**SPOILERS FOR END GAME** DON'T READ THIS STORY IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS!

A/N - I wrote this piece after seeing "The Final Straw" quest. Most of the in-game dialogue appears here, but it is greatly expanded on. I really felt that it was lacking in emotion and depth, especially if you romanced Anders. I mean, you build a relationship with him over years, he commits a heinous act, and you don't yell at him at all? Your options are: a) it's all good, b) get out of my sight, c) or knife in the back? There should have been some emotional exchange first, and then the choice. It just felt rushed, and very anti-climatic. So, this is my attempt to rectify what I felt was lacking, with a real twist. I'm sure some people will like my twist, and some will not. Oh well…can't make everyone happy all the time.

Reviews are like Coke Zero out of the fountain…I can never have enough!

Disclaimer - Dragon Age, its characters, and the "The Final Straw" dialogue belongs to Bioware. I just felt incomplete after seeing it, and tried to fill in the gaps.

In the Dark

It was sadly funny and really honestly very pathetic that as I stared at the back of my lover's head, all I could notice was that a lock of his hair had somehow escaped the confines of its ponytail. I was aware that my fixation was a feeble coping mechanism—a stray piece of hair was something I could easily remedy—the hellish inferno that burned in front of me was anything but. I had seen death and destruction all too often in my life, but this was different. The sheer brutality and scale of the magic used was intimidating and terrifying. I had never experienced anything like it, and I was born around magic and into a family with mages. It was a horrific sight: bodies were strewn around, thrown by the force of the shockwave; tongues of fire raged and danced throughout the compound.

Almost nothing could have made this atrocious scene more painful to absorb and deal with, except that I knew it was orchestrated by the only man I had ever dared to love. I couldn't reconcile my Anders with the one that had committed this magical massacre. The man who held me at night, who healed my wounds, could not be the same man who unleashed this massive firestorm on the Chantry. This Anders had condemned hundreds of innocents in the name of mage freedom, by incinerating them all—templars, mages, sisters, even the Grand Cleric herself. This Anders had lied to and manipulated me in order to carry out his crazed scheme. This Anders, who sat before me on a crate amongst the madness, was a fraud, a meager imitation of the man that I knew and cared for. I could feel the fury spreading through my gut, like the burn from a shot of dwarven fire whiskey, because I had been tricked by this doppelganger.

I was about to demand that he attempt to explain himself when he began, "There is nothing you can say that I haven't already said to myself. I took a spirit into my soul and changed myself forever to achieve this. This is the justice all mages have awaited."

"This is what you call justice?" I scream. "Your brand of justice for mages involves killing hundreds of people whose only sin was being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Lying to loved ones? Manipulating your comrades? Using me as an unknowing accomplice, a distraction to carry out your evil plan under everyone's noses? It does not sound like justice—it sounds like the act of a foolish coward."

His eyes narrowed a bit in response, but he did not speak. I continued, "You don't even trust me. I might have understood, if you'd only told me."

He sighed and stated, "I wanted to tell you. But what if you stopped me? Or worse, what if you wanted to help? I couldn't let you do that."

I shook my head in disbelief. "You couldn't let me help you? Who the hell do you think you are fooling, Anders? Not me, but maybe yourself. You have involved me in this madness under false pretenses since its inception. You asked me for help to obtain the Sela Petrae and drakestone and lied about their uses. Then, you guilted me into speaking with the Grand Cleric, using me to distract her while you laid your filthy trap. You pulled me into this all along, and only decided not to tell me what you were planning because it's easier to be a lying, conniving bastard in hiding."

He flinched at my words, and I saw him clench his fists. I knew I was beginning to get through to him, so I continued my attack. "Tell me, Anders. Have you always been a deceitful snake-in-the-grass? All your words over the years of love and gratitude, were they convenient lies as well? Did you bed me because you cared for me, or because you wanted the Champion aiding your cause?"

I almost relented then, because this wretched semblance of my Anders looked so sad, so beaten, sitting there. He replied softly, "I have loved you all along, as I still do, and will do until I draw my final breath. But, this has become bigger than just you and I. I can not just think of myself any longer. I have lived as a free man, not trapped in the Circle, or bullied by templars, because of your help. But, I still live in constant fear of being caught, waiting for the day when your status can no longer save me. What of all the mages in Thedas who don't have someone like you, Marian? What are they to do? Live in cages in the Circle and suffer abuse at the hands of the people sworn to protect them? The world needs to see this. Then we can all stop pretending the Circle is a solution."

He took a deep breath, and exhaled slowly. "And if I pay for that with my life…then I pay. Perhaps then Justice would at least be free."

"Of course," I sneer in contempt, "That is who you would be worried for. Not yourself, and the fact that you could die for your crimes. Not me, the woman who has stood behind you all along."

I spit it out with all the venom I had, "Justice. That is all you will ever be concerned for. Your twisted, warped view of what you believe justice is."

I felt my hands begin to tremble with rage, and I balled them at my side. "You have massacred hundreds of people ruthlessly and in cold blood, many of which never harmed any mage. You want to pay for what you've done with your life? But, your pay is insufficient—you are a mere shell of the man I proudly called an ally. Even your motives are suspect. I believe that you would like to die, but not to pay. You want death so that you can claim to be a revolutionary who gave all for his cause."

I lowered my head, and sighed deeply, "With all that said… I still can not bring myself to kill you."

Í felt my eyes well up, and a single tear slid down my cheek. "Know this, Anders. I really and truly loved you. I gave you everything I could—my support, my bed, and my soul. I trusted you and you betrayed me. I will no longer protect you, but I can not be the one to take your life. You will not become a martyr at my hand."

I leaned down to him, so that my lips were right next to his ear. My next words were for him alone, and I wanted to ensure that he heard them as clear as a bell.

"You said there was nothing that I could say to you that you had not already said to yourself. You were wrong. I am with child."

He spun around to face me while quickly getting to his feet. He looked shocked, confused, but his face seemed alight with a cautious glow. A few moments ago, this half-empty husk of the man I adored looked resigned to his fate, sitting on a crate, waiting for death. Now, for a fleeting second, I caught a glimpse of my Anders. He was reinvigorated, animated—maybe even hopeful. He reached out to me, "Marian, I…"

"Do not touch me. You are no longer the man I knew. Get out of my city. Now that you know, exile will be a fate worse than death for you. You made your choice, and now I have made mine."

I turned to the others, "Come…we are going to end this. To the Gallows."

I looked over my shoulder at him once last time, and left him standing there to accept his fate. He could be concerned for justice. I had someone other than him to be concerned for now.