The basement was down a flight of cracked stone steps, dusty with disuse. Ariane took up the rear, keeping one eye behind them for followers, and the other on their Templar companion.
Ser Rowan gave her the impression of a large man who had shrunk after being washed badly. He might have even been handsome once, Ariane realized, but withdrawal and starvation had taken its toll. He was shorter than she had expected from his gruff, gravelly voice; Finn was taller by several inches. Rowan might have been burly once, but now he was painfully thin. His broad cheekbones stood out over the cavernous hollows of his cheeks. His eyes were sharp, but his black hair was lank and appeared to be falling out in places. His skin was grey, and a pale sheen of sweat covered his face.
Still, his steps seemed sure, and he was present enough to make it clear he planned on ignoring them the whole way.
The steel door to the storage rooms had clearly been through a lot. The wall around it was scorched and blackened, and the floor had cracked, revealing the hard black dirt underneath. Ariane shuddered to think of how much power it would have taken to break the thick stone tiles. The door, however, remained stubbornly shut.
Rowan stopped in front of the door. He was breathing hard already – even the stairs seemed to have been an exertion for him. Without looking at either of them, he walked towards the archway and whispered the password, too quietly for either of them to hear.
When he was done, he leaned back and looked wearily at Finn. The mage looked panicked for a moment, then his face cleared and he relaxed. He held out one hand. A violet orb materialized, and then flew with a whoosh into the door.
Machinery clinked from inside the workings of the black iron lock. The door slowly swung inward, revealing the stone corridor beyond.
Ariane stepped through and was immediately faced with another door. She frowned. Why was she never on the right side of a door?
Cautiously, she examined the door's heavy iron handles. This one's lock appeared to be more conventional.
'Phylactery chamber,' Finn whispered. 'Used to be, anyways. We can go around.' He indicated the passage to their right, which looked clearer.
Beyond the door to the right was a series of long hallways and boarded off rooms. Ariane was glad that Finn knew his way – she would have been lost in moments. Rowan followed them silently, his face a mask of mute hostility.
Stacked haphazardly against the wall were crates and chests, some of their contents strewn across the floor. She tore one of the lids off. It appeared to be someone's personal effects – a set of worn mage's robes, a few pages from a workbook, a small jeweled pin. The Templars must have thrown everything they could in here before the storage rooms were sealed off. She tried another and found a stash of medical supplies. Surreptitiously, she grabbed a roll of bandages a jar of burn salve and stashed them in her pack. None of the chests seemed to contain anything of Finn's.
Finn didn't seem to be having much more luck. He ducked into a small unfurnished room to check series of chests. He frowned as he dug through the contents. 'Ser Rowan?'
The Templar looked up from making his slow way down the hall. 'I said I'd get you in here, not that I'd talk about it,' he barked. Finn quailed visibly. 'What do you want?'
Finn held up a small bottle, retrieved from the chest. Even through the grimy glass, Ariane could see the blue liquid inside was glowing. Lyrium. 'Here.'
Finn tossed the vial to Rowan, who caught it easily and held it up to the light. The viscous potion sloshed against the glass.
'...Cheers,' said Rowan grudgingly, his face looking slightly less haggard. Then, in one movement, he upended the bottle into his mouth.
'You should probably... not all at once...' Finn objected, '...Never mind,' he said, as Rowan drained the last of the lyrium potion.
Ariane wandered down the hall and around a corner. Instead of more storage rooms, she was faced with a row of prison cells. The bars were rusted, but the locks seemed to be secure. Inside were piles of filthy straw, bundled rags, and-
'Are those...' Finn asked tentatively. He reached one arm through the bars to touch the shape lying on the straw. A shrivelled hand fell out. Finn yelped and jumped back.
Ariane realized that what she had taken for rags were shredded mage robes, discoloured and filthy. The cells were filled with the dead.
'Wasn't just the mages who split up, when we heard the rebellion was going to be official.' Rowan had come up so quietly behind her that she hadn't heard him. His rough voice was bitter and sad. 'I wasn't posted here, but I remember it. Mages declared intent to retake the tower, some of the Templars wanted to go back to the Chantry with the mage holdouts.'
He looked at Finn, who was still staring in horror at the corpse in the cage. He hadn't mentioned prison cells to her, Ariane realized – surely he would have if he'd known about them. They must have been out of use during peace.
'The rest of the Templars stayed,' Ser Rowan continued. He was still sweating and frail, but the lyrium had put some colour back into his face. He looked around, mouths set in a grim line. 'Locking this place up must have been one of the last things they did before the Tevinters showed up.'
The Templar had known that they would find these. She felt a wave of fury that he hadn't warned them.
'So they just left people down here,' she said. It took some effort to keep her voice steady. The idea was too horrific to think about. The fingers on the dead mage's protruding hand were worn into points of bone. He had died trying to claw his way out.
'Prisoners, yeah.' Rowan shook his head. 'Bloody inhumane. Then again, that lot,' here he gestured at the ceiling, where the rebel mages were sleeping on the upper floors, 'were hardly sweet. Half the servants who stayed are dead, and all the Chantry sisters.'
'Really?' Finn asked in a small voice. His eyes were vacant, and he couldn't seem to tear himself away from the cells. Ariane touched his arm and he jumped, then smiled weakly at her.
The Templar watched them with an odd look of sympathy in his eyes. Finally, he sighed and shook his head again. 'Listen, both of you. If we make it out of here, get as far from this bloody war as you can. That's what I'm planning.' He looked around the dungeon with cold fury. 'I'm not fighting for anyone who would let this happen and call it collateral.'
Ariane didn't answer. Steeling herself, she hurried down the hall, intending to get them away from the disturbing scene as quickly as possible. Visions of being similarly trapped played out in her mind, and she realized there was nothing she could have done that the mages hadn't. She rounded the corner, still thinking, and walked straight into a monster.
All her trained skills momentarily abandoned her. 'Fuck!' The creature, which had been crouched on the stone floor, rose unnaturally quickly at the sound of her voice.
She bit back another yell as it turned. The thing towered over her, a misshaped hump on its back rising above its neck-less head. Pale tumour-like protrusions poked through its matted clothes. Its face was a mess of broken blood vessels and scar tissue, and its one visible eye shone a murderous yellow.
The creature lunged for her with a roar, much faster than she would have thought possible given its size. She dodged, but its huge arm caught her on a backhand and sent her flying into the wall. Gods, it was strong. She rolled to the side, narrowly missing being raked by its claws.
The monster turned as Finn rounded the corner in response to her scream. No sign of the Templar. Ariane took advantage of the creature's distraction to leap up and draw her swords. The monster howled at the sight of the steel and lashed out at her. Finn, who had turned an alarming shade of grey, started whispering under his breath, moving his hands in complicated patterns.
Ariane slashed at the creature, opening a wide gash on its arm. It tried to strike back, but missed by a foot. Its other arm flailed wildly. Ariane stayed at a cautious distance, trying to figure out where the creature's previous agility had gone. Whatever Finn had done seemed to be interfering with its sight. She decided not to wait for the effects to wear off. She thrust her longsword into its chest as hard as she could. The blade scraped against the creature's misshapen ribs, finally sinking into something soft. It collapsed onto the floor. Using her other blade, she slashed through what passed for its throat.
The Templar had reappeared. Rather than looking alarmed, he peered at the dead monster with mild interest. Ariane wiped her bloody swords on the rags that the thing had worn. The fabric was filthy and tattered, but surprisingly soft. Remnants of mage robes, she realized.
'Hunger abomination,' said Finn dully, confirming Ariane's suspicions. He seemed to be avoiding looking at the corpse. Some of the mages must have turned to demons when they started to starve, she realized. She shuddered, then glared at the Templar. Rowan should have warned them that the basement could be dangerous. Being angry at him was a lot more satisfying than being angry with herself for letting her guard down.
Rowan saw her expression and shrugged. 'I assumed they'd all be dead by now.' He stepped back to evade the growing pool of blackish blood leaking from the dead abomination. 'Damn, you're neither of you as sweet as you look, yeah?' he added, grinning. His hollow cheeks combined with the bared teeth made him look like a skull. Ariane didn't smile back.
'Through here,' Finn said flatly, starting down the hallway on their left without waiting.
Ariane hurried to catch up. 'Finn..?' she said quietly, trying to keep her voice below the Templar's hearing.
'Someone you knew?' Rowan asked loudly, indicating the abomination. Ariane swore inwardly.
'I'd just like to get out of here.' Finn mumbled, almost inaudibly. 'Please,' he added, looking so wretched Ariane wanted to hug him and turn around immediately.
Book, she reminded herself. This is worth it to get the book back for her people. Even so, she wasn't sure the happiness the book would bring her clan balanced out the look on Finn's face.
'Okay.' Ariane found that she had no idea what else to say. She put one hand awkwardly on his arm.
The dank hallways twisted and turned. Ariane was glad Finn seemed to know where he was going. She would have been lost a hundred times already. They passed other sealed-off rooms, and she deliberately avoided looking inside.
The storage room was through a nondescript metal door. Ariane listened for anything moving inside. Silence. Slowly she pushed the door open. A wide stone cavern filled with clutter greeted her. Chests were stacked on top of heaps of books and strange-looking artifacts, with stones and potion ingredients strewn randomly around the floor. A leering stone gargoyle grinned at one wall, and the corners were filled with cabinets belching papers.
'Oh, hey,' said Finn, sounding slightly more cheerful. 'Everything's still here.' Ariane stared at the mess, aghast. How were they going to find anything in here?
She shook herself. They had to start somewhere. 'You take that side,' she directed Finn. Rowan leaned impassively in the doorway. She had the feeling he was smirking, but didn't want to give him the satisfaction of looking. She marched to the other side of the room, and looked at the endless heaps of chests with a sigh, before digging in.
The first chest she tried was filled with moldy textbooks; the next was filled with bottles of some kind of purple swamp weed that smoked and stung her eyes. Why did the mages keep all this rubbish?
After digging through a stack of papers and a pile of discarded robes with no success, she found an area of the mess which looked more promising. Several locked chests had been hastily shoved into a corner, blocking a bookcase, and several of them had what appeared to be names engraved on them. She would bet they contained the personal effects of mages who had lived here before the war. She scanned the engravings.
A dark brown wood chest at the bottom had an extra nameplate added underneath the first. Someone had run out of space when labelling the chest. Ariane grinned. She shoved the cases on top of it to the ground, where they landed with a resounding crash. 'Finn! Here!'
'You found it?' He rushed over, and actually smiled when he saw the chest. 'Oh, brilliant, it's not even damaged,' he said, kneeling to examine it. He sat back on his heels and looked expectantly at Ariane. 'Right, how do we get it open?'
Ariane looked at him blankly. 'You don't have a key?'
'Well, I did, but I sort of... lost it.' Finn tried to pry the lid open to no avail. 'Can't you pick the lock?' he asked hopefully. He peered inside the keyhole. 'It's not a very good one.'
'I've never picked a lock before.' She experimentally kicked the lid. No change. 'Isn't there magic or something for this?'
'Um.' Finn considered, poking the brass lock with one finger. 'Maybe we could melt it? Or freeze it?'
'Or smash it.' Ariane unsheathed her shorter sword. Maybe she could bash the lock off with the hilt.
'Bloody hell. You're both hopeless.' Ariane jumped. She hadn't noticed Rowan moving from the doorway. The Templar dropped a handful of bottles on a nearby table – he must have been hunting for more lyrium potions. He picked up a shiny gold brooch from the floor and extended the pin. 'Move over,' he barked, kneeling in front of the chest. Ariane realized he was smiling again.
She was about to ask how a member of a religious order knew how to pick a lock, but seeing as her own ideas for getting the chest open had amounted to hitting it as hard as possible, she felt she wasn't in a position to complain. She stood back and let Rowan work.
Finn tapped her on the shoulder to get her attention. 'Amaranthine's by water, right?' he asked quietly. His usually spaces eyes were oddly intense. Ariane realized he was still shaking slightly from their fight in the hallway.
'I think so,' said Ariane, confused by the sudden interest. 'You're the one who's from there, not me.'
Finn gestured around at the trashed room. 'I'm from here.'
He paused for a moment. 'Do you think there are boats heading to the Free Marches?'
Ariane looked into his eyes. Rowan was still working on the chest, but she didn't trust that he wasn't listening, so she couldn't ask Finn if he meant what she thought he did. 'I don't know,' she said slowly. Even with her spotty knowledge of politics, she knew that the Free Marches were a mess. There was no reason to go there... unless you were looking for something specific. Something like a functional Eluvian.
This is an insane idea, she told herself. We'll just get ourselves killed. She needed to get this done and go home, where there was real, non-insane work to be done, Even if they found the Warden, how could he fix the state of the world? He was just one person.
He fixed it once before, the traitor part of her mind whispered back.
'We could find out,' was what she said instead. She smiled nervously. 'I think I'd like that.'
'Me too.' Her agreement seemed to be a relief to Finn. He relaxed visibly, and looked around with more interest than she had seen before. His eyes widened and he smiled as he spotted something in the opposite corner. 'Hey! There's Eleni Zinovia!'
Ignoring the Templar, he vaulted over an overturned chair and approached a stone statue of a severe woman. Ariane realized that it was the same Tevinter statue she had seen eight years earlier, the one the Warden had spoken to.
Finn waved energetically at it. 'Hi! You said we wouldn't speak again, but here I-'
Ariane detected movement out of the corner of her eye. She started to yell a warning, but a flash of light blinded her, accompanied by an ear-splitting crack. She instinctively drew her swords, blinking rapidly to try to clear her eyes.
Finn was standing, open-mouthed, in front of the smoking ruin that had been Eleni Zinovia. The spell that had missed him had taken the stone woman's head clean off and scorched the stone wall behind her. A small group of mages stood in the doorway, weapons in hand. Leading them was the elf girl, Enalla, looking distinctly less foolish holding a smoking iron staff. They'd been caught.
Thank-you for reading! Apologies for the terrible action writing... My theory is that if I keep trying to write fight scenes it will eventually get easier, but it's slow going.
If you have any advice or suggestions, please leave me a review or a PM! I'm making a lot of changes as I edit this thing, and would really appreciate it.