Chapter Text
She has never seen so many shems before in her life. Not even in the village market before they left Alerion. They are everywhere. Shems in rags, shems in silk, shems with staffs for magic, shems with blades for fighting. Big scary shems, little baby shems, all dark skinned as the smelly shemlen men with their jokes about what was between her legs that found her asleep by the river. They made her nervous. They looked at her like she looked at the food they gave her. They looked at her like a horse they wanted to buy. They stripped her down and looked at her all over and touched her and laughed when she winced. They opened her mouth and checked her teeth. They put their too-big shemlen edhisen in her mouth, in her masa. They laughed. She bled like Mamae had bled, but not as much. She thought of Tamalin, who did not cry. If Tamalin could shed no tears, she could do the same. She was older. Crying was for babies. It hurt, it hurt, it hurt, but she didn't cry. She learned to find the Fade, to float there, to close her spirit's eyes and not be her and not see her and just exist where it didn't hurt so much. It got easier then. And they fed her. To fatten her up, they said.
"Nobody wants a fuckin' bag o' bones," the one in charge said. He wouldn't let them put their edhisen between her legs. He wouldn't let them beat her. "No marks, you shits," he told them. "Leave her whole. You break it, you fuckin' buy it."
The one in charge stands behind her now on the platform, holding the rope that ties to her hands and feet and neck. She is naked. She is often naked with them. Brown-skinned shems in clothing that is strange and leaves parts of their chests bare, clean shems with coins jingling in the pouches they carry. They look at all the naked elves on the stage. They grope arm muscles and slap haunches and pinch sides. Hair is held out when it is pretty -- hers is pretty, like unrefined silverite, the fast-talking man with the funny hair (they all have so much hair, the shems, all over) on his face tells everyone who stops to stare. There are women there too, shem women, but they frown at her and if they are with men, they drag them away.
"Prettiest knife-ear bitch you'll ever see," the one in charge tells a man who is alone, who has paused in front of her and makes her turn her head with a hand on her chin. His hands are soft. So soft. She has never felt such soft hands on anyone but Tama. Like baby hands. Hands that have never held a tool or strung a bow. "Sweet and pliant and pure as any Dalish cunt can be. She won't fight you, no serah, not a wit."
"Tried her, have you," the man asks without asking. The one in charge turns red. He is not in charge any longer.
"'Course not, serah. Have her inspected if you don't believe. She'll bleed for ya, that's a surety."
The man has dark eyes like how she feels inside now. Dark like her dreams. Dark skin, but like tree bark, not the pitch of his eyes. His hair too is dark dark dark. But he regards her thoughtfully, does not just look at her flat chest and her bare edhas like the others, does not just talk about her like she isn't there, even though she isn't there, not really, not anymore. She is a snail shell when the snail is dead. Empty and hollow and easy to break. Dirty on the inside. He does not just mention her purple-teal eyes, her silver hair, does not just grab at her body. He looks her in the eyes, not just at her eyes. It is strange to be seen. She has been practicing being invisible since Babae stopped moving. But he sees her. She doesn't like it but she wants it. Wants it like she wants food and air and shelter from the storms and wolves.
"What are you called, child." It is not a question. It is a command. What is she called? Knife-ear bitch. Tight little cunt. Pretty Dalish slut. Heathen quim. Her eyes round because these are not what he wants to know, she thinks, and she wants to please him, wants him to like her so he will keep seeing her, but she was called something else once, if she could just remember. What was it? And how does she make her mouth work? She knows how to put things in it. Food. Shemlen cocks. Water. Air. But she can't remember how to make things come back out. Words. Sobs. Vomit. The hot white sticky mess they put in her when they grunted. Things went into her, but not out. Not anymore. "Your name, child. What is it."
"Speak, bitch!" The one in charge yanks at her hair. She does not make a sound, even though it feels like ripping skin.
"That won't be necessary," says the man. She thinks she loves him. He is kind and good and he sees her. He sighs and goes to move away, to look at the city elf woman down the line. He's leaving. He's leaving! Speak, stupid, worthless rabbit bitch! Speak or you will disappear forever!
"Lanaya!" Her mouth moves without her knowing what she's done. Her surprise is on her face like the vallaslin she one day would have worn. Her voice sounds wrong. Dry and croaking like a frog. But he stops. He turns to look at her again. He smiles.
"Lanaya. Good girl. Can you cook and clean, Lanaya?"
"Y-yes, hahren," she realizes slowly, and marvels still that she can make sounds at all. He laughs.
"We'll have to break you of that Elvish habit." He nods over her head at the man who holds the rope. "I'll take her. Clothe her. I'll have my man come round to collect her in half an hour."
Her heart soars. She will go with this man? With this man who is kind and good and sees her? She will be good for him, so good. She will do anything he wants and more. She will please him.
If only he always sees her.
~~~
They were always pounding on the door for her. No matter how many men and women she'd had that day, they were always sending more. It was good to be popular. She was beautiful for an elf and knew how to please. She had learned that young. She knew what the humans wanted when they came to her. She could read it in their faces and demeanors, whether they needed to bruise her and spit on her, whether they secretly craved when a knife-ear called them shemlen and rode them hard while shouting terrible things in Elvish. Truthfully, she barely remembered anything from her time with the Dalish. She made it up. They never knew. And they always came back. Always. She was popular. They were always pounding at her door. She didn't care. It put food in her children's mouths. It kept them from doing this. It kept the humans from knocking at their door.
Lanaya checked herself in the distressed mirror and tucked a stray strand of her infamous silver hair into her braids. She adjusted her breasts in her turquoise gown, chosen specifically to accent how she was curvier than most elves, the vivid color of her eyes. She pinched her cheeks to wake the color there and smoothed her hands down her hips. She wondered idly who it was they'd sent her this time, what they'd desire from her. She hoped it was a green young man so it would be over quickly. Fathers loved to give her their sons to turn into men.
It was not a young man. He was a handsome, broad-chested fellow in armor, clean-cut and already blushing. He...didn't want anything from her. He wasn't even looking at her. What the fuck did they send her? Maybe he meant to knock on Danyl's door down the hall; maybe he fancied men. Only one way to find out. She pressed herself against him, insinuating serpentine into his arms, grinding her thigh against the hard leather of his breeches. He jolted, eyes widening, and took a sharp step back. His skin was practically scarlet. But he was responsive, she could see that clearly. So he knocked on the right door after all.
"Don't be scared, shem," she purred, reaching for the laces of his pants to drag him into the room with her. "I don't bite. Unless you want me to."
He looked up then, flustered and panicked like a maiden. But when he actually saw her, actually took in her face, he suddenly froze. Simply stopped breathing entirely. Maybe he didn't want an elf? This was going to be work, she decided, but it would end quickly. He would come before she even got him out of his smalls.
"Maker's breath," he breathed, eyes large like he'd seen a ghost. He hesitated and asked uncertainly, "Lanaya Alerion?"
Now it was her turn to jerk backwards, crossing her arms protectively over her cleavage and scowling dangerously. "Who are you." No one used her clan name. No one knew her clan name.
"Commander Rutherford with the Inquisition," he stammered, still violently blushing. But now that he'd looked at her face, he couldn't seem to tear himself away. "You look just like her!"