Even the Greatest Hero Falls
Title: Even the Greatest Hero Falls
Series: Dragon Age
Characters: Alistair Theirin, F!Cousland, Loghain Mac Tir, Riordan, Anora Theirin
Words: 1,090
Summary: Same verse as Brothers in the Night and A Hundred-Thousand Never Agains. Alistair takes on Loghain in the duel at the Landsmeet. This is that scene from the Hero of River Dane’s point of view.
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His knees hit the floor of the Landsmeet chamber seconds before his fingers go limp and his shield slides from his grasp. There’s a moment where his mind screams get up but his body says we’re too old for this and he can’t find the strength to move except to drag his helmet off.
Loghain seriously thought he could beat the boy, having barely remembered catching a glimpse of the too-familiar face at Ostagar. He’d been trailing along at Duncan’s heels like a lost puppy since the Wardens arrival and then escorting the Cousland girl around days later. There had been a softness about him there, something he shared with Cailan, and the boy’s too easy joking demeanor had him playing him off as nothing to worry about.
The man he’d just fought - just lost to - is nothing like that boy. And all he can think is that this is the son Maric should have had in Cailan.
A year of fighting Maker only knows what while he mostly sat in Denerim and tried to hold things together has hardened the boy that was. His sword never hesitated in its strikes and Loghain’s head still rings from where the Grey Warden shield clashed against his helmet earlier. Even before the fight started, he could tell there was something different about the boy as he stood next to the Cousland girl. There was something harder in his face, the lines drawn starker and hazel eyes gleaming in a way that said I have seen, fought, and killed things that would chill your soul.
He was a fool to think he could win.