The Calling
They fought as shadows in the flickering light of the fallen torch. Edric dodged a blow and cut deeply into the hurlock's side. His blade caught the rusted armour and tore it free.
The creature shrieked at him, rotting blood ran freely down its leg and its breastplate swung, half-off from its chest. The enraged monster threw its notched blade down and came at Edric with its claws. He bashed it in the face with his shield and hammered at it with his sword. Black blood sprayed across the wall and the darkspawn slumped to the floor.
Edric stumbled forward. He caught a blow on his shield. The force of it juddered up his arm. He swung wildly and sliced messily through the hurlock's exposed neck. Edric spun about. The last of the creatures crawled across the ground, dragging its mangled leg along the stones. Edric wiped his face.
The excitement of battle that had kept his body fighting beyond his limits faded and Edric began to feel the many bruises and cuts ranged across him. He gasped for air and moved up alongside the creature. The hurlock growled and Edric brought his sword down. The blade grated against the monster's spine and then it was still.
"Done." Edric whispered hoarsely to Moire. "How many did you take? I think I'm ahead of you Mo."
Edric knelt down and examined his cut. The chainmail was rent and his leg was sticky with blood.
"Mo?" Edric asked again. He looked over and was scrambling to her, his sword forgotten on the ground. "No. No. No."
The Warden clutched at the broken arrow sunk into her stomach. She leant against the body of the genlock she had downed and took short, pained breaths.
"Moire." Edric cursed. He took her hand. "How?"
The woman took her glove away with the wet sound of sodden paper ripping. "The last one got me." She smiled ruefully. Edric brushed her grey hair out of her eyes.
"Do you want me to look at it?"
"Straight through." Moire shook her head. "I can feel it." She tried a grin. "It's uncomfortable."
"Mo." Edric took her bloody hand in his and squeezed. "Please. Don't leave me alone."
Moire slid further down the grenlock and rested her head against the creature's mangled back. "Look at this place." She breathed.
The cavernous beauty of the Deep Roads enveloped them. Their stuttering torch struggled against the crushing darkness of the tunnel. Carved with ancient Dwarven runes and so high the ceiling was shadow. Long-forgotten battles raged across the walls.
"I'm glad I saw it." Moire smiled. "The Deep Roads. An empire underground."
Edric sat down beside her. They held each other.
"You should go." Moire said finally. "More will come Ed. They always do."
"I can't leave you." Edric replied.
"Are you thinking of me or you?" Moire asked slyly. "You don't want to wander these dark places alone."
"True enough." Edric had spent almost fifty years arguing with Moire and he couldn't be bothered now.
Moire gripped the arrow bolt. She grimaced. "I can hear it. Still hear the Song. Can you hear it Edric?"
"Always." Edric replied dully.
"It's louder now. I can almost hear the words." Moire closed her eyes. "Is this the madness of the Darkspawn? To hear the song always?"
The chittering and groaning of Darkspawn sounded from the unseen depths of the tunnel.
"You should go, Edric." Moire said again. "One of us has to reach Aeducan Thaig."
"We were supposed to see it together." Edric told her.
"You shall have to tell me about it." Moire smiled.
"I can die here, with you or there, alone." Edric said. "I've made my choice."
Moire sighed. "Get my axe, at least. It's buried in that creature's head."
Edric stood and retrieved Moire's Dwarven axe, having to pull it free from the Darkspawn's skull.
He passed the cruelly curved axe to Moire. She held the weapon to her chest. "Thank you." She whispered.
Edric knelt before her, wincing at the tear in his leg. "I don't want to die down here, Moire."
Moire stroked his cheek. Edric felt the blood wet on his skin but she seemed not to notice.
"The song." Moire whispered. "I hoped it would stop before the end."
Edric wiped his eyes furiously. "Moire. Please. Don't go."
Moire smiled vaguely. "Do you think I want to?"
She paused. "I wish you hadn't come."
"I don't." Edric forced a smile. It broke over his face.
He stared at the ground. Blood pooled beneath his leg, the steady drip of it. He felt Moire's hand drop. Edric groaned. He was afraid to look at her.
Her head was slumped forward, her hair hid her eyes.
"Blessed are they who stand before
The corrupt and the wicked and do not falter.
Blessed are the peacekeepers, the champions of the just."
Edric intoned the Chant. The words were stale in his mouth. He stood and took his sword up.
The heat scalded his face. Edric brought a hand up as he edged closer to the edge of the chasm. A roiling river of magma drifted sluggishly along the bottom of the trench. It burned with such intensity that Edric shielded his eyes. The cavern was lit with the river's orange glow.
A wall had collapsed and Edric had picked his way through empty halls with toppled statues of Dwarven paragons and defaced runes. Spacious rooms lit by magma flows, engineered in ages past. The lost homes of ghosts and gnawed skeletons. Edric felt that he must be the first to wander these ruined thaigs in hundreds of years.
The Song was loud inside him. The call of the Darkspawn. His kin, Edric thought sardonically. Bound by blood, doomed to die in these twisting roads.
Edric sat on a drakestone throne, dark red as blood. He looked out over an empty court and thought of the dwarves that had abandoned these underground palaces to their new masters.
The Warden slept little. He kept on.
The four of them had set out from Ozrammar together. Edric, Moire, Fly and Dani. They each heard the Calling, the Song that would drive them mad and were told together what it meant. That their service was finished.
That the Joining was no cure.
That from the first moment the Darkspawn blood had touched their lips they were doomed to die down here.
Dani was lost first. Taken by the monsters, dragged back into the darkness. The echo of his scream remained.
Fly caught a blow to her head. The elf managed on for a time before she fell for the last time.
They buried her under the stones.
She'd spoken about an oak staff and a cedar branch before she died but they walked the Deep Roads and there was none to be found. Edric hoped her gods had found the elf and she didn't wander the tunnels still.
He caught a camp of Darkspawn unawares. A barbed arrow shot from a genlock cut into his neck but Edric gutted the monster. He slaughtered them and sat down by their fire and nursed his wound.
And then he continued on.
Thirty years he'd fought for the Grey Wardens. Devoted his life to the Order in the first years and then learned to live with himself and the Wardens in the last. He was almost fifty years and that was old where Edric came from. An accident. Exploring a cave near the village with his sisters.
Edric climbed steep steps, built for dwarves and awkward for a human to ascend. He found a fork at the top. Edric consulted the old map the dwarves had given him. He rubbed his eyes and squinted at the vellum. He chose the left way. His food was running low. His leather flask was dry and his throat itched. Edric found ancient tombs cut into the rock. He paid his respects to the warriors.
Edric licked the moisture from the walls. He wiped the damp across his parched lips.
He was naked to the waist. His flint spluttered in the stale air.
Edric clutched at his head. The Song called to him. A beating behind his ears of drums and shrieks.
The Warden slid to the ground and pressed his face against the cool, wet stone. He closed his eyes and a thought leapt, unbidden into his mind. A memory of a Chevalier he'd met tracking darkspawn near Jader. Ten years or more now. A glade they'd found and her skin against his.
Edric forced his eyes open. He pushed himself up. And walked.
Edric pulled his blade free and adjusted his grip. The darkspawn slid to the ground, gurgling pathetically. Its fellow growled, hunched over its club.
Edric thought the hurlock's wariness was justified. There were seven corpses strewn across the wide path.
Edric shuffled to his left, keeping his shield up. The creature lunged and Edric knocked its club away. He swung but the hurlock dodged the blow. The pockmarked skin of its face was pulled back tightly, revealing the contours of its twisted skull. Its lips were drawn back, two rows of sharpened teeth snapped at him. A few sparse hairs crowned the top of its head. They circled each other warily. Edric waited. The monster attacked fiercely, hammering at him but Edric kept his shield up. He waited until the darkspawn straightened slightly to take a step forward and slammed his shield against the hurlock. It overbalanced and fell backwards. Edric cut into its head. He wrenched the blade up. A shower of polluted blood. Edric sheathed his sword and stumbled on. He didn't bother to stop for rest or food or water now. He could barely hear anything but for the Song. His time was growing near.
He slipped down ruined stairs, catching himself before he dropped.
Edric wiped his face. There was a gap in the masonry that he would have to leap. Edric leapt.
He landed hard on his knee. His body was a mess now. His wounds felt dull, as though he were in a dream.
Magma heated the stones and Edric lay on the ground. He breathed deeply.
Edric's father ran towards them, shouting hoarsely. Edric raised his head, slumped against the knight's shoulder. He had heard their screams and come to their aid. But too late. His father wept when he was told.
Edric woke. He heard the the sounds of running steps on the stone. He groaned as he stood. Edric slipped down a narrow staircase. He tripped into what had once been a home. The ceiling was low and Edric was bent low. Spiders scuttled away from him and the cobwebs were thick across the room. Edric stepped over ancient toys, left on the floor. A crumbling wooden soldier and a tiny bronto.
He pushed the door open with his shoulder and stepped back out onto the Road. An arrow whizzed past his face. Edric raised his shield and the next spun away from him with a clang. The genlocks roared.
Edric charged them. He threw the first over his shield. The creature landed heavily behind him but Edric was already cutting into its fellow. The hurlock's axe slashed at him. Edric fell to one knee and stabbed the creature through its belly. He rolled away as a hammer came down, cracking against the stone. A genlock armed with a spiked bow loped away from him. Edric slashed at its leg and caught it at the ankle. The monster squealed and fell. Edric turned and swung at the creature pursuing him. The hurlock deflected the blow with its huge hammer. It snarled at him from behind a helmet adorned with the horns of a bronto. Edric sheltered behind his shield. It would only take one blow to end him.
The creature grunted and brought its hammer down. Edric slid easily to the side and cut through the monster's leg. The hurlock growled and shuffled away. Edric pressed it, raining blows down. The monster turned Edric's sword aside and elbowed him in the face. Edric stumbled away, his eyes clouded. He raised his shield and it was knocked aside. Edric shook his head, trying to clear it. He saw the hurlock raise its hammer and Edric leapt forward, catching the creature around the middle. They crashed into a column. Edric lost his sword and scrabbled for his dagger. The hurlock grabbed at him. The Warden stabbed at the creature, the knife slid against the monster's helmet. Edric was thrown backwards and landed on his back. He gasped for breath. The hurlock took its hammer up and snarled. Edric rolled to the side and stabbed the creature through the foot. It howled. He tore his knife free and scrambled away. The hurlock limped towards him. Edric spat blood from his mouth and grimaced at the monster.
The creature seemed to laugh. Edric held his knife loosely. The hurlock pressed forward, swinging its hammer threateningly from side to side. Edric hurled his dagger at the monster, the knife skittered off its chestplate and was flung harmlessly away.
Edric almost smiled at the injustice of it all.
The hurlock charged. Edric slid under its blow and knocked his shoulder against its left leg. He felt the hurlock leave the ground and then come crashing down behind him. Edric grabbed his shield and brought it down onto the hurlock's exposed neck. He felt the crunch vibrate up his arms. The Warden fell to his knees. He wheezed.
There was a sharp pain biting into the left side of his chest. Edric took his sword up and turned around. He gasped.
The huge gate of Aeducan Thaig rose into the still air. The huge doors, taller than a giant were shut. Great statues flanked the entrance. Bearded dwarven warriors with hammers held aloft. The fierce gaze of dwarves that had carved the roots of Thedas itself.
Edric felt very small beneath that gaze. He bowed low.
"We're here." He coughed. "It is beautiful, Mo. You were right." He sheathed his sword and rubbed a hand against the stone. The columns lined the way, thick as the body of a high dragon and carved with runes.
The dull glow of magma behind the walls, the heat escaping through windows carved into the stone.
Edric sat in the shadow of the statue. He rested his head against the stone boot. Edric smiled and took his medallion from around his neck. A gift. A carved wooden griffon given by his sister.
Edric clasped Mo's hand. The Warden sat at their table. He spoke to their parents. Edric didn't understand much of it. His leg pained him.
Mo was sick. And she would die.
But this Grey Warden told Edric's father that he could save her. She would live but she would have to leave. Mo was wrapped in sheep skins but she shivered all the same. Edric's parents held each other. Edric stood on his cut leg. "I will go with her." He told them.
"It is no easy life, boy." The Warden said in his thick Orlesian accent.
"Then she shouldn't be alone." Edric said. "Father. Let me go with her."
Edric gripped his sword. The darkspawn hid behind the thick columns. An arrow fired too soon skittered against the stones at his feet. Edric raised his shield. He looked to the statues that flanked him. He swore they smiled at their new defender. Edric carved the air with his sword.
A stream of crackling magic tore at the stones behind him.
Edric watched a loping ogre, three times his height at least, roar its displeasure.
Edric deflected a thrown spear. The darkspawn hordes made way for the ogre. The huge monster grabbed a shrieking grenlock and hurled it at Edric. The pathetic creature crashed into the ground.
Edric bashed his sword against his shield.
"Come on!" He roared. The darkspawn abandoned the shelter of the columns. They could see that he was alone.
Edric glanced at his stone guardians. They glared down at the dozens of approaching monsters, trespassers on their ancient land.
The song echoed in his head.
"In death, sacrifice."