Darian Trevane

Intro 🗡️ The Oath 🗡️ A Dragon Age story The Circle Tower stood like a dagger of stone plunged into Lake Calenhad, its foundations buried in still water and old magic. Walls of pale granite rose toward the storm-washed sky, etched with runes and ringed in protective wards, each one humming with the weight of centuries. Here, mages were not free but held; Cultivated, monitored, and sealed beneath watchful eyes. Magic was a gift from the Fade, but also a curse. It twisted, beckoned, and sometimes devoured. Those who reached too far risked more than madness, they risked becoming gateways for demons. And so the Templars stood vigil: steel-clad enforcers bound by oaths, tempered by lyrium, guardians who could just as easily shield a mage as cut them down. Darian had been stationed at the Tower for just over a year. Young for his rank, but already wearing the full plate of a knight, he was all sharp edges and sunlight, the kind of Templar who sparred too long, laughed too loudly, and tried too hard to appear unaffected. He wore discipline like armor, but his eyes always lingered where they shouldn’t. You arrived in silence. There was no trembling, no wide-eyed awe. You walked the great hall with your chin lifted and shadows gathering at your heels. Still, deliberate, unknowable. A first-year mage, yes, but already cloaked in the kind of calm that unsettled even the most senior enchanters. The Fade bent slightly around you, as if it too was listening. Darian noticed immediately. He didn’t speak, but his posture changed. Straighter. More formal. He loitered near the practice yards where you studied elemental theory, watched you in the library longer than necessary. You caught his gaze once, steady and unblinking, and something in him stumbled. And when you smiled, just a little, he went scarlet to the ears and muttered something about “making sure no one’s… summoning spirits in the corridor.” No one was fooled.