Beware of spoilers for games which are 10, 13, and 15 years old and whose endings you've likely already seen many memes about.
After so many years of waiting to hear anything of substance, Dragon Age: The Veilguard is all of the sudden almost here. BioWare is fire-hosing information at us—about its action-y combat, pansexual companions, and "mission-based" exploration—but there's one thing we really should be asking ourselves right now: Which one of these mages is going to betray my ass in the third act?
If I had a nickel for every time one of my magical companions in a Dragon Age game left me in the lurch by making some very consequential decisions I would have three nickels. That is the same number of nickels as there are games in this series. It's a whole tradition. The series often dunks us in the horrifying oppression that mages face around the world and then asks us if we'll still defend them when they lash out in desperation.
The pattern wasn't obvious immediately. As far as betrayals go, Morrigan's "dark ritual" at the end of Dragon Age: Origins almost doesn't even register as one. She doesn't even lie to your face about it and tells you straight up that she wants to conceive some mysterious "old god" child with a Grey Warden. It's just that she kinda dips after you kill the Archdemon and shows up two games later with her maybe-antichrist child trying to act like that's not suspicious.
The ending of Dragon Age 2 hits a bit harder when, even after spending years as Anders' friend or lover, the mage possessed by the former spirit of Justice (now Vengeance) goes behind your back to blow up Kirkwall's giant church. It felt like quite the twist at the time, even after watching a whole game full of mages succumbing to the temptation of powerful blood magic to fight back against the Chantry and Templars who'd oppressed them. I blame it on the other mage Merrill for her red herring dabbling with blood magic and the creepy Eluvian mirror.
Getting betrayed by Solas in Dragon Age: Inquisition is easily the most embarrassing of the three though. I should have known better by then. He lured me in with his meditative mage mentor persona, teaching the Inquisitor about the Fade and what he knows of the Veil that stands between it and the human world. I was totally gobsmacked when he pulled a Morrigan and ran off after the main events of Inquisition, turning up as the antagonist in its final DLC and revealing his identity as the old elven god the Dread Wolf.
Adding insult to injury, it turns out that BioWare telegraphed Solas' turn as early as some of the game's marketing art (above). In the reveal of Inquisition's companions, the party is displayed in a Last Supper style arrangement with Solas taking the place of Judas. At the time, more attentive minds than mine did predict his betrayal, even.
These aren't even half the times that your party members can totally throw you overboard in the series. The Dragon Age games love a good betrayal. Alistair keeps a pretty big secret from you in Origins, as does The Iron Bull in Inquisition. In DA2, Isabela runs off with a plot critical item right in the middle of the game and only comes back to help clean up the mess if you've got a high enough relationship with her.
At this rate, it's not just a question of which party member is going to betray me, but how many?
Though no class remains blameless in this series, mages are always the fulcrum of the plot and seem most likely to wield my credulity against me. Based on the list of companions for Veilguard, here are our prime suspects:
- Neve Gallus: An ice mage private detective and part of an underground Tevinter faction.
- Bellara Lutare: An elven "veil jumper" mage in Arlathan Forest.
- Emmrich Volkarin: A necromancer from Nevarra with a skeleton assistant.
It won't be Solas. He's already gotten his chance. Not only that, but BioWare changing the game's name from Dreadwolf to Veilguard, and the very early-game confrontation between him and Rook's party shown during the gameplay reveal, suggests he won't be the culprit again.
Personally, my money's on Neve right now. She's a member of the Shadow Dragons, a resistance group fighting oppression by ruling mages in Tevinter. Dragon Age games are full of mages whose road to hell is paved with good intentions and I'd bet Neve is stuffed to the stitches with well-meaning conviction.
As part of a secret faction of anti-oppression fighters, Neve is in prime position to pull an Anders in some fashion—orchestrating an explosive retaliation against Tevinter's magisters. Her credentials as a PI would also suggest she's got the skills to vanish at the end of the plot like Morrigan and Solas. At a more meta level, she seems to be involved rather early in introducing the player to the main city Minrathous, and it's totally within BioWare's ability to pull a full Scooby Doo on me by ripping the mask off one of the first people I meet in this new story.
Maybe BioWare is going to hang up the old trick of the last minute rug pull, but in a series that's always been full of complex people with conflicting agendas, I'm watching for the knife in my back either way.
