I Just Noticed That Lavellan's Eyes Well Up With Tears The Moment Solas Starts Sobbing

Eldest of the Sun. All-Father.

Ghilan’nain’s Elvish

People seemed to enjoy the psychic bitchfight post so I figured I’d do one for Ghilan’nain’s lines in the ‘Siege of Weisshaupt’, too. Once again, I'm no expert, all glory goes to to [ FenXshiral ], and remember this is a vibe-based language so results vary with context, inflection, speaker and so on.

In the lead-up to the boss battle, First Warden Jowin will show up to take Davrin’s place as final sacrifice, only to be snatched up by Ghilan’nain before he can deliver the blow. After remarking on the quality of his blood, Ghil rips out his heart, turns it into an archdemon strength buff, then drops the used-up Warden like hot garbage. A moment later Wyrm!Razikale emerges from the moat to start the fight.

Ghilan’nain has two lines in this cutscene:

“Lasa hedallin ghellara”

(Spoken either to or about the First Warden as she manipulates his blood/heart).

Lasa = grant/allow/give

hedallin = blood of a noble kill/sacrifice; blood of [your] defeat

1. hel/hell (adj. noble, moral, just) + dala (v. kill, destroy) + lin (n. blood, person m.)

or 2. [hela (v. contest, oppose, fight) + dala (v. kill, destroy)] + lin (n. blood, person m.)

The use of ‘noble kill’/‘blood of your defeat’/‘sacrificial blood’ feels very deliberate here. Just before Ghilan’nain grabs him, Jowin recites the Grey Warden motto, “In war, victory! In peace, vigilance! In death, sacrifice!” . She’s throwing his words back at him, saying his ‘sacrifice’ would’ve been a waste... she'll put it to better use. She even taunts Rook with this later in the fight: “Witness! A Warden’s blood to birth your own destruction.”

ghellara = [my] beast more strong

ghe (n. monster, beast, creature) + elvara (v. to make difficult, hardy, sturdy, complex; from adj. elvar) + el (more, much, many. Used as a superlative) + ara (pron. sb. poss. my)

= “The blood from your sacrifice will strengthen my beast.”

"fenathra mellas”

(Spoken as Razikale’s transformation completes)

The natural assumption is fen = wolf, which would result in: fen (wolf) + ath (embodiment of) + ra (prn. it) or ara (my, possessive), making it, ‘the wolf’ in a kinda roundabout way. More like, “that wolf guy” or even, "my wolf guy" instead of a name or title. But I don’t think Ghilan’nain is invoking Solas or "the wolf” here. He isn’t an opponent at this point in the game, and neither her nor Elgar’nan see him as a real threat anyway. Additionally, the way she says the word ‘fenathra’ is quite soft — almost wistful — especially by comparison to the deep, guttural, delivery of, “mellas”. I think the root word she’s using here is actually ‘fenor’.

She calls Razikale her greatest creation. She mourns her death; pitifully telling Elgar’nan that Rook took her away. Razikale is more than just important to her — she is the very embodiment of the word 'precious'.

fenathra = My Precious One

fenor (precious) + athe (used to change the meaning of an existing word into, ‘physical manifestation of’, or ‘embodiment of’, eg. “the dead” from death) + ara (my)

Mellas = Allow now / Go!

melana (adv. now, in relation to ‘time’ or ‘when’) + lasa (v. grant, allow, give, let - imperative verb form)

= “Go, My Precious One!”

I've been working on her remaining lines for several days now and am currently tearing my hair out about it, but I will add them to this post as a reblog once I finish!

As a bonus I'll throw in Solas' dialogue to Davrin when he briefly joins your party at the end of the game.

Dialogue source: Solas Interaction with All Companions [ x ]

"Mala shivanas ar athim"

mala (your) shivana (to do one’s duty, conjugated) ar (I) athim (humble, humility)

The Elvish scans in Solas’ Hallelujah cadence, so I preserved it for the translation.

= “I am humbled by your duty," or, "Your sense of duty humbles me"

Dragon Age: The Veilguard | ▶ dev. Bioware

Rook: Gee, I wonder what Solas felt about these things we see in his regrets, such mystery, big mystery, lets put all of our minds together and see what we can come up with! Solas in every painting:

Rook: I've got nothing.

(I know it's about POV, I know it's A Choice, I still find it funny.)

Sometimes it seems to me that after the game they wanted to show villain stand-ups. I don't know how else to explain these.

Elgar'nan?

That did not go as planned. I had such high hopes. I would lay the blame at Fen'Harel's feet. As usual. His plans never work out, so he insists on no one else's plans working out. He wouldn't even leave my designs for my temple alone. Structurally unsound, he said. "What's holding up the top fifty floors?" Magic. Obviously. "What if someone falls off?" (Groans) I don't care, Solas. Elves can fly. "What do you mean, elves can't fly?" The Venatori were also disappointing, I have to say. Ten percent dogma, ninety percent chanting, zero percent execution. Excellent footwear, though. I swiped this fur-lined slouchy boot for slumping around the kitchen. So cozy. No. Ghilan'nain's not to blame. She's still torn up about Andruil. I know it's been a thousand years, but that's eternal love for you. Touching, really. I'd shed a tear, but the plumbing's been blight-clogged for centuries.

the 'vallaslin are sacred to all elves ✋️😔 not just the Dalish' tattoo dialogue is so weird but if I write an essay explaining why I fear I'll combust and die

URGENT!!!!! can anyone find the image from the art book of an inquisitor's gloved hand reaching out to pet a small dread wolf's snout???? i can see it so clearly in my mind but cant find it in my tags and @kraujuota must witness it

cadash being able to dream because of the anchor, not knowing how to dream, even, and solas, visiting her in these dreams in harmless forms to see what it is exactly she will dream about--- an experiment of sorts. what will a dwarf conjure up in their sleeping hours when they can? where will they go?

and then he is confronted with the fact that among the visages of the people she has met so far, he is in every one of them. that, more often than not, her dreams are simply images of his eyes while he looks to the sky, or the way his ears catch the sunlight on the plain, or the movement of his hands when casting a spell, all surrounded by echoes of his words, his voice poignant and precise. beautiful recreations of moments stolen when he wasnt paying attention, each one more reverent than the last. a creature that has discovered escaping to the Fade in their sleep for the first time, having the opportunity to explore its rich environments and histories, and yet she is content merely to bask in the memories of him.

love all the concept art of lavellan just touching solas' chest. finally the answer to his ass grabbing

I feel like something that’s obvious but nobody’s actually pointed out is that the Blight (which we now know to be corrupted Titan spirits/Titan nightmares) perpetually creates darkspawn to replace the dwarves. The dwarves used to be some kind of vast, populous hivemind before they were severed from their dreams/the Titans, and the Titan’s spirits were separated from the Stone, yeah? Dwarves practically WERE an extension of the Titans until that point. Point to Inquisition dialogue where Solas describes them as a “severed arm”. But once those two separations happened, the Blight had to create new bodies to maintain the structural integrity of isunatoll/the song, now that the two were separated. The darkspawn are a lesser hivemind because the Blight/the Titans no longer have access to the dwarves. And the darkspawn are typically mindless + hostile because the severed spirits/dreams that are attempting to pilot them have gone mad with rage from the sheer violence and isolation of the mutilation they’ve experienced. It’s astounding writing and worldbuilding. But in Veilguard all we got was “oh the darkspawn aren’t people” :) :) :)