Dramatis Personae - Canon relationships (updated for Witch Hunt)

[boundinblood]

A Hero's Allies (and enemies)
			Alistair Alistair almost single-handedly changed Katherine’s entire outlook on life. They collided in precisely the right way at vulnerable moments where they needed one another most, in the midst of trials that had broken her mold, and nothing was ever the same. Where she was once self-serving, though not unkind, her reluctance to hurt Alistair or cause him to disapprove of her has seen to her internalizing a more altruistic, giving personality. She had once considered herself unlovable due to her aloof nature and perceived ugliness, and Alistair changed that, too, when they fell in love. In spite of the Circle mages’ generally liberal attitudes, Katherine’s self-perception and extreme focus on her studies led to this being her first relationship, romantically and physically alike, and it brought an understanding she had never bothered to pursue before (she had never been uninterested, after all, merely believed herself undeserving). Her mood heightened overall, she found a new beauty in not only love, but life itself, and she emerged from the most rigorous of her journey’s ordeals a better person than she had been when she left the Circle. In return, she did everything she could to help him, whether it was serving his own desire (in avoiding the throne), or acting against it for his benefit (in coaxing him into Morrigan’s ritual, however much it hurt her to do so).
			Morrigan In Katherine’s mind, Morrigan is who she could have been, had Alistair not become the hand to reshape her in the events following the two most major upheavals of her life, and this perception is not stayed any by the evidence before her eyes, the lapse in what she sees as the same walls that had begun to form around her own heart when she thanked her for her help. Because of this projection, Katherine cannot hate Morrigan as her lover does, instead tolerating her at worst. She even likes her, both as a fellow mage and as the person who saved her and Alistair’s lives when fate demanded one of them die. She even sees an extra, perhaps unintended kindness in the ritual, a hope to heal the Archdemon’s corruption instead of simply destroying it, an idea that resonates strongly with a member of a class faced with the terrifying threat of a corruption of their own. The friendly reception she got in front of the Eluvian has slightly changed how she perceives their relationship - where she believed Morrigan distrusted her inherently, she now knows Morrigan sees her as a friend, allowing her to drop any wariness against it from her end.
			Thunder Without Thunder, not even Alistair’s considerable influence would have taken root. When she had been wounded by betrayal too often, too quickly in succession, Thunder was the stability of unquestioning loyalty. She took the wardog with her almost wherever she went, and his presence provided a “safety net”, someone who would always protect her even if someone else tried to attack her. Even when she came to trust others so completely, like Alistair and Wynne, she was rarely seen without Thunder at her side. Ultimately, she allowed Denerim's kennels to hold him for breeding while she went to deal with the situation in Amaranthine (and subsequently Amgarrak).
			Leliana At first, Katherine didn’t know what to make of Leliana. The claim that the Maker had sent her to help her and Alistair seemed crazy, but she did intervene in a battle that she could have easily avoided, and she was just starting to feel the renewed security of her hound’s company, so she allowed the former bard to come along. How ironic that someone whose life was built on deceit came to be one of her handful of totally trusted companions – now how did that happen? Her friendly personality and candor about her previous life helped, but the defining moment was actually a puzzle: On their quest to find the Urn of Sacred Ashes, the bridge puzzle became a trust-building exercise as they shouted across the chasm to coordinate their movements, and on Katherine it worked like a charm. Leliana’s patience through it all was the final nail in the coffin for any lingering distrust (and her piety probably helped – the Chantry does, after all, oversee the mages).
			Zevran Where Leliana proved Katherine capable of trusting someone of a shady background, Zevran is the counterpoint, the reason why it is not always true. He tried to kill her, and wounded Alistair and Leliana, two people she had come to call friends, as they rushed to her defense. Though she spared his life with the promise he would make himself useful, that was not easily forgiven, and even though she sympathized with his problems as she sympathizes with most, sympathy is not trust. Ultimately, she did not trust him enough to bring him close, meaning he never came to trust her, either, and when given the opportunity to return to the Crows, he took it and attempted to kill her again, and this time she and her companions showed no mercy.
			Wynne Kind and maternal, an elder mage of the Circle that Katherine grew up in, Wynne is like the mother she never had the chance to grow up with. If Morrigan is who she could have been, Wynne is the metric by which she measures where she is going. She doesn’t want to be exactly like her, but considers that the general “right way” to go, and was all too happy to spend more time with her in the months of peace she and Alistair shared in Denerim after the Blight.
			Oghren Like an inversion of Zevran, Oghren is the opposite of shady. Straightforward and a reliable fighter, he simply followed the team out of Orzammar even though they killed his wife. Katherine saw no reason not to let him come along, though some of the things he’s said to Alistair about their relationship when he thought she couldn’t hear him have been appalling. (He does nothing to her legs, but what she does with them in their tent is none of Oghren’s business!) She would not take him along without one of her “absolutely trusted” companions, but found him dependable enough to watch their backs in the final battle. Ultimately, his demeanor led to her not wanting to learn much more about him – he is the only recruited companion who did not have his quest completed. This pattern held true even when he followed her to Amaranthine and joined the Wardens under her command - she got along with him easier than she had before, but not well enough to earn his trust in his family issues. Considering he drank poison for her, she's come to see him as a friend.
			Shale Shale was only found after Katherine had learned about the way golems are made. Immediately, by virtue of what she is, Katherine felt sorry for her. That and that alone was the rationale for bringing her along, and she didn’t regret it. While she didn’t earn the level of trust Alistair, Wynne, and Leliana had, Katherine wound up liking Shale as an acquaintance and ally, and if she had been given just a bit more time, might have begun to warm up to her as a friend.
			Loghain Nothing hurts Katherine more than betrayal. Loghain’s betrayal was the least directly personal, but it was the most complete, including dragging the reputation of her order through the mud along with killing their king and everyone on that battlefield. He hurt countless people, had innocent men imprisoned and tortured to protect his good name. He is one of the few people Katherine has ever had an outright desire to kill (as opposed to killing in self-defense or perceived self-defense). She is sorrier for Anora losing her father than for killing him, though his calmer, saner behavior at the end caused her to waver. She might have spared his life had Zevran’s betrayal not been so fresh.
			Jowan And here’s the traitor that kicked off the plot for her. He exists in a bit more of a gray area as compared to Loghain, because he was Katherine’s childhood friend. When she was a small child screaming for the mother she’d been taken from, it wasn’t one of the older magi that brought her about, but another child – Jowan. His betrayal cut deeper than any other in her life, and if Alistair can be said to have “softened” her, Jowan is the one who “hardened” her in the first place. She was torn when she encountered him again, one of the roots of the problems in Redcliffe. She thought she had gained closure for her mistake in helping him when she turned him over to the Circle again, but when she found Irminric, captured and tortured by Arl Howe simply because he had been the one to capture Jowan, who wouldn’t have been out there had she not helped him destroy his phylactery, the wound reopened. The mistake she made at the very beginning keeps returning to haunt her, even though Jowan is not her enemy, and should they ever meet again, one of them no doubt Tranquil now if he is still alive, it will hurt tenfold.
			Queen Anora Loghain was right about one thing: Ferelden had a strong leader all along, in Queen Anora. Her problem wasn’t with a Theirin not being on the throne (indeed, being raised in the Circle of Magi all her life, she didn’t much care), it was with Loghain’s influence on it. With him dead, she trusted his daughter, who seemed like a good person at heart and a capable leader, to keep Ferelden together without being of Calenhad’s descent. Better, she thought, than putting someone who didn’t know how to rule and didn’t want the crown under that sort of pressure just because of his name. She feels bad for her loss, and while Anora insisted it “could have been” different, Katherine disagrees. Loghain’s influence would have been intolerable.
			Anders In Anders, Katherine sees someone a lot like herself. She didn't have the same difficulty with the Circle's environment that he did, and certainly not the same hatred of templars, but when Templar Rylock demanded he be turned over after he helped her party clear the Architect's darkspawn out of Vigil's Keep, it struck a chord in her. Whatever wrong he had done, he had helped here, and had shown a genuine desire to. It was too much like the situation she faced after attempting to help Jowan escape. Just like Duncan conscripted her away from death or Tranquility, she felt the need to rescue him from Rylock. She bonded with him almost immediately, being able to commiserate with his pains without being a complete echo chamber (she had fond memories of the Circle as her home, after all), and he's even managed to sway her a little from what casual devotion she might have to the Chantry, though not through his own actions. It was when Rylock tried to take him away again as if he wasn't a Warden, setting a trap with the promise of his phylactery as a lure. Feeling trouble brewing, between this and Wynne's news of one of the Fraternities wanting to pull away from the Chantry altogether, she wants to find both their phylacteries to save them from whatever is coming. Anders fills a role that no mage in her original party did: the peer. Morrigan was an outsider. Wynne was a mentor and maternal figure. Anders is in a similar age group and grew up in the same environment. That's easily part of why this friendship blossomed as quickly as it did. She's fiercely protective of him as someone she rescued from a situation he wanted out of (sort of like Jowan if Jowan hadn't been a blood mage, actually - she hasn't made that connection consciously, however), and if she can, will defend him from harm.
			Nathaniel If anyone had told her the son of the sadistic Rendon Howe would have been her second-closest friend among her recruits, she would have been equal parts offended and incredulous. She probably would have laughed at them. While she may not have the personal claim to hating the name a Cousland cousin-Warden might have had, the things she saw in his dungeons, most importantly the poor templar who just happened to be the one to catch Jowan, were enough. All the same, there was a sincerity in his voice when he said he no longer wanted to kill her, and she trusted her companions if he did, so she allowed him to take the items he came for and leave. You'd think, given Zevran, she would have sent him on his way again when he came back, touched by her mercy. Oghren even invoked that same incident. And yet, he didn't have the same tone as Zevran. It might be because of his nobility, but there was something more sincere, more inherently trustworthy about the way he said his words. She let him join her party, let him Join the Wardens. It's hard to distrust a person who agrees to drink poison for you in the first place, and in Nathaniel she found a soft-spoken man with a good heart, fighting against the deeds of his father. If she attributed the deeds of a person's father to themselves, after all, she would not have allowed Anora to keep the crown. His struggle to clear his name of deeds he personally had no hand in resonated with her in much the same way Anders attempted to compare himself and Nathaniel - mages constantly fight preconceptions, after all. (His reaction, however, to Anders's comparison, meant she never brought it up, herself, even if a bit of persuasion from her might have convinced him to see Anders's point of view.)
			Velanna Katherine wishes she could have gotten to know Velanna better. Everyone she meets seems to have a theme of missing family to find, enough that she's begun cautiously looking for information on her own (enough to have discovered they aren't from Ferelden at least). In any case, with Velanna's sister a ghoul that nonetheless helped her, she was hoping there could be a proper reunion yet. She was hoping that such lucidity was a good sign for everyone, and maybe having her sister back would have retracted Velanna's thorns a little. She reminds her a little of Morrigan, actually, but a little more guileless. It's an interesting, and endearing combination.
			Sigrun She likes Sigrun, actually. She reminds her of the wide-eyed wonder she saw the world with after leaving the Circle, a little, except perkier and more open about said wonder. Her withdrawal from people after the Mother's death has her worried, but ultimately, she doesn't know her well enough to prevent what's coming. Katherine doesn't seem bothered by the fact that Sigrun considers herself already dead, and even framed joining the Wardens as "well you'll die fighting darkspawn anyway". She accepts Sigrun's view of herself and the world and wants her to be satisfied with the end she gets.
			Justice Justice is another person unfamiliar with the world, but unfamiliar with it in an entirely different way than Sigrun or herself - everything is new, right down to the basic stability of existence. Seeing the world through a spirit's eyes, so to speak, is an interesting perspective, and one she wanted to hear more of. Hearing firsthand what the mortal world is like from the Fade is something that intrigues her as a mage, and uncovers things about the world she hadn't even thought about. Unfortunately, this can no longer happen. She's impressed with his desire to make things right with Kristoff's wife, and did what she could in opening dialogue between them. At least Justice's departure means Aura has her husband's body to mourn.