what does fear say to solas in the fade

Solas is, I believe, one-half-mad, and existing in a waking nightmare. Nosotros alibi our choices in "In Hushed Whispers" because that world "isn't real." But, well, to Solas...? Neither is this one .

ALICE:He was part of my dream, of course — merely then I was part of his dream, too.
—Lewis Carroll, THROUGH THE LOOKING-GLASS

FELASSAN: They're stronger than you retrieve, you know.
—Patrick Weekes, THE MASKED EMPIRE

I've been writing several posts almost Solas and his romance over the past few weeks, which means that I've also been thinking a lot well-nigh dreams, and about Solas'south powers within the incredible and richly textured dream-world of the Fade.

I've been thinking peculiarly difficult on how his long sojourns in that location may have impacted his waking life and actions in Inquisition, as well as upon how they may also accept impacted his sanity.

After all, if yous think about it, at the starting bespeak of the events centered around Dragon Historic period: Inquisition, later on his long sleep, Solas may take spent more of his life in the Fade (by a sizeable margin) than in the real and waking globe. He has nearly certainly spent most of the last 8,000 years there—in a world where all cognition is accessible to him, where he tin shape his reality, his landscape, his environment, with exquisite item. Where he has total command and wields an unbelievable amount of ability.

Once Upon a Dream

Simply a dream-world is as well notable for other aspects. A dream is a dream is a dream. The lighting is a niggling rosier. The air is sweeter. In that location's no sweat or blood or dirt or bad breath in a dream. All the little rough spots smoothed over. All the ugliness—even in the nightmares—simplified.

Function of me even wonders if Solas's first kiss with the Inquisitor takes identify in the Fade considering, well, everything and anybody is prettier at that place, easier to take. If he has been thousands of years without a touch upon living skin, of a kiss upon the lips of a living woman, it'due south no wonder that the Fade buss is his easiest entrance into waking life merely when he's finding the real earth at all palatable.

Even time would be flexible in the Fade, as time doesn't matter in dreams, after all—it speeds or slows equally needed. Distance is every bit irrelevant. All that matters is perception, emotion, feeling. And ability—dreams are incredibly powerful, and we are often incredibly powerful within them, ourselves. And we aren't even dream-masters.

And then is information technology any wonder that Solas enters the stage with a massive superiority complex? This is someone used to things going his way, someone who has spent most of the past eight chiliad years in a universe that he can control, control and shape to his volition. His visible disgust with the globe in which he finds himself, in the start, is therefore not so much a symptom of Solas's bigotry every bit it is of his difficulty with acclimating to the real world, likewise as of his open yearning to go dorsum to where things make sense.

No wonder all Solas talks virtually when nosotros first meet him is the Fade. He's homesick.

The Place of Ability

To me, it'south all also understandable that Solas is, to some degree, fond to that world of dreams in which he wields then much power—non least considering it lacks the limits imposed by the concrete world.

Information technology's likewise why I think he speaks of the Fade with such longing and frequency when we first encounter him, as well—he's left that beautiful kingdom where he holds such supremacy and command, and for the past year or 2 at present has plant himself walking a world of waking nightmare. He would love to go back, but he has things to do hither in the ugliness of reality... things he would rather not exercise.

Lucky for Solas, then, that all he has to do to go through this interlude is to tell himself that this is simply another, more than distasteful dream. (Note: I'thou not the commencement to posit this, so shoutout in particular to this mention of the idea—which I deliberately didn't read until I'd written this postal service, considering I wanted to brand sure I'd kept my ain POV clear beforehand.)

Solas's brutal capacity for tough choices is due, in no minor part, I believe, to his belief that the earth he walks through after
awakening from his long sleep isn't actually real. Merely one possible universe among many.

The Nightmare Reality

The matter is... I call up this is the key to who Solas is when we meet him. He may be walking in the living world, merely his mind is still back in the Fade. And then is his perception of the reality in which he finds himself—and of its beings. And of the choices he makes here... and that he allows himself to make.

In other words, I recall part of Solas still feels like he'southward dreaming. The reality in which he finds himself is no more permanent than the reality of a dream.

To me, this is the single most dangerous and terrifying secret to who Solas is in Dragon Historic period: Inquisition, and even, to some extent, through "Trespasser."

Certain, Solas is by all appearances awake now. Present, living, interacting. Heseems awake. But I recollect he'southward still acting similar everything's non quite real. Like things are child-bearing, impermanent... dreamlike. And so are lives within that reality. And so he can gamble them with dispensation.

A Task, Timed and Temporary

I've even wondered if, after wandering the Fade for thousands of years, Solas has sometimes forgotten how to tell the difference between the dream and waking worlds at all. To be off-white to Solas, his dialogue about those moments is sharp, nowadays, and keenly attuned to the situation at hand. He is certainly enlightened that he's dreaming, for case, when he visits the Fade with a romanced or high-approval Inquisitor.

Doesn't thing. I notwithstanding think Solas is, always then slightly, not in his right mind. He'southward certainly (justifiably) traumatized, and I'd argue that he'due south also become destabilized and unbalanced by the calamity he unleashed, and all he can do now is pull himself through the unpleasantness and pain of the waking earth while thinking feverishly of the all-time manner to discard this reality and bring back the universe where things made sense.

This is too why I believe he's and so at-home when sent physically into the Fade... because I call up at that place'due south literally nothing the Nightmare can say to upset him there.

He'south lived it all, a one thousand nights or more already. A thousand, thousand nights. And he remembers every moment. And every time, I guarantee that he tells himself, "It'due south non existent." As a reminder. As condolement. Whenever these pesky fragile creatures get to him. Whenever they make him call back they may have lives and feelings of their own.

Conversations with the Nightmare

It'south e'er interesting when you've played DAI at least once, to play through afterward on and to see the Nightmare's sly annotate to Solas. The Nightmare seems abrupt and blunt, barely trying. As if information technology recognizes (as it should) that it cannot sway this particular object.

The Nightmare speaks to Solas: "Dirth ma, harellan. Ma banal enasalin. Mar solas ena mar din."

Which, for me, translates literally to: "Talk to me, Rebel. Your victory was zero. Your pride begins your death." I've seen some who interpret it instead as "your pride appears expressionless." But I remember given the syntax and phrasing here, that it is more than ominous than that.

I could also make a instance for "Tell me, Rebel, of your empty victory. Your pride will pb you lot to your death." I could further make a case for "Your death emerges from your pride." To me, this estimation also works better with Solas'due south response.

And Solas brushes it away most peremptorily. He responds with, "Banal nadas" ("Nothing is inevitable/certain"), but which again I feel is more Solas being sly and speaking in multiple meanings, depending on emphasis. He's not merely saying "nothing is inevitable." He'southward also, I would argue, saying that nothingness itself is inevitable, that he knows he is doomed to failure but that he tin can allow himself to walk no other path. Like, not but "We can't know anything," but alternatively, and more terrifyingly, "Zippo we do matters."

Meanwhile, no worries, either way... it's all a dream.

What is real? If yous're going to ask anyone in Dragon Historic period: Inquisition, don't ask poor Solas. I believe he hasn't a clue.

Aboriginal Elven PTSD

I think Solas was very aware of what his pride had wrought centuries before his official awakening, as he'd seen information technology all from the Fade. I suspect he thought he had mastered his reactions, that he idea he was okay about things (or that he could fix them), until his physical enkindling. When it all hit him more powerfully than he could take expected.

And hither's where I recall the temporary insanity kicked in, in hostage. Where he became focused on righteousness and restitution. His respond in fury and disbelief was simple:This isn't real.

Once he fixes things, he thinks, the world volition exist right again. The way it should be.

It's why Solas's beginning truly villainous activeness, that of getting the Orb to Corypants in order to unlock its power, probably doesn't affect him much, at first. And it should—after all, it's the first time in his entire journey when he does something that is evil and indefensible. Did he think the Breach and catastrophe of the rifts would occur? No, I don't. I genuinely think he idea Corypants would unlock the Orb, and die in the attempt. Solas would have then used the unlocked Orb to "fix" reality and restore the past.

And yet.

Sliding Doors

Either fashion, if this reality is merely temporary for Solas, much like the i in which the Inquisitor finds herself in "In Hushful Whispers," then naught he does here is blameworthy—every bit long equally he tin get back to the point where everything inverse. If he tin can reset this earth back to where things made sense, all will be forgiven. Nobody will even think otherwise.

I think it's worth pointing out that in "In Hushful Whispers," the Inquisitor never has to question whether what they are doing is correct. Her companions urge her on even at the spending of their ain lives. Death is immaterial. All that matters is 'fixing' the world dorsum to how information technology should be.

Is Solas'due south situation whatever different? He himself would certainly fence that it's not. The only divergence is that he'south not the hero of this story.

I'd but say: To his credit, he knows that.

What would information technology be like to see yourself memorialized in sculpture and vocal, to detect yourself a villain thousands of years later on
yous had attempted to free the slaves, fight for your people, and avenge the murder of the one you loved most?

The New Reality

Meanwhile, dreams are tricky things. Dreams are dangerous, ephemeral, seductive. Dreamscapes are places where nothing is necessarily permanent. Where deportment may not have consequences. Where everything is centered on us, ourselves. Where the question "What is existent?" may not affair at all.

Which makes it richly ironic that ane of the greatest lessons Solas must learn in the story ofDragon Historic period: Inquisition is the nature of reality; and that the beings he meets in living Thedas are as real, vital and worthy as those of the civilization he has lost.

I mean, yes, it'due south an obvious lesson for someone to have to learn, particularly given Solas's brilliance, simply then again, the brilliant are often the near blind. Solas has spent thousands of years trapped in his ain dreams (and nightmares), then awakened, traumatized, to the terrifying and disturbing fresh realization that he'd doomed what he tried to salve, killed what he tried to protect, and that he was now naught more than a joke, a maligned and forgotten relic—a simplistic villain, hated past his people and used as a warning to frighten naughty Dalish children.

And when he approaches those very Dalish, the vestiges of the elven people in this terrible new reality, they turn him away. His virtually loyal friend and lieutenant is dead past his ain paw. He'due south no longer a ruler, a rebel, a wolf, or a god—at to the lowest degree, non in this place. And at offset, he'southward and so weakened later his long slumbers that he's barely even a mage anymore.

And he'south solitary—more solitary than he's ever been.

That's a hell of an awakening.

Is information technology whatever wonder that, trapped in his ain waking nightmare, Solas speaks of the Fade with such yearning? That he
holds himself solitary and autonomously?

Dawning Sensation

This is why I tin forgive Solas, especially early on, for the water ice of his condescension, and for the rage of his own regret and powerlessness. Is it any wonder he speaks of the Fade with such yearning? That he holds himself solitary and autonomously?

Then the dream softens. His trauma begins to heal. He begins to permit himself to be vulnerable, to react to things, to feel things. Everything changes when he meets the Inquisition... when he recognizes Cassandra's faith, Balderdash's vulnerability, Varric'due south credence, and Cole'southward compassion. When he watches the people of Thedas and recognizes their backbone... and how they decline to submit—even to a world raining demons.

And nigh of all, he changes because ofher... when he allows himself to fall in beloved. And he simply allows that all-important first touch, that first moment, because it occurs where he is well-nigh himself... In the Fade. Where everything is allowed. Where everything is permissible. Where he feels safest. Where nix he does matters.

In looking back here, I was reminded of the wonderful and underrated show "Angel," and the conundrum, quoted in a higher place: "Nothing we do matters." And of the show's incredibly moving response, the but ane possible for thinking beings: "If aught we do matters, so all that matters is what nosotros practice."

It's a lesson Solas, alas, has yet to larn. Only I believe that he will. Even if he must visit a dream to exercise so. Or a nightmare.

It's where he's well-nigh comfortable, after all...

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