The Pot Calling the Kettle Black

When they departed the Knight-Commander's office Helena's aggravation manifested in her long, quick strides and spear-like looks. Not only had Maricara escaped the shelter of the Starkhaven circle, but Helena was expected to hunt her down with a circle mage? The Seeker doubted this woman, Bethany Hawke, would be anything but a hindrance to make her own mission more difficult. Circle Mages were no apostates, but, they were not nearly as disciplined, stringent, and trustworthy as those that had climbed with the Templars, or better yet, with the Seekers. For when circle Mages wandered, it was the Templars who kept them in line. And when Templars wandered, it was Helena Prieskorn who snuffed them out. 

She stomped to the stables, and then barked orders for two mounts to be prepared. After she whirled on Bethany, her fingers twitching like the legs of dead spiders - like the Rivaini witches and their somatic component style she so reviled, and she warned the other mage. 

You, Hawke, I expect you to not be a dallying nuisance. Actually, do you know what I expect you to be? A snivelling dove, who will betray me the first chance she gets, because she loves her magic and all those who use it regardless of how. Your weak policies are the most foolish tripe I have ever laid my eyes on. They are warped, Hawke, taken over by a destructive rush when the Maker's magic is left to rule their bodies. And I don't think you even know how bad they become. If you get in my way, I swear you will regret it, she finished, lowering the finger she had begun to jab towards Bethany. She immediately began to root into the saddle bags of the mount that had been lead to her during her tirade, muttering, I don't know why I ever trusted her.

Helena Prieskron was a thorn in her side to say the least.  She reminded Bethany of the worst of the lot back at the Gallows, the ones who had refused to see mages as people.  The ones who looked for the tiniest mistake to drag you over the coals for.  The ones who took joy in stripping them of their freedom, their humanity.  The ones who took pride in presiding over failed harrowings and rituals of tranquility.  Bethany had seen both sides of magic and so she found it hard to deny that the Templars should exist, but it was ones like Helena that had her questioning her own stance at times.

So she wasn't joining this quest because she wanted to, nor even because the Knight-Commander wanted her to.  No, she was doing this because if someone had to be stuck with Ser Prieskorn it ought to be someone like her.  It was the same game she'd played in the Gallows - play by the rules so well they couldn't question you.  If anyone had a chance of keeping the templar in line Bethany hoped it was herself.

Oh and this tirade?  This was getting them off to a fine start.  When Helena turned her back Bethany looked to the sky and silently asked the Maker for patience.  Her plea was at least momentarily granted as she didn't immediately start in on her own angry rebuttle.  No, she had to be better than that to prove the templar wrong.  So she would be.

[color=#68c4e8]"Think of me and my policies what you like, Ser Prieskorn, but we should focus on our charge, should we not?"[/color]

She checked her own saddle bags and saddle to ensure she'd be equipped properly; she would have trusted what came from Sebastian or the Circle, but the Templars were another matter.  She was pleasantly surprised to find herself well provisioned, but paused before getting onto her mount.  [color=#68c4e8]"People deserve the benefit of the doubt at first.  They deserve trust until they prove themselves unworthy of it.  You can't judge everyone to be a criminal before they've committed a crime or you're no better than a tyrant,"[/color] she said sharply. 

Her tone softend slightly as she concluded.  [color=#68c4e8]"But when they do betray you then you're right to be cautious until you know why."[/color]  She didn't know Mari, and she didn't know her reasons, and so she at least was going with withhold judgement until she knew more.

Helena swung up onto her mount, glowering at Bethany. The mage's motherly appeal ruffled her further, and she doubted the other mage's calmness would last through their spat. Ser Prieskorn had long ago pegged Bethany as an idealist and romantic, groomed by Starkhaven's stability and peace, and she would not allow herself to be affected by such naivette.

Oh, don't patronize me now; I know when I've right to be cautious, when to use my magic, when to end another before they can do more harm, she growled. You aren't even aware of how spoiled and sheltered you've been here. Maybe in time and with experience and mistakes, you will learn the truth of people, of *them*. But I haven't the time for that. There will be no mistakes with me.

Helena pushed her steed into a brisk trot, heading through town to drop a word in with her daughter about her absence for a time.

Have you, Hawke, ever left Starkhaven? Have you even heard of what has become of the Antivan circles? she threw behind her.

Bethany nudged her horse into keeping pace with Helena.  She was going to let her rebuttal go, allow accusations of being spoiled and sheltered fall off her back like water.  After all, it might be for the best that she think her so naïve at first and hopefully in the end Bethany could prove her wrong.

But then she asked her point blank if she'd ever even left Starkhaven it was too much.  [color=#68c4e8]"Have I-, please tell me you're joking.  You don't honestly think I've spent my entire life sitting in the Starkhaven Circle twiddling my thumbs, do you?"[/color] she asked incredulously.

[color=#68c4e8]"I spent the first 18 years of my life in Ferelden, and then I fled to Kirkwall from the Blight.  I joined the Circle there - and you know how troubled that place was.  I spent years in the Gallows under Meredith.  I fought the Qunari, I was kidnapped by blood mages, my mother died at the hands of the most twisted blood magic imaginable, I came face to face with Corypheus and survived."[/color]  And those were only the highlights, the things that might get through to her that Bethany hadn't come to her ideals lightly.

She could have stopped there, but Bethany found herself continuing in an effort to impress upon her templar companion just how much she did know.  [color=#68c4e8]"I've seen what happens when mages become so desperate that they will turn to anything in an effort to simply be left alone to live.  And I've seen the Templars drive them to this in their cruelty, abusing and violating those who are supposed to be their charges.  I've seen both the Right of Tranquility and the Right of Annulment put into effect just because a Templar wanted to show they had the power to do so.  And if you're asking if I know about Dairsmuid, I do.  And those mages did not deserve their fate."[/color]

[color=#68c4e8]"So yes, I am aware.  I am aware that both Templars and Mages are capable of great evils, and I am also aware that they are capable of amazing good.  I chose to return to Starkhaven when I didn't have to because I believe that the Circles can be reformed into places for all to safely learn about magic without tearing people away from their homes and families and treating them as less than human."[/color]  While she never resorted to yelling, her voice had taken a continually more firm and determined tone as she continued.

[color=#68c4e8]"So don't assume me to be a sheltered enchanter naïvely unaware of the realities of the world.  I am painfully aware, and I have not come to my beliefs lightly."[/color]  So much for holding back.

Throughout Bethany's longwinded 'tirade,' quite the list of the chantry's past decade of history, Helena pictured the scale of Bethany's words beginning as a weak little stem but soon, they would grow far higher than her own. Prim little Bethany Hawke would eventually cast quite the shadow over the puffed up Helena Prieskorn. You see, the lady-Templar had only been left to imagine the Qunari affairs and that whole Dairsmuid massacre, and she had been quite certain each offending antagonist had gotten their just desserts. So at the start of what would become a proper speech, Helena side-eyed Bethany with a look of disgust, at first, that melted into one of simple-minded disbelief as detail after detail piled on with snippy, robust smacks. By the end of it, Helena's beliefs in the chantry's absolute goodness were on the stand, threatened, and her face had grown pink from listening to it all.

Your beliefs - How can you speak so treacherously? Then she whispered. How do they still let you hold your position when you speak so? I would turn around and take you back if this pursuit weren't such a priority. Surely, you were led astray or only imagined what you think you saw. Blood magic, Hawke, how rediculous that they didn't deserve what they got. What did you imagine they got? I have seen some transgressions of my rank, but none have equated to the sheer evil that possesses those of blood magic. The shriveled skin of its victims rung like a bell in her mind. What she had seen of the world herself, she clung to now.

Helena assumed she had far more power than she actually did if she believed she could turn around and seek to see Bethany punished for speaking her mind.  This was not the world she'd been born into when Templars and their Chantry minders could do more or less what they wished.  No, the playing field was far more equal now and she wasn't afraid anymore.  Still, probably best to let Helena believe she held power for the moment.  Bethany could always disabuse her of that if need be.

So instead, she laughed.  Perhaps it was meant to be a chuckle, something to lighten the tension, but it came out bitter and disbelieving.  I know full well what I have seen over the years.  You can feel free to ask around - there are others who can corroborate everything I've said.  Helena hadn't even gotten half the story or any of the details and still bristled.  She had no idea.

As for Dairsmuid, who said anything about blood magic?  They were simply living as they always had, following their own centuries-old traditions which had caused no trouble for anyone.  And they were murdered for it. Bethany hadn't been there, but she'd seen the reports.  She was well connected enough to know the truth of it, and blood magic had nothing to do with it.

I will grant you, however, that some of the vilest things I have ever seen did stem from blood magic, but blood magic isn't around every corner.  Sometimes evil hides in plain sight, no magic required.  Nor was it always awful.  It usually was, yes, and Bethany had no intention of ever using it, but she couldn't say that everything the Wardens did was evil, for example.  She didn't like blood magic, and in her mind it would forever be linked with terrible things, but objectively she couldn't say every single use caused harm.  And besides, the Templars themselves used blood magic.  After all, what were phylactories if not that?