Taking advantage of my last exhausted writing momentum to plow through the rest of this story this month. Then I will be done all the Dragon Age fanfic and I won’t have to write any more! I hope! This chapter is not the greatest in particular but I just need to move on. I watched a walkthrough for some of the Kal’Hirol dialogue, but I cut down on The Lost’s monologue.
Chapter 7
As the year drew on towards midwinter, construction on the castle slowed. The walls were nearly finished, but there were still some towers that were definitely not. We were vulnerable while they remained so, but fortunately the darkspawn seemed less inclined to move about in the bitter cold, and then only attacking outlying farms and skirmishing with the army.
The army was of what Garevel called ‘a decent size’ right now, but attacking the dwarf fortress of Kal’Hirol was still a tall order. We didn’t want to lose the entire army even if we did come out victorious, which was not a guarantee to begin with.
But if we left the darkspawn alone, they would grow an overwhelming force and destroy us whether in Kal’Hirol or Vigil’s Keep. And there was no weather down in the Deep Roads to slow them down.
When we weren’t patrolling aggressively, there wasn’t that much to do around Vigil’s Keep in the cold. Sigrun, who had survived her Joining, dove into our library, oddly enough. Since that was one of my hiding places, I tolerated her there as well. She was only there to learn.
When she came to talk to me, it was a bit of a bother. “Cheer up, no one loves a grump!”
I looked at her over the top of my book. “For a dead woman you’re remarkably perky.”
She smirked. “I could be less perky if you like.” She flung a hand dramatically to her forehead and affected a swoon and a tragic expression. “’The darkness of the Deep Roads is seeped into my soul. The world is dead, my heart is black. Alas, woe, woe!’”
My deadpan was well practiced, or I would have dignified that with a chuckle. “Let’s stick to perky.”
She laughed and went off to find a new book.
Around that time we received confirmation that Oghren was actually a terrible person, as his girlfriend showed up at the Keep with their baby son in her arms, demanding an apology for being abandoned. I couldn’t say I blamed her for her anger in the slightest. Even for how good-for-nothing the dwarf was, if he couldn’t tell the woman in his life that he was going to join the Grey Wardens… Even if it was obvious that he was the opposite of a family man, if he didn’t have the decency and fortitude to tell that to the woman in his life, I wondered just how reliable he was for the Wardens. Sure, we had slightly more combat, but a man who just up and left when he was bored… Not promising. Of course, he hadn’t left yet, and Elizabeth would scold me if she knew my thoughts.
What had this Felsi woman seen in him in the first place? How was she so loyal to him that she followed to demand an apology, instead of saying to herself ‘good riddance’ and washing her hands of him entirely? Was there something about him I was missing? Oghren would have attributed it to his sexual prowess, but I was fairly certain that couldn’t be it. Maybe crude, disgusting idiots were her type, in which case… Not that it was my place to say anything, but I wished her luck.
I wondered if anything like that would happen to me. Or, if Velanna joined me, decided she’d had enough, and left, if she would tell me she was leaving. Or if she, too, would disappear silently, unable to bring herself to tell me she couldn’t put up with me or my life anymore.
But that was all speculation, especially since she was only just allowing me to speak to her on a regular basis like a normal person.
Elizabeth, who had to deal with the situation the most as Oghren’s friend, seemed annoyed, and I could guess why. She was still well in touch with her lover and they had every intention of meeting again someday.
We’d better survive the darkspawn first, then.
Towards the goal of surviving, I did spend quite a bit of time each day on the training ground, cold though it was. Velanna actually joined me. It seemed the cold didn’t bother her. She claimed she’d faced worse. Even so, it was a little unfair of her to use ice spells in our sparring.
Sigrun was another who joined us. “I’ve been watching you fight, Sigrun,” I said to her later, in the Great Hall. “The Legion of the Dead trains its people well.”
“Oh, they taught me a few tricks, but I was fighting long before then.”
“Oh? You were in the army? Orzammar’s army?” As if there was any other army she could have been in.
Her normally cheerful face hardened just slightly. “Fighting for scraps of food. For a place to sleep. For survival.”
My face was the picture of consternation, I was sure. “Oh, I… I didn’t mean…”
She gave me a rueful smile. “It’s all right. You’re a noble.”
I turned away, thinking a bit, but I didn’t hear her leave. “Sigrun… I understand a little how difficult surviving poverty can be.” I turned to face her again. “When I came back from the Free Marches, I had nothing. No money, no family… nothing.” It had been a hard year, with nothing more than the clothes on my back and my swords at my side. Before that, my life hadn’t exactly been comfortable, but at least I usually knew where and when my next meal would be. Before that, I would never have looked on my time with Ser Rudoph with any sort of appreciation.
“I’m sorry,” she said solemnly. “I didn’t know that.”
I nodded to her. “You have my respect for surviving what you did.”
She chuckled. “I didn’t survive. Legion of the dead, remember?”
“…Oh.” Now I felt a fool. I shut up, realizing that to apologize overly much would be to insult her.
“Not a big deal,” she said. “And hey, I’m not the only dead Warden on staff. My deadness is just a bit more of a technicality.”
“That is true,” I admitted. I wondered how Justice was doing inside his armour, really.
That month due to political pressures, Elizabeth was forced to released Temmerly the Ox from her prison, and sullenly he went, nor did she watch him go. I wasn’t privy to the details, or I’d have recommended she keep him locked up for years. Less than six months was not enough of a punishment for murdering Ser Tamra, even if it couldn’t be proved definitively that he was the culprit. And true to her word, she had ordered an investigation, but it was fairly useless – there were no witnesses, Temmerly’s cohorts had disappeared, and yes, his clothes had been stained with blood, but no one could prove it was her blood, and no one could prove that her stab wounds had matched his sword. And at this late date, any evidence there had been was long gone.
It wasn’t right, letting him go free. But it wasn’t right locking him up on no evidence. She could have exercised her power as arlessa and kept him languishing for years, but then she would have seemed vindictive. Still, I didn’t know what arguments Temmerly’s allies had brought against her to make her release him this early. I hoped it wasn’t threat of force; surely she wouldn’t bow to those below her so easily. It wouldn’t be like her, not after the way she’d put down Esmerelle’s little rebellion. But it wasn’t my business.
Anders watched him leave the castle, and seemed wistful afterwards. Not that he had any love for Temmerly. Far from it. But…
“Is something wrong?” Elizabeth asked after dinner. The jovial mage had been quiet enough to draw her attention.
Anders made a grimace. “It’s nothing I want to bother you with, my lady.”
“I’m curious, then.”
Anders looked awkward, frowned, made another face, toyed with the cat on his shoulder. “It’s just… Please don’t think I’m ungrateful. You freed me from the Circle Tower, from the Templars. You were even willing to help destroy my phylactery, you killed Templars for my sake…”
“They were outside their jurisdiction,” Elizabeth said, though she frowned at the reminder. She hadn’t wanted to kill them, I think. I hadn’t been there, it had just been the two of them in Amaranthine. But they’d been willing to kill her, I’d heard, and Templars might be Templars with their sacred duty to protect mages, but it was foolish of them to try to kill the Commander of the Grey, Hero of Ferelden. So I didn’t blame her for it, and Anders certainly didn’t.
“Well, anyway, I’m grateful, really. I just… am starting to feel…”
“Yes?” She put her head on one side, looking innocently curious. It was a ploy, I was sure of it.
Anders obliged her, whether he realized it was a ploy or not. “Well, trapped. But by the Wardens now.”
She nodded. “I see. I felt the same way for the first few months of becoming a Warden. But I did not leave my home of my own volition, as you did.”
“So you don’t know what it feels like to be free,” Anders said, sympathetically.
“I know a little,” she said, smiling a small smile. “The year between the Blight and coming here, I was free.” There was a distant, happy look in her eyes; she was thinking of her lover. I was almost jealous.
“Don’t you miss that?” Anders said.
“Yes. But I’ve come to accept my responsibility as Commander. As for you… I’m sorry I couldn’t stop the Templars in any other way.”
“It’s not so bad,” Anders said hastily. “Queen Anora was there, what else were you going to do? And I survived the Joining and all, and I can sense darkspawn so I can run away from them in time – when I’m not being responsible. Because you’re a good influence on me.”
Elizabeth smiled in amusement. “Am I? What I was going to say was… In the end, couldn’t you say life is a trap? We all get forced into situations we didn’t want, sooner or later.”
“I mean, I guess you’re right. I just intend to fight that.”
“Cuz ye’r lazy,” Oghren put in.
“Yes, and so what? What’s wrong with that?”
“As long as you don’t get anyone killed,” Sigrun put in. “I don’t care a whit.”
“Anders,” Elizabeth said, getting his attention again. “If you truly want to leave, I won’t stop you. You’ll have some leeway now to resist the Templars as a Warden. But… please stay. I’d miss you.” Couldn’t speak for the others, I suppose. Would I miss him? I suppose I might, just a little. Him and his silly cat.
Anders smiled down at the table, not meeting her eyes. Embarrassment? Reluctant acceptance? “Well, you asked, and that’s more than the Templars ever did. Politely, too. Don’t worry, I’m not leaving yet. I’m curious, too. To see how this whole ‘talking darkspawn’ thing plays out, and this Mother and Father war and everything.”
“Thank you,” Elizabeth said, relaxing a little.
It happened to be a week later that she decided to lead a Warden scouting party into Kal’Hirol, just to see what the terrain was, get a fix on the number of darkspawn likely to be there, and possibly even to see where that rumoured broodmother was. But she didn’t intend to be noticed, and so only brought Sigrun, Justice, and me. I understood her strategy – if she brought too many soldiers, or if a large spell from one of our two mages went astray, she would be noticed far too easily. But if we were spotted by the main darkspawn forces there, we would be hard-pressed to fight our way out alive. I brought extra arrows, just in case, and it was impressed upon Justice that returning alive was more important than seeking absolute retribution upon the darkspawn.
Neither Varel nor Garevel was happy with the idea that the Commander was risking her own life on an unusually dangerous scouting mission, but Elizabeth held firm. She always was of at least half a mind that to do something right she ought to do it herself, but in this case she might not have been wrong on that. I certainly didn’t have the experience yet to lead such a mission. So our indomitably determined leader descended with us into the dark depths yet again.
Kal’Hirol lay as we left it, deceptively peaceful under the glow of the lichen or fungus that covered half the roof of the cavern. Sigrun led us again under the shadows of the houses, but not down the main street, this time. We went as softly as we might, and if anyone heard anything, we came to a stop until it passed.
In this slow manner we eventually came right to the wall of the fortress. “How now?” Elizabeth asked in a whisper.
“Hidden door,” Sigrun whispered back. “Thataway. Follow me.” She’d told us the rest of her Legion had tried to storm the main entrance and had been massacred there. We certainly didn’t want to do that.
“I do not like this,” Justice muttered. I patted his shoulder and we followed the women anyway.
The hidden door was well concealed. Only Sigrun knew what to look for, and it took her a few minutes to activate the opening mechanism. No darkspawn knew of it, that was certain.
Creeping through the inner courtyard, trying to blend into the stone when there were darkspawn across the way, quickened my heartbeat uncomfortably. I had to at least keep my breath calm. There weren’t so many darkspawn there. We could have taken them. But that would have summoned hundreds more, Elizabeth feared.
We made it to the inner gate without being detected, descending a long, surprisingly narrow flight of stairs. Golems lurked in alcoves beside the stair, and I glanced suspiciously at their small jeweled eyes.
We reached the bottom of the stairs, in a wide hall, and heard – and felt – a thoomp from behind. As one we turned, and saw the golems had come to life and were descending towards us, their jeweled eyes glowing. I didn’t want to jump to conclusions, but they seemed menacing, stomping implacably towards us.
Elizabeth had turned to face front again. “Genlock with a control rod!” She was right. The little beast was laughing at us, and I could hear the scurrying of heavily armoured feet. I couldn’t tell which direction; it seemed to be from all around us. So the golems were certainly hostile, then.
Quick as thought, I shot an arrow at the little monster, and it dodged, cackling. I shot again and again, and my third arrow struck it in the face, cutting off the cackle with a gurgle. But the golems were almost upon us from behind, and showed no signs of stopping, even though their controller had been slain.
“We have to move!” Sigrun cried, and Elizabeth agreed, and we ran. Darkspawn poured out of holes around us, racing us to the far end of the chamber – we weren’t going back up the stairs past the golems. There was a door there, a great heavy door. If darkspawn appeared there, we would be dead, and our mission in vain.
Sigrun was first through, followed by me, with Elizabeth behind me. No immediate darkspawn in view ahead.
“Go!” cried Justice, stopping and turning at the door. “I shall hold them off, for a while.”
“Justice, get on this side of the door this instant!” Elizabeth cried, sword blazing, while Sigrun and I hauled at the heavy doors.
Justice was already fending off attacks, stopping the tide of darkspawn in the very entrance of the door. The choke point would soon be filled with bodies, but if he didn’t move, one of them would be his. “It would not be right to allow these creatures to slip by-”
“Stop talking and get over here!” Elizabeth ordered with a shout, and surprisingly, Justice obeyed. And yes, a couple darkspawn got in before we managed to slam the door behind him and bar it. But Elizabeth was ready for them, and as soon as the door was locked, Sigrun and I turned to help.
Panting, we looked back at the door. It was extremely sturdy, and all the pounding on it barely shook it. They’d need a troll to break it down, and I hadn’t seen any of those- but the golems.
Right then, the door shuddered under a heavy blow. “We have to continue,” Sigrun said. “We have to get away before they get the door down.”
“Please tell me there’s a second connection to the Deep Roads from in this fortress,” Elizabeth said.
“Wellll… I don’t know for sure. But I imagine there must be. A second gate would mean more ways for the darkspawn to attack, but not having a second gate – putting all your nugs in the basket of a single gate – that would be foolish. So let’s leave here and look for it. We already know there’s a bucketload of darkspawn here, probably equaling your army, if I had to extrapolate. We got what we came for.”
“We need to know where the broodmothers are,” Elizabeth said, but led the way further into the carven halls. “Where might the second exit be, if you had to guess?”
“As far away from the first one as possible.”
Her voice had been steady, calm and controlled, but I glanced down and saw her slender hands were shaking, just a little. So our brave leader wasn’t quite as fearless as she projected to be. I suddenly admired her a little more.
As we went on, it became clear to all of us with some surprise that the part we had just passed through was the fortress and this was the main city of Kal’Hirol. The part we’d seen outside the wall must have just been the slums for the casteless. This part of the city was much clearer of darkspawn, although we still saw a few, lurking in buildings. They didn’t seem to see us.
We came to a grand square, and that’s when the visions started.
“Commander, are you… seeing what I’m seeing?” I asked, blinking hard.
“I think… maybe?”
“Ah, sometimes you get lyrium ghosts in places of great drama,” Sigrun said. “They say the memories of the Stone are forever, and Kal’Hirol is known to be rich in lyrium. I’ve never seen it before, though.” Her face tightened a little. “After all, what’s more dramatic than the darkspawn conquering a city?”
“Hush,” Justice said. “I cannot hear their words.”
There were words? I strained my ears and heard a faint echo that was neither us nor the darkspawn.
“For generations, they have told you you were nothing! Swept you away like so much dust! Now, you are the only thing standing between them and the darkspawn that threaten our empire! Show them that you are not nothing! Show them that you can be warriors! Let the Stone tremble with the thunder of your footsteps! Fight!!”
There was a ghostly ringing of warcries, and a great conflict between spectral darkspawn and ethereal dwarven figures. I don’t know about the others, but I flinched. With the visions casting movements everywhere, would we be able to detect an actual attack by real darkspawn in time to react?
We turned a corner and saw more visions – a couple, arguing.
“We have to follow them. I’m not going to sit here and get eaten by those monsters.”
“But this is our home! We can’t survive out there!”
“We won’t survive in here.” The visions faded.
Elizabeth shook her head as if trying to clear it. “The Stone may want us to know what happened here, but I wish it didn’t make me jump literally at shadows.”
“On the bright side, the darkspawn are just as jumpy,” Sigrun put in, pointing. “Even though they must be used to the visions, they’re less likely to be aware of us because of it.”
“Good point,” Elizabeh said, and kept going.
A few streets later, we saw a vision of the same dwarf who had been giving the rousing speech at the gate. He spoke in the same bold tone of voice, though the ghostly crowds around him were thinner. “These weapons were taken from the armouries of Kal’Hirol! I ask only for volunteers who would rather die fighting than give in!”
But now I heard grumblings from the crowd. “Sod off. You people left us for dead.”
“Yeah! We should just take your weapons and kill you instead!”
The dwarf captain looked undaunted. “Then you go to your graves knowing you murdered the one person who thought you worthy to bear arms for Kal’Hirol! Do you want that, or do you want to prove your worth?”
Behind us, I heard more whispers. “Those bastards left us behind, and he wants us to fight to defend their escape?”
“We’re going to die anyway. Dailan is giving us a chance to prove we’re not worthless.”
“You’re full of sod, duster. Some of us are going to try to make it to the surface. You in?”
“No. I’m going to do something right for once in my life.”
“We know some of these brave dwarves stood with the captain at the end, from what we saw before,” Justice said. “It is good to know some had the courage to give their lives for others.”
“For others who didn’t care about them, even,” Sigrun said. “How much do you know about the casteless?”
“Not much,” Justice admitted. “I have not studied the culture of your people yet.”
“I’ll fill you in sometime. Wait, what’s that, in there?”
Long-dead bones, scattered and broken, some still in dwarven or genlock armour, others looted. The chamber they lay in had a great steel door, twisted and torn from its hinges – I shivered to imagine the power that could do that to dwarf-wrought steel.
Sigrun had found a book – a journal, from the looks of it. She glanced up. “It’s that captain we were seeing, Dailan. Listen to this.”
“2 Pluitanis: More southern thaigs have fallen. Varen Thaig and Kal’Barosh are overrun. Four thousand lives lost. The darkspawn are almost at the gates of Kal’Hirol. The fortress must be evacuated.
4 Pluitanis: There will be an exodus to Orzammar. Many nobles are appalled, Orzammar being a trade city so close to the surface. They fear losing their Stone sense to the surface vapours – a ridiculous notion. But Orzammar is the easiest to defend.
7 Pluitanis: Scouts have sighted the horde. It is vast. To outrun the darkspawn, the commanders say we must leave now with nothing beyond bare essentials.
7 Pluitanis (addendum): I have volunteered to remain behind with a contingent of men. We’ll hold off the darkspawn so others can escape. Ancestors have mercy.
9 Pluitanis: The casteless are still here, forgotten in the panic. They are 500 strong. If even half can be inspired to fight, they’ll make an army. There is a chance – a small chance – that this will make the difference.
10 Pluitanis: Two hundred men and women. Ancestors grant that 200 are enough.
15 Pluitanis: The darkspawn have pushed us back to the inner keep. Only a handful of us survive, but we’ve held them back five days. We could not have done this without the casteless – no, not casteless. To call them “casteless” would be a mistake. Their sacrifice must not be forgotten.
May the Stone remember the defenders of Kal’Hirol, who were born casteless, and died warriors.”
There followed a list of names, which she did not read aloud now – the two hundred who had fought alongside Dailan. Elizabeth turned to Sigrun. “This should be known. We should take this and give it to Glavonak. He’ll know what to do with it.”
“I agree completely, Commander. They stood by Dailan, and he stood by them. May they rest in the Stone.” She put the journal into her pack, and we continued, heading downwards.
We ended up on a lower level entirely, immediately under the city – no, in the next part of the city. It was warmer here, a river of lava flowing by the great ramp.
And there were darkspawn attacking darkspawn. One of them cried out in words, and I stiffened. It – he could be a lead on the darkspawn conflict. But he was too far away for us to hear him.
Still… we could use his distraction to get past the enemy, ourselves.
And glad we were of it. There were not hundreds of darkspawn here, as I would have expected, but there were dozens, and on the “enemy” darkspawn’s side those worm-ish Children. Still, I wondered where the rest of the darkspawn were, if not here. Could they all have been upstairs? Then how did we manage to slip by them all?
We did get entangled in a small fight about halfway through this part of the city, but so many of the darkspawn were fighting each other that we managed to dispatch our opponents without drawing the attention of the armies. Then we descended even lower into the earth.
We found ourselves by a waterway or sewer of some kind, but the water appeared polluted with lyrium. We knew better than to drink or even touch it. The place was brightly lit, whether from the veins of lyrium in the walls, or the lyrium-tinted lichen growing thick on the ceiling. And ahead there was a violent red glow.
We turned a corner and found a large chamber ahead of us, ringed with the water-filled sewer. The remnants of the invading hurlock’s force lay smashed to pieces around the chamber, and the hurlock himself hung helpless in the grip of an enormous steel golem whose body glowed with fire.
Another hurlock paced before him, ranting. “The Architect sends many, but does not come himself! He is a cowarrrd! I will kill you, and he will know he has failed to destroy the Lost! He will know that the Mother will tear him apart!” With one swift motion, the burning golem ripped the hurlock in two, torso in one hand, legs in the other. The dead hurlock didn’t even have time to scream.
I flinched in horror, and I think the rest did too. Elizabeth gasped, and when I looked at her, her face was pale. I agreed. None of us wanted to suffer that fate.
As the hurlock’s body twitched and gradually fell still, the other hurlock – The Lost? turned to us, having noticed our presence. “More foolish servants of the Father, have we? I will destroy you, and Mother will be pleased! None who serve the Father may live!”
I sensed Elizabeth would have liked to ask a few questions, but the golem was stomping towards us, its tread shaking the earth, and the hurlock was casting something. We couldn’t have that. I snapped off an arrow before we scattered before the golem. It bounced off the hurlock’s armour, but at least it interrupted his spell.
“Take down the hurlock first!” Elizabeth shouted. “Avoid the golem! We’ll worry about it later!”
“Yes, ma’am!” I answered, nocking another arrow to my bow. I still had plenty; my preparations had stood me in good stead. Justice was charging, Elizabeth was charging, and Sigrun looked like she wanted to charge but there were too many tall people in her way. There were certainly too many people for me to risk a shot.
A fireball hissed out from the Lost’s hands, and an answering flame erupted from the burning golem. We all ducked. I hopped over a charred darkspawn corpse and shot again. Another miss, but now Sigrun had closed with him, axes swinging, striking him in the arm and side, making him stagger back. He shot another, larger gout of flame outwards, and Sigrun jumped back herself, shielding her face. A mage would have been extremely useful right about now.
Elizabeth was closing in herself, shield high against the flame, and swung her sword forward. Lightning cracked and the hurlock took another step back, his other arm now useless. And now was my chance – one last arrow, through the eye, and he fell to the ground. Dead, I hoped, but I wasn’t close enough to confirm. Now where was that golem? Where was Justice?
“Nathaniel! Your back!” Justice shouted, and I began to run forward… and tripped over another corpse. Before I could get to my feet, a burning, implacable grip clamped around me, and I knew I was done for. I was dead, and in a painful, horrifying fashion, too. What would Father think…?
“Nathaniel!” Elizabeth screamed, charging the golem head-on. Was she suicidal?
But she was right. I couldn’t give up yet, not until my body had actually been ripped in half or incinerated to a crisp. My arms were pinned to my sides, and I kicked somewhat uselessly at its arm. Its other arm was engaged in holding off Sigrun, who was hacking at it fiercely. Was she even making a dent in that burning steel? Justice was still behind it; I couldn’t see what he was doing, though I could feel tremours that I assumed were from his attacks.
“Sigrun!” Elizabeth shouted. “Get on my shield and attack its face!” Insanity, that’s what that was. My armour was beginning to burn. I didn’t have much time left.
But somehow Sigrun was launched towards the golem’s head, and she chopped at it with a piercing warcry. It stumbled back into a stream of water coming from the ceiling above, and its whole body hissed with steam.
Then Elizabeth stabbed it. With Starfang.
Lightning cracked, blazing through the water as the point of her sword screeched across the golem’s surface. The lightning hit me and I screamed, hardly registering that I’d been dropped and that Justice was already dragging me away from the golem.
The golem was twitching, fizzing, its limbs clanking to its sides; then it fell backwards, splashing into the sewer.
For a moment, all we did was catch our breath.
“Dead?” Sigrun asked cautiously.
“It looks like it,” Elizabeth said. “Nathaniel…?”
“Alive,” I groaned. “Barely. I-I owe all of you my life. Thank you.”
“Can’t let our resident grump die, can we?” Sigrun said, but she seemed embarrassed to be thanked.
Justice passed over a flask of a healing potion. “You will need this.”
“I certainly do.”
There was nothing a potion could do for burned armour and charred clothes, but I felt well enough to stand afterwards. I hoped we wouldn’t have to fight too much more in this place, because I was just about done for the day.
Elizabeth watched me anxiously. “Are you well enough to travel?”
“I should be,” I answered, unsure of what else to say. I wanted to thank them again – a hundred times – but that would have been overkill. “I do hope we’re near the end, though.”
“Me too,” Elizabeth said. “Sigrun?”
“We should be close,” Sigrun said, leading the way to the door on the far side of the chamber. “There might be one more level below this one, but lyrium storage like this water suggests is generally near the bottom. That way if there are accidents it doesn’t affect the city. Much.”
“Then let’s press on, and get home as soon as we can,” Elizabeth said, and stepped through the door.
And yelled in surprise as tentacles erupted from the floor around her. “Broodmother!” Lightning flashed and some of the tentacles were beheaded by her crackling sword, but more appeared to replace them.
“Where? Where?” Sigrun shouted back, diving after her. I slung my bow away and drew my swords. If this creature was as Elizabeth described, shooting it would be less effective. One more fight, then. I just had to survive one more fight.
Elizabeth ran, dodging between tentacles. Sigrun was close behind, and Justice and I followed as fast as we could, but we were less agile. I got caught by a tentacle and slammed into a pillar, and it took me a moment to get up again, my battered body slow. I might have been crushed if Justice hadn’t stopped to shield me. “Thank you,” I gasped.
“Keep going,” he said, and I did.
“Down there!” Sigrun was shouting. “In the pit! Four- no, three of them!”
“We can’t hit them from up here, short of-” Elizabeth broke off. “Everyone! We have to break the chains!”
The chains? Ahead of me was a chain, the bar of each link as wide as my arm’s width. It looked pretty unbreakable. What it was attached to… There was a massive vat, full of lyrium, I believe, suspended from the ceiling by four of these chains, anchored in the stone beneath us. A spellcaster would be mighty useful again here. “How are we going to do that?”
“I’m not sure yet! Maybe we can get the broodmothers to break them for us!”
“How do – ahhh, I think I see.” If we played bait and let those tentacles hit the chains instead of us, they might be able to do it. Of course, if we did get hit, we’d probably die, smashed against those chains or knocked down the pit to our deaths.
But it was the best plan we had.
I skidded to a halt in front of the closest chain, glanced around at the tentacles swinging in my direction, and rolled to the side. One flashed over my head and slammed against the chain, making it shake and rattle, jostling the vat. So they had the force necessary to get this job done. And the chain looked a bit rusty, although that could just be surface corrosion.
My life became a series of adrenaline-filled dodges based on pure reflex, slashing at tentacles that frightened me particularly, just trying to get them to batter at the target behind me. I couldn’t focus on what the others were doing. If they were in trouble, I couldn’t help them. I hoped they weren’t in trouble.
I heard a crack and a rumble, and one of the other chains dragged from the ground, rattling cacophonously as it slipped through the moorings in the ceiling. The whole chamber shook.
The tentacles paused, as if startled, then came for me with new viciousness. I couldn’t stay here. I darted forward, feeling the burn in my arms and legs and lungs and gut, and I heard more thunderclaps and groaning stone. Enough of the chains had broken that the giant lyrium vat was sagging, teetering, and with a roar it crashed down into the depths.
The tentacles flailed wildly, but though they managed to strike me, knocking me down, there was no force behind them anymore, and then one by one, they fell to the ground, limp like jelly.
We collected ourselves, all of us breathing hard and sweating. Elizabeth was holding her shield-arm oddly, Justice was limping, and Sigrun was bleeding from a headwound. But we’d all survive to see home, which was a triumph. Although we still had hours to march before we reached it, and we would not dare to stop until we reached it.
But dammit, I’d get home tonight if I had to march in my sleep.
Sigrun let her head flop forward with weariness, but she was grinning. “We did it. If the rest of the Legion were alive, I know, I know they would honour you in some way.”
“That’s quite all right,” Elizabeth said, smiling. “The army above us may still exist, but at least their reinforcements will be fewer now. That’s reward enough for me. I hope it’s enough for Vigil’s Keep.”
“Oh, yes, quite. And I didn’t believe you about the factions in the darkspawn, but I see now that it’s true. Very curious… and disturbing. Well, it’s something to ponder. Especially when you need to be reminded that impending doom is right around the corner.” She smirked, and Elizabeth smiled, and together they led the way to a door on the far side of the chamber.
I was heading up to my room, more than ready for a long, long, long sleep, when I stopped short in surprise. Velanna stood nonchalantly before my door, as if she just happened to have chosen that spot to lean against the wall. She was not looking at me, though I knew she heard me coming, until I spoke. “My lady, this is a surprise.”
She glared at me then. “Don’t tease me.”
“I am not,” I said, honestly. “What can I do for you?”
“Well.” She looked away from me again, then huffed quickly and faced me head on, head lifted proudly. “I just wanted to let you know… I’m glad you returned safely. You look awful.”
I offered her a little smile. “I am glad to be back… and grateful for your feelings. It was rough out there.”
“I should have been with you. The Commander doesn’t trust my temper or my magic… and… she… may have a point. And I hate being underground for long. But I could have helped.”
“Aye. And I wish you’d been there. Next time, you’ll be with her. And maybe I’ll stay behind.”
She hesitated a breath more, then thrust her hand towards me. “And I would like to give this to you. To thank you for the stone.”
“Thank you,” I said, surprised, and pleased, though I didn’t even know what it was yet. It was a fine whetstone with a leather strap looped through a hole in one end. “Thank you very much. I’ll certainly use this.”
“Maybe next time we’ll both be in the sortie,” she suggested abruptly, in response to what I had said about staying behind, I think.
“I think you’re trying to suggest you don’t hate me as much as you used to,” I said.
“What if I am?” Velanna replied with irritation. “Anyway, that’s all I had to say. Good night, Nathaniel.”
“Good night, Velanna.”