The Stolen Throne:

The Calling:
Maric steepled his hands together and considered. He hadn’t wanted to tell Loghain, but it seemed like he had no other choice. “Do you remember the witch we met in the Korcari Wilds?” he began. “Back during the rebellion, when we were fleeing the Orlesians?”
Loghain appeared taken aback, as if he hadn’t expected a rational explanation. He hesitated only a moment. “Yes. The madwoman who nearly killed us both. What of her?”
“She told me something.”
Loghain looked at him expectantly. “And? She babbled many things, Maric.”
“She told me that a Blight was coming to Ferelden.”
He nodded slowly. “I see. Did she say when?”
“Only that I wouldn’t live to see it.”
Loghain rolled his eyes and walked a step away, running a hand through his black hair. It was a gesture of exasperation with which Maric was well familiar. “That is a prediction that almost anyone could safely make. She was trying to scare you, no doubt.”
“She succeeded.”
He turned and glared at Maric scornfully. “Did she not also tell you I was not to be trusted? Do you believe that now, too?”
There was a tension in that look, and Maric knew why. The witch had said of Loghain, “Keep him close, and he will betray you. Each time worse than the last.” It was the only one of her pronouncements to which Loghain had been privy, and obviously he remembered it well. Perhaps he thought that if Maric believed one, he believed the other. Loghain had never betrayed him, not to his knowledge. It was something to keep in mind.
“You think it’s a coincidence?” Maric asked, suddenly uncertain.
“I believe this witch was serving her own purposes, and would lie about what ever she thought con ve nient. Magic is not to be trusted, Maric.” Loghain closed his eyes and then sighed. He shook his head slightly, as if what he was about to say was madness, but he opened his eyes anyhow and spoke with conviction. “But if you truly believe that the witch’s warning has merit, let me be the one to go into the Deep Roads, not you. Cailan needs his father.”
“Cailan needs his mother.” His voice sounded hollow, even to himself. “And he needs a father who isn’t . . . I’m not doing him any good, Loghain. I’m not doing anyone any good here. It will be better if I’m out there, helping the kingdom.”
“You are an idiot.”
“What you need to do,” Maric ignored him, “is to stay. Look after Cailan. If something happens to me, you’ll need to be his regent and keep the kingdom together.”

第一次背叛应该是指卡崔尔之死——洛根隐瞒信件这事是他干的我最想砍他，也是我在领主大会有时会砍他的真正理由

第二次背叛其实我不太理解，可能是指奥斯特加？但感觉那说是背叛凯兰合适，但说是背叛马瑞克并不合适
也不大可能是指跟洛纹的关系

“You are a king,” Loghain said harshly. “You will need to make a decision.”
The two of them stood there in uncomfortable silence. Maric leaned against a wall, folded over with his hands on his knees as if preparing to become sick. Loghain looked at him from across the room, keeping himself cold and reminding himself that this was necessary.
The candle on the table guttered dangerously as the sound of rain increased outside. The winds were blowing in from the ocean, and bringing with them a freezing storm that would chill the entire coast before morning. The seasons were changing. By the end of the month, there would be snow again. Either the rebels acted before winter settled in or they would be able to do nothing until spring.
So they waited.
It did not take long. The door to the study creaked open, and Katriel quietly entered from the dark hallway outside, having maneuvered carefully past snoring soldiers. She was in traveling leathers and drenched from the rain, her blond curls clinging to her pale skin. Her long cloak dripped onto the floor.
Katriel paused, immediately becoming aware that something was amiss. The tension in the room was palpable. Her green eyes flicked from Loghain on one side of the room, glaring at her, and Maric on the other, standing up straight now and looking pale and ill. She stepped inside and closed the door behind her, her expression deliberately neutral.
“My prince, are you well?” she asked. “I would have thought—” She glanced back at Loghain suspiciously. “—you might be asleep. It is very late.”
Loghain said nothing. Maric walked toward her, his emotions playing across his face. He was tortured by his torn loyalties; even Loghain could see that. Maric took Katriel by her shoulders and looked into her eyes. She seemed passive, almost resigned, and did not flinch away from him.
“You went to Denerim,” he stated. It was not a question.
She did not look away. “Then you know.”
“What do I know?”
Grief filled her, or was it shame? Tears streamed down Katriel’s wet face, and she would have pulled away if Maric did not hold her there. She sagged as if the strength had drained out of her, but still she did not look away from Maric’s fierce gaze. “I tried to tell you, my prince,” she whispered, her voice thick with emotion. “I tried to tell you that I wasn’t who you thought I was, but you wouldn’t listen. . . .”
Maric’s mouth thinned as he clenched his jaw, and his grip on her small shoulders became visibly tighter. There was seething fury in his eyes. “I am listening now,” he said, each word enunciated carefully.
Her eyes swam red with tears. They said to him: Don’t make me do this, Maric. It doesn’t have to be this way. And he ignored them, answering with tears of his own. Loghain looked on gravely and did not interfere.
“I am a bard,” she said reluctantly. “A spy. From Orlais.” When Maric did not respond, she continued. “I was brought here by Severan, the King’s mage, to find you, to bring you to him, but—”
“And what of West Hill?” Maric asked, almost too quietly to hear.
Katriel shrank as he towered over her, crying pitifully, but still she did not look away from him. “It was me.” She nodded.
Maric let her go. He released her shoulders almost gingerly and stepped away, sick horror on his face as he looked at her. It was true. All of it was true. Maric turned from her and looked toward Loghain, twisted up with agony and tears freely streaming down his cheeks.
“You were right,” Maric muttered. “I have been a fool.”
“I’m so sorry,” Loghain told him gravely. He meant every word.
“No, you’re not,” Maric gasped. But there was no venom in his words. He turned away from Loghain and made to walk away, his gaze falling on Katriel again. She stood there, vulnerable and shaking, crying as his gaze went from horror to disgust, and then calmed to icy rage.
“Get out,” he spat at her.
She flinched at his words, but did not move. Her eyes were hollow and hopeless.
“Get out,” he growled, more forcefully. Slowly Maric drew his dragonbone longsword from its scabbard, the glowing runes overpowering the faint candlelight and filling the entire room with an icy blue tint. He held the deadly sword before him in an overt threat. His whole body shook with a seething rage.
Ignoring the sword between them, her anguished eyes fixed solely on Maric, Katriel began to slowly walk toward him. “You said you didn’t care who I was before, or what I had done.”
Maric went cold, his eyes narrowing as he backed away from her. “I trusted you, I . . . believed in you. I was willing to throw it all away.” His voice broke, and he gulped back a surge of grief-stricken tears. “And for what?”
Katriel nodded and continued to walk toward him. “If you believe nothing else, my prince,” she whispered calmly, “you must believe that I love you.”
“Must I?” He raised the sword sharply to bar her way. “You dare.” He set his jaw firmly, refusing to retreat any farther.
She stepped forward again, her eyes solemnly fixed upon him. Letting out a scream of blind rage, Maric rushed toward Katriel with his blade raised high. The runes pulsated as he halted in front of her, sword poised over his head. She didn’t flinch, didn’t retreat, didn’t attempt to stop his swing. She merely stared at him, tears coursing down her cheeks. He lowered the blade to his side, his knuckles white as his hands shook.
He couldn’t stand to look at her, but couldn’t look away.
Katriel closed the last distance between them to gently touch Maric’s face. She said nothing. His whole body began to shake violently. With a cry of anguish and rage he threw off her hand and suddenly ran her through. His sword barely made a sound as it cleanly passed through leather and then flesh. Katriel gasped, clutching at Maric’s shoulders as he embraced her, her blood gushing out over the sword’s hilt and his hand that held it.
Maric stared down at her, his hateful expression dissolving into disbelief and horror. The moment stood suspended and still, Maric exhaling in a burst as he realized what he had done.
Katriel gasped again, and this time bright blood rushed out of her mouth, spilling down over her chin. She looked at Maric with eyes wide, tears flowing freely, and she slowly collapsed as the strength ran out of her. Maric caught her, still not letting go of his sword.
He looked over to Loghain. “Help me! We have to help her!”
Loghain, however, remained where he was. His expression was grim as Maric and Katriel continued their slow descent to the floor, but he made no move to approach them. Maric’s expression of horror only grew as he realized Katriel was already dead, her lifeless eyes still staring into his.
He began to shake. Convulsively he let go of the longsword and scrambled away from her on the floor. Blood was already beginning to pool beneath her, and she folded forward like a limp doll. As her body covered the blade’s bright runes, the room sank into shadow.
Maric shook his head. He lifted his hands and saw that they were covered in blood, dark and black in the dim light, and he stared at them as if he could not quite comprehend what he had done.
The door shook as someone pounded on it. Several voices could be heard outside, and the muffled voice of a soldier asking if all was well could be heard.
“Everything is fine!” Loghain shouted. Not waiting for a response, he crossed the floor toward where Maric sat. He put a hand on Maric’s shoulder, and Maric looked up at him with wide, bleary eyes. “Stop,” he said. His tone was firm. “She betrayed you, Maric. She betrayed all of us. This is justice.”
“Justice,” Maric repeated hollowly.
Loghain nodded grimly. “Justice that a king must dispense, whether it pleases him to or not.” Maric looked away, but Loghain shook his shoulder roughly. “Maric! Think of the days to come. How much justice will you need to hand out, when you sit on that throne? The Orlesians have dug their fingers in deep, and you will need to pry them out!”
Maric looked dazed. He shook his head slowly. “You and Rowan both told me what she was, and I refused to listen. I should not be King. I am a fool.”
Loghain slapped Maric, hard.
The ringing sound of the blow hung in the air, and Maric stared at Loghain in shocked disbelief. Loghain crouched down, his face close to Maric’s and his eyes intensely ablaze. “There was a man,” he whispered in a bitter voice, “a commander among the Orlesians who sacked our farmhold. He told his men to take whatever they liked, and then laughed at our anger. He found it amusing.”
Maric looked about to speak, but Loghain held up a hand. “He said that we needed to be taught a lesson. They held us there, me and my father, and made us watch as he raped my mother.” He shuddered. “Her screams were . . . they are burned into my mind. My father raged like an animal, and they knocked him out. But I watched it all.”

Loghain’s voice became hoarse and he swallowed hard. “The commander killed her when he was done. Slit her throat and then told me that the next time we forgot our taxes it would be death for us all. When my father awoke he cried over her body, but it was worse when he saw me standing there. He left and was gone for three days. I didn’t know until he returned that he had followed after the Orlesians and had killed the commander in his sleep.”
“That was why we had to flee,” Loghain sighed. He closed his eyes for a long moment and Maric simply stared at him silently. “He was a wanted murderer. He thought he had failed her, failed me, but not for one moment did I ever think that what he did to that Orlesian bastard wasn’t justice.” He gestured to Katriel’s slumped corpse. “Tell me, Maric, that her treachery didn’t call out for blood.”
“You wanted this,” Maric realized, his voice quiet.
Loghain looked him in the eyes, unrepentant. “I wanted you to see the truth. You told me you wanted to win this war. This is how it must be. The alternative is to be done in by treachery just as your mother was.”
Maric looked at him reproachfully but said nothing. Absently he wiped his hands on the floor, and uneasily got to his feet. Loghain stood and watched him, but Maric only turned and stared helplessly at Katriel’s body. It remained slumped where it was, a great red stain on her back where the sword pierced her, and a pool of blackness around her.
He looked sickened. “I . . . I need to be alone.”
Maric stumbled to the door leading to his bedchamber and quietly went inside, shutting the door behind him. Loghain watched him go. Outside, lightning flashed again and lit up the darkness.
Rowan stood at her window, restlessly watching the lightning.
The patter of rain against the stone eased her nerves, but it couldn’t make her want to sleep. Her muscles ached from the days of marching and fighting, and while her wounds were healing nicely, they itched under their bandages and threatened to drive her mad. She assumed that Wilhelm would want to see to her injuries personally at some point, but she almost wished he wouldn’t. Some scars are deserved.
When the knock came at her door, she didn’t respond at first. The chill wind blew in through the open window and tugged at her nightgown, and the lightning flashed again. She felt the rumble of thunder that followed in her chest, and for just a moment it filled up the emptiness. It felt good. It felt right.
The door opened, hesitantly at first, and then he walked in. She didn’t need to ask who it was. Taking a deep breath, she turned and watched Loghain as he closed the door behind him. His grim expression said a lot.
“You told him,” she said.
He nodded. “I did.”
“And? What did he say? What did she say?”
Loghain seemed uncertain, pausing for a moment to choose his words carefully. She didn’t particularly care for that idea and arched a severe brow at him, prompting him to hold up a hand. “Katriel is dead,” was all he said.
“What!” Rowan’s eyes widened in shock. “She didn’t return? Did the usurper—?”
“Maric killed her.”
Rowan stopped short, stunned. She stared at Loghain and he stared back at her, his icy blue eyes unswerving. Certain things began to fall into place, and her heart went cold. “You told Maric everything, didn’t you?” When he didn’t respond, she marched up toward him angrily. “You told him that Severan has put out a price on her head now, that she must have—”
“It doesn’t change anything,” he stated firmly.
She shook her head in disbelief. Loghain was all ice and sharp corners now, staring at her like a man whom she didn’t even know. She tried to imagine what must have happened, what Maric must have done. She couldn’t picture it. “Loghain,” she could barely get the words out, “what if she really loved him? All this time we thought she was just using him, we thought she could hurt him—what if we were wrong?”
“We weren’t wrong.” Loghain’s look was intense, and he set his jaw stubbornly. “She did hurt him. We thought she was a spy and we were right. We thought that she had been responsible for West Hill and we were right.”

Rowan took a step back from him, horrified. “She saved his life! She saved our lives! Maric loved her! How could you do this to him?” Then she realized the part she had played in this. It was her scouts who had spotted Katriel sneaking away. She had conspired with Loghain to have her followed, had kept the information from Maric to prove that her suspicions were correct, and they had been. But Katriel had surprised her, too. Even so, she had let Loghain go to confront Maric alone. Despite everything that had happened, the thought that Maric might forgive her, that Maric might choose her . . .
“How could I do this to him?” she breathed, sickened.
Loghain strode toward her and grabbed her by the shoulders, his fingers digging in. “It is done,” he snapped. He stared down at her, his face steel, and for a moment she was reminded of the moment at West Hill. She had rushed to him to make the decision she could not, and he had made it. They had abandoned their men and run to do what they felt they had to.
“Rowan,” he began, his voice filled with anguish, but then he banished it completely. “It is done, and it can go one of two ways now,” he stated. “Either Maric wallows in self-pity and is no use to anybody or he realizes that being a king and being a man are not always the same thing.”
“And why do you come to me, then? It’s done, as you said.”
“I cannot reach him now,” he said evenly.
It took a moment for her to realize what he was suggesting. “But I can,” she finished for him. She stepped away from Loghain, her eyes narrowing at him, and he let her go.
5楼、6楼和这层，卡崔尔之死以及洛纹跟洛根的对话
@林中宁芙