to believe what Leta said.
"Very good, Commander. You might almost be as clever as you are large." Leta inclined her head, still entirely unperturbed.
"Weeks, is it?" Leta's choice of words seemed specific and certain enough to have meaning for Rom. Quite possibly a slip. "So something big is happening, and soon. Has to be somewhere you'd be able to return to with your escort in time, to report back to Marcus whatever you went into the Deep Roads for." Some of the others knew more about Marcus's specific aims than he did, but Rom didn't really need to for this.
"We'd know if you were preparing for something big in Ferelden. Our scouts caught you and your band moving through the woods, they wouldn't miss something bigger than that. Every Marcher city state is on full alert since your red lyrium-addled friends attacked Kirkwall. That leaves Orlais." Unfortunately, Orlais was a very big place, but there were still ways to narrow it down. "We have too many eyes and too many friends in the cities. Would have to be somewhere remote..."
He leaned his weight back against the wall near the door and crossed his arms. "Am I on the right track here?"
"Oh, getting very warm, yes." It might have been confidence that kept Leta looking so untroubled, even though it was hard to imagine that she'd meant to give them all that information with what little she'd actually said. "A remote Orlesian somewhere. Really, you don't need anything from me, with all that." Irony laced the words; she sat back and let her hands fall into her lap with a jangling of metal.
Her eyes shifted to the wall behind them, narrowing slightly. "Just a little while longer, and everything will be as it should."
Leon ignored her for the moment, or at least pretended to, clearing his throat slightly and glancing between Rom and Lady Marceline. "Not any remote somewhere, I should think. History is telling: Marcus has spent years traversing elven ruins, something we now know was part of his plan to usurp Corypheus. It stands to reason that since his spell was still incomplete last we saw his notes, he'd have continued interest in such sites. Not too many with enough history this far south, I think."
For the first time, Leta showed a hint of frustration, glaring hard at the wall and sucking her teeth. It took only a moment more for her to speak unprompted. "You want a location? Fine. It's no great secret. But unless you wish to flounder in the dark through every ruin between here and the Tirashan... I want an actual room. With a window. You can bar it if it suits you, but I hardly have the resources to survive this godsforsaken mountain anyway."
Marceline nodded in agreement. "That can be arranged," she said glancing at Leon. "We will see to it that it is comfortable as well," She spoke with an even tone, unperturbed by Leta's previous goading.
"Provided what you tell us is true, of course."
"The Arbor Wilds." Leta parted with the words in a way that conveyed a little more reluctance than her umbrage suggested moments ago. Clearly the effort to contain her emotions was beginning to wear. "And may the crows there feast on you all."
"We'll make sure your room has a nice view of the main gate," Rom promised her. "Wouldn't want you to miss our return." Their scouts would have to confirm that the Venatori were indeed there before any reward would be given to Leta, but he was confident she was telling the truth. What wasn't included was exactly what Marcus and perhaps Corypheus were after there, and where exactly in the Arbor Wilds they could be found. It was a large place, as far as Rom knew.
Thankfully, they had some experts on these things that could be consulted. And they had an army that had been itching to take the fight to the Venatori for a long, long time.
He was here as the Lord Inquisitor, and the Lord Inquisitor wasn't allowed to torture anyone. Even high-ranking Venatori that wanted them all dead. They did things differently than their enemies. They tried to be better.
It didn't change the fact that Amalia, Cyrus, Lia, and Rilien had brought back a woman in chains, and deposited her in a dark room of the Skyhold dungeons, and that Rom among other people would be going in to speak with her. She had much to answer for, including an attempted assassination on Cyrus back when she'd been an infiltrator in their ranks. But right now she needed to give them information about her master and the Venatori, information that could give the Inquisition the confrontation they sought. A chance to destroy their enemies before any more harm could be done.
He found Amalia, Ithilian, and Lia outside the dungeons, speaking amonst themselves. He imagined this was a big moment for them. Perhaps too big for any of them to risk setting foot in the room with Leta. Rom gave them a respectful nod as he made his way down the stairs to the dungeons. They followed him inside soon after.
The others awaited him at the bottom, in the entryway of the dungeons. Leon was present, looking better and stronger by the day. With him were Lady Marceline, and Cyrus, who knew their prisoner the best. Between them, they'd have to find a way to get Leta to divulge something valuable. And trustworthy enough to act upon.
"What's her mindset?" Rom asked, directing the question to Cyrus. "Anything we can take advantage of?"
Cyrus offered a half-smile, the expression almost slightly pained. He'd been looking especially happy since the return of his magic, but that was gone now, masked by the dark circles under his eyes and the uncomfortable way he held his shoulders. “She hates me." He shrugged, clearly trying to downplay the fact that this did not sit especially well with him. “And I don't mean she considers me a rival or wants to punch me in the face. I mean she went out of her way to kill me in a manner that could have jeopardized her mission—just about the most painful way she could think of, I might add. When it didn't work, she at least had the consolation of knowing I didn't have my magic anymore. And now she knows even that didn't stick. There's probably an advantage in how angry that makes her, but... I don't know. I'm not sure it would be a good idea for me to be in there. Not unless nothing else works." Reminding her of just how much she wanted to resist them, after all, was not likely the best way to secure her cooperation.
“More generally... it's hard to say. I knew her so long ago. We were both different people then. I wouldn't be surprised if she was devoted to Marcus. There weren't a lot of chances for someone like her, and he gave her one. Might be tough to drive a wedge in there, but powerful if you can."
"All right." He wondered what form that devotion would take, if indeed her loyalty to Marcus could be described that way. Not likely earned from love, he thought. He turned and stepped to the side, allowing Amalia, Ithilian, and Lia into the circle. "And what about Marcus? Do you think he would even take her back under his wing, after we've captured her?" The last Venatori they'd captured had led them into a difficult trap to escape from, after all. As it turned out, he'd been disposed of to begin with, and he didn't even know it. Somehow Rom was willing to guess this situation was different. Leta had fought at Marcus's side that day, after all. Not a small honor.
Amalia contemplated that for a while, arms crossed. "Maybe," she said at last, sounding dissatisfied with her own answer. "Marcus is cold enough to discard that which is no longer useful to him. But his personality is also... obsessive. He tends to sink much of his effort into relatively few things. Training an apprentice to this degree would have had to be one of those things. Relinquishing her is not a sacrifice he would make easily. But also not one I think he'd be unwilling to make if he felt he had to." Her brows knit. "You might get somewhere, if you remind her of that. She strikes me as someone who has her own aims, ultimately. Devoted or not, there is a breaking point somewhere. A place where her own ambitions could unmoor her from his."
Rom nodded, considering that. Leta's aims were undoubtedly not going to be the Inquisition's aims, but if they were separate from Marcus's, they could potentially pull them apart that way. He looked to Marceline next. "If it comes to it, how much would we be willing to offer her? We can't let her go, obviously, but there must still be some flexibility in her fate here."
Lady Marceline thought for a moment, her arms crossed and her chin resting on the ball of her first. When she spoke, her hand moved away from her face, "We can take execution and hard labor off of the table, but like you said, her freedom is out of the question," she agreed, though even she didn't seem convinced the effect these would have on her. "Moving on, we could also offer her better living conditions than a dank prison," she continued to offer, though like the others, this one still didn't seem to convince her.
Rom doubted it would enough to sway her much, but it was something. Leta had to be thinking, too. She would know that if she didn't cooperate at all, she'd be spending a very long time rotting in a cell. Perhaps she was willing to face that. There was only one way to find out.
"Let's see what she has to say, then. Maybe just Leon, Marceline, and myself to start." Others could always enter if they needed a change of pace.
Leta was considerably smaller than some of the other people who'd sat in that chair, but perhaps no less proud. The last few days imprisoned hadn't worn on her in any way she was allowing herself to show. Though her hair was unwashed, she'd pinned it up meticulously, and the dirt on her robes was minimal. A healing abrasion remained on her cheek where Amalia had planted her in the dirt, as the story went, but it didn't look to be bothering her. She sat with straight-backed posture, wary dark eyes tracking them as they entered. Her face gave away little by way of clues to her thoughts—it remained hard and impassive even as they took up their places in front of her.
Leon spoke first, adopting what Rom now recognized easily as his preferred opening tack in interrogations: courtesy. "I understand you're a captain within the Venatori. Captain Leta, I am Commander Albrecht, and this is Lord Inquisitor Romulus, and Lady Marceline Benoît, though I suspect you knew all of that already." Leon pulled out one of the chairs across the table from where Leta was chained and sat in it, bracing his forearms on the edge of the wood. "We've no intention of insulting your intelligence. You already know what we will—and won't—do to get the information we need. And you have a better sense than we do how far you're willing to go to keep your silence. This doesn't have to be any more antagonistic than it already has been."
From the way Leta's eyes came to rest on him, she was listening, but the silence after Leon spoke stretched much too long for the exchange to remain polite. Her face remained stony. She flicked her eyes to Lady Marceline next, as though anticipating the next words to come from her.
Unwilling to disappoint, she spoke. "We are willing to offer you a number of concessions for your aid," she began. She stood still and calm by Leon's side, her arms still crossed and her face impassive. It appeared that she was going to continue with his polite method. "We will help you, but only if you help us," she stated.
"Concessions?" Leta's lip curled, but she smoothed her expression back out quickly. "And what would those be?"
"We will take hard labor rebuilding what this war has destroyed off of the table, for one," she started, putting a subtle emphasis on 'destroyed.' "We will also ensure that you remain more comfortable than the cold hard stones of our dungeons would offer. Depending on what you tell us, we may even be able to work out something more." she added. The girl wasn't foolish however, and she had to have known that the Inquisition would not simply offer her freedom back to her.
The chains dangling from the cuffs on Leta's wrists clinked as she raised her hand, just enough to run the pad of her thumb over her lower lip. "Or... I could endure your dungeons for the mere weeks it will take this castle to be overrun by my master, and taste freedom once more without having given you a damn thing." Her tone was a mockery of the civility both Marceline and Leon had used, light with false humor.
Leon's brows furrowed, though probably not because she was mocking them. "Your master," he repeated flatly. "Marcus. Not Corypheus." If that was true, it had to mean that Marcus was alarmingly close to his goal of overthrowing the darkspawn Magister—but then again, they had no particular reason to believe what Leta said.
"Very good, Commander. You might almost be as clever as you are large." Leta inclined her head, still entirely unperturbed.
"Weeks, is it?" Leta's choice of words seemed specific and certain enough to have meaning for Rom. Quite possibly a slip. "So something big is happening, and soon. Has to be somewhere you'd be able to return to with your escort in time, to report back to Marcus whatever you went into the Deep Roads for." Some of the others knew more about Marcus's specific aims than he did, but Rom didn't really need to for this.
"We'd know if you were preparing for something big in Ferelden. Our scouts caught you and your band moving through the woods, they wouldn't miss something bigger than that. Every Marcher city state is on full alert since your red lyrium-addled friends attacked Kirkwall. That leaves Orlais." Unfortunately, Orlais was a very big place, but there were still ways to narrow it down. "We have too many eyes and too many friends in the cities. Would have to be somewhere remote..."
He leaned his weight back against the wall near the door and crossed his arms. "Am I on the right track here?"
"Oh, getting very warm, yes." It might have been confidence that kept Leta looking so untroubled, even though it was hard to imagine that she'd meant to give them all that information with what little she'd actually said. "A remote Orlesian somewhere. Really, you don't need anything from me, with all that." Irony laced the words; she sat back and let her hands fall into her lap with a jangling of metal.
Her eyes shifted to the wall behind them, narrowing slightly. "Just a little while longer, and everything will be as it should."
Leon ignored her for the moment, or at least pretended to, clearing his throat slightly and glancing between Rom and Lady Marceline. "Not any remote somewhere, I should think. History is telling: Marcus has spent years traversing elven ruins, something we now know was part of his plan to usurp Corypheus. It stands to reason that since his spell was still incomplete last we saw his notes, he'd have continued interest in such sites. Not too many with enough history this far south, I think."
For the first time, Leta showed a hint of frustration, glaring hard at the wall and sucking her teeth. It took only a moment more for her to speak unprompted. "You want a location? Fine. It's no great secret. But unless you wish to flounder in the dark through every ruin between here and the Tirashan... I want an actual room. With a window. You can bar it if it suits you, but I hardly have the resources to survive this godsforsaken mountain anyway."
Marceline nodded in agreement. "That can be arranged," she said glancing at Leon. "We will see to it that it is comfortable as well," She spoke with an even tone, unperturbed by Leta's previous goading.
"Provided what you tell us is true, of course."
"The Arbor Wilds." Leta parted with the words in a way that conveyed a little more reluctance than her umbrage suggested moments ago. Clearly the effort to contain her emotions was beginning to wear. "And may the crows there feast on you all."
"We'll make sure your room has a nice view of the main gate," Rom promised her. "Wouldn't want you to miss our return." Their scouts would have to confirm that the Venatori were indeed there before any reward would be given to Leta, but he was confident she was telling the truth. What wasn't included was exactly what Marcus and perhaps Corypheus were after there, and where exactly in the Arbor Wilds they could be found. It was a large place, as far as Rom knew.
Thankfully, they had some experts on these things that could be consulted. And they had an army that had been itching to take the fight to the Venatori for a long, long time.