"It's been nearly a year!" Damian Hawke flung his arms out to emphasize his frustration as he paced through his room, eyed by a wary Varric. "And still no word from Fenris. Or Aveline for that matter. Not a single word! How hard could it be to write: "Hello, I'm fine" or: "I'm miserable"? Surely he's had the time for it at some point. Unless he's been stuck in his demented state for all this time because I left him in Kirkwall..."
"Elf is doing fine. I've been in touch with Aveline. He's just focusing on getting back on his own two feet."
"If he's doing so well then why doesn't he bloody write to me?" He spun around for yet another round between bed and desk. "I'll send him another message. Maybe then he–"
"Hawke." Varric's interruption had him come to a halt and turn to face the rogue. In that calm, persuasive tone of his the dwarf said: "Do you really think Aveline will give Elf all your letters?"
"Well, no, but maybe–"
"Do you think he will read them if he does get them?"
Damian stared at him. Then his shoulders slumped. "No... I suppose not."
"If he wanted to write you back he would have done it by now. Just give him the chance to figure things out. You know that both Elf and Aveline have pretty good reason to not be quick to get in touch. I get that you're concerned, but rest assured that he's doing well."
"Concerned," Damian snorted. "I vowed to take care of him and I've been miles away for nearly a year. My brother has been thinking he is going to die for nearly a year. I'm sick of waiting! I joined up with the bloody Inquisition to stop Corypheus, not sit around on a snowy mountain top."
"I'm sure we'll manage to put a few bolts in the bastard soon," Varric replied with uninspiring lack of conviction. "It'll be over before you know it."
He shot the dwarf a foul look. "How slow do you think I am? At this point that phrase will only hold true when Corypheus comes bursting into Skyhold to get permanently killed off right this instant. As that didn't happen this morning, yesterday, last week, in the past month or the eight months before that, I'm just going to say it won't happen at all and that you are full of shit. I tracked Erimond to Adamant, the place was crawling with Wardens and the Inquisitor is fine with simply leaving them to summon demons and become slaves of Corypheus under the guidance of the evil magister."
Such a tremendous surprise that the white-robed figure at the ritual tower had turned out to be a Tevinter magister. Obviously the modern magisters could not let Corypheus rise to godhood and establish world domination on his own, they had to offer a helping hand in hopes of sharing in the profits. How anyone in their right mind could decide to serve a power-hungry darkspawn with a superiority complex Damian did not understand, but magisters were high on the list of most likely suspects.
Despite the minimal head start, catching up to Erimond had proven a challenge, one he and Stroud had ultimately failed at. They had pursued the magister through the Western Approach but his clever use of fire glyphs, obscured by the reddish sand of the desert, had slowed them down and allowed him to reach the safety of Adamant fortress before they could get close enough to capture or kill him. Damian had enjoyed a scorched beard and pair of eyebrows for almost two weeks as a souvenir of one of the close escapes from Erimond's fiery traps. With Stroud he had spent a day near the fortress, which had appeared pretty crowded for something that was supposedly "abandoned". By estimate at least three hundred Wardens had gathered – possibly more. Maker only knew how many of those had been traded for demons by now.
Once they had managed to form a decent idea of the size of the Warden forces they had made the journey back to the main camp to inform the Inquisitor of the situation. Only to be told that she and her personal group of fighters had already left to return to Skyhold and Hawke and Stroud were expected to do the same. Damian still fumed at the tremendous waste of time the journey all the way back and the period of inactivity that had followed, had been.
"Come now, Hawke, you know that's not true," Varric countered. "The Inquisition has a lot to deal with. Corypheus didn't exactly put all his sovereigns in one coin purse. The assassination of the Orlesian Empress had to be stopped too."
"I don't care about the Empress! If a bunch of Orlesian nobles wants to stab each other in the back while eating desperate ham and other nonsense as part of their "Game", they can go right ahead. In the meantime the Wardens have had plenty of time to prepare. Their mages have had months to do Erimond's treacherous ritual, so all that's left are probably a pile of corpses and blood mages that aren't worth saving."
The dwarven storyteller looked at him as if he had truly lost all credibility. "The Wardens' big fortress is in Orlais, which makes the Orlesians a pretty good ally to have, despite how Orlesian they are."
Damian folded his arms in front of chest, not of a mind to be talked out of his anger so quickly. After months of idleness, of being stuck at Skyhold without means to find out how Carver and Fenris were doing – or, in the latter's case, means to get him to reply – his mounting frustration had built up to its peak. "That was still – what? – two, three months ago. And yet. We're. Still. Here. We had Erimond running. He may have had the chance to warn the Wardens but they would have had little time to prepare if the Inquisition had attacked as soon as possible. When we finally assault Adamant they'll be as ready as they could possibly be. How do you keep defending this rubbish?"
"I don't know a thing about waging wars and shit," Varric replied, spreading his hands. "Neither do you. It used to be simple when it was just our small group. We'd run into a couple of bad guys, shoot them, burn them, and go for a beer. The Wardens are an army. The Inquisition has people who know how to deal with this stuff. Apparently we need siege equipment we don't have up here to have a shot at getting into their fortress. And an army of our own. Ruffles has been busy trying to borrow both from the Orlesians. Besides, it's not like the Wardens have been free to roam as they saw fit. The way to Adamant has been blocked so nobody can get out or in. Their resources are shrinking. It really can't be much longer till everything is ready to kick some Warden ass. Or get our asses kicked, which does sound more likely, but I'm an optimist."
"Inspiring. Really."
Varric's "I know!" sounded forced and Damian ignored the exclamation. The number of times he had bested the dwarf at diamondback and seen through his bluff over the years could be counted on one pair of hands, but he caught on to the underlying uncertainty here. Wardens were formidable opponents. Wardens who had turned to blood magic, had summoned demons to come to their aid and were under the influence of Corypheus... That sounded like it could be worse than facing Meredith and Orsino had been. At this point Damian was past feeling overly worried by the prospect, however. Actually doing anything, even if it was taking part in a massive battle against some of the most formidable fighters in Thedas, would be preferable by now. Anything to get closer to finally put this mess to rest. To let Carver live in questionable security with what remained of the Wardens. To finally return to Fenris.
He grabbed the next rung of the ladder tightly and pulled himself up. Flames from a burning arrow which had been shot at the ladder licked on the rung above, close to his face. Damian released a little bit of ice magic when he reached up again, dropping the temperature to such an extent that the fire was smothered. Frost coated the blackened wood under his palms. It was an awfully long way up but he had almost reached the top now. There was no other way to go; below him more Inquisition soldiers had already begun their ascend.
The sounds of battle – screams of fury, courageous battle shouts, outcries of pain and surprise, the sharp clangs of metal striking metal, the much duller noise of a blade connecting with thick leather or underlying flesh, the vehement hiss of arrows flying past, crackling magic and roaring demons – thundered around him on a larger scale than he had ever experienced before. Down below the massive battering ram slammed against Adamant's sealed gate, making the walls – as well as the ladder he was on – shake.
The Inquisition's prolonged period of inactivity had finally come to an end, and in quite a spectacular manner. Nothing spelled the opposite of sitting around twiddling thumbs like a frontal assault on a fortress where every Warden – barring a few exceptions – of the south was holed up. The long journey to one of the most remote parts of the Western Approach should have provided plenty of time to prepare for what was to come, but as far as Damian was concerned you could never truly prepare for a battle like this.
A warning cry resounded nearby and he tilted his head back just in time to see a Warden lean over the battlements with a rock about twice the size of a dwarven skull.
The Warden did not dally with his heavy load, releasing it quickly and ducking out of range of potential archers waiting for the opportunity of a good shot. There was nothing the young Inquisition soldier, who was above Hawke on the ladder and had five more rungs to climb to the top, could do to stop or avoid the massive stone. Realizing he would suffer the weight of the soldier, the rock or a combination of both, Damian let go of the ladder with his left hand and raised it as the stone crashed on the soldier's head with a sickening sound. He barely had time to hope his magic would comply straight away, no chance to form a proper spell, instinctively pulling at his mana to create an uncoordinated blast of force. The force magic burst from his hand and hit soldier and rock, stalling, stopping, reversing the downward plummet.
The soldier was flung on the battlements, the rock pushed aside to drop back down a safe distance from the ladder. Damian grabbed the next rung and rushed to the top as fast as he could. His boot slipped on the icy wood and for one panicked moment he thought he would fall to his death anyway. But he managed to hold on and finally, finally, drag himself up on Adamant's walls.
Not that this accomplishment gave him the chance to catch his breath. The Warden who had dropped the stone had – in a perfect example of irony – been hit by his victim and was struggling to worm his way out from under the Inquisition soldier. Three shades were rapidly advancing with that awkward wading gait of theirs, as if they had to push through the air itself to propel themselves forward. Demons were dangerous, but Damian suspected that the Warden would pose an even greater threat when he was back on his feet. The soldier who had been hit by the stone did not appear to put up a fight or offer any form of resistance. Either he was unconscious or dead.
More shades and Wardens were doing their best to prevent Inquisition infantry from gaining a foothold on the battlements. Protecting the soldier who was likely already dead would take time and energy he could not spare. Damian's fingers found the smooth wood of the staff on his back and pulled it free. Fire flickered to life in the focusing crystal at the top. He focused his will on the spell, aimed, released.
The Warden let out a shriek when the concentrated ball of fire hit his head and set him ablaze. Damian blocked out the flailing of arms in desperate attempts to douse the flames and turned his attention to the shades. He evaded a razor-sharp black claw lashing at his throat, tried to regain his concentration but had to dodge a second blow. Backing away, mindful not to stray too close to the edge of the battlements, he wrestled with his mana to make it obey to his will. Spikes of ice eventually materialized in front of him, piercing the shades and freezing them in place.
The other Wardens present were beginning to see the threat he posed and acted accordingly. A woman with glowing red eyes sent a crackling bolt of lightning in his direction and Damian hurriedly erected a shield around himself. Rushed as it was, it absorbed the electricity but was destroyed by the impact. This, a battle with this many enemies, requiring fast reactions, offensive and defensive spells cast in quick succession, was much more challenging than fighting a bunch of undead could ever be. Soldiers continued to climb up the siege ladders but had to fight the waiting demons and Wardens for access to the fortress walls. Losing that fight meant a lethal fall. So few allies on the walls meant a lot of hostile attention for Hawke.
He fought, no moment of respite. Fought to protect the Inquisition forces, fought to stay alive. Damian was aware of his reserves dwindling rapidly, sucked down greedily by his spells. Soon, again far too soon, he felt that hollowness that signaled the depletion of his mana. And more Wardens and demons remained. The female mage made the ground beneath him light up in the familiar pattern of a glyph. Fire, ice, paralysis – it did not matter which she intended for him. With what felt like an enormous effort he dispelled it a heartbeat before it went off.
It would be easy, so easy, to use a little of his blood and be done with it. A cut, a few drops, and he could end her, end all of them here and get one step closer to defeating Corypheus.
The heavy, metallic smell of blood already hung heavy in the air; the stench of death penetrated his nostrils. No one else would even know. Surely it was small, meaningless in the grand scheme of things, in the face of all that was at stake. He could just forget about it as soon as it was done and move on. After everything he had already done, a few simple spells, a couple of fireballs cast with blood would hardly matter – no added weight to his conscience.
Damian pressed the sharp metal of the glove encasing his right hand against the skin of his arm. Blood and power underneath, within reach. He only needed a little...
His gaze shot back to the mage. He could burn her to a crisp in the blink of an eye. It would be easy.
Unexpectedly a memory, years old, part of a life he no longer had access to, surfaced. Just a flash of Fenris regarding him in a way he had not looked at Damian in quite some time, a look of respect, trust in his large, mossy green eyes, his pose as relaxed as it could get while still retaining some of that caution he never seemed able – or willing – to shake. "You are strong, Hawke."
Fenris had been wrong, of course. The fear of losing him, of watching him die had driven Damian to blood magic. Had pushed him to do monstrous things. He was no better than any of the maleficarum they had faced over the years.
He met the red light that had swallowed the Warden's eyes, his stomach clenching in revulsion. She might as well be an abomination with her will surrendered to Corypheus like that. That was what she had murdered one of her fellow Wardens for. Someone like Carver. To be reduced to a mindless slave. Two worthless sacrifices.
That was not what he wanted to be, was not how he could return to Fenris and look him in the eye. The repeated handing over of his knife when the elf was lucid had been a promise. A symbolic one, but a promise nonetheless: I won't do it again. I won't hurt your trust in me again. He would not lose what remained of his mind and soul just to protect himself. It would not be worth it if it meant having to go back to Fenris with the shame of weakness he bore on his shoulders even heavier.
The Warden moved her staff and free hand in a way which signaled she was preparing another spell.
Damian started running. Not away from her, as she might have anticipated, but towards her. He shot a handful of sparks her way to distract and hopefully trick her into getting defensive for a few precious moments.
To his own surprise it worked. She held off casting whatever she had had in mind for him to strengthen her spell shield. But she had nothing to fear from Hawke's spells. Barely slowing his steps Damian turned his staff so the blade was pointing up and aimed for the red light on the right.
Realizing her mistake, the Warden mage raised her own staff to block the oncoming attack. Too late, too slow, not enough. Hawke's weapon veered a little to the side but its momentum was great enough to pierce the eye and the brain behind it. Damian gave a jerk on the wood to twist the blade before pulling it back. The Warden went limp and collapsed, neither of her eyes glowing red anymore.
Slowly the Inquisition's numbers on the battlements increased, but the Wardens refused to give ground easily and called for the aid of more and more demons. The balance only truly shifted in favor of the Inquisition when the Inquisitor and three of her associates appeared and contributed to clearing out the demons. Damian managed to hide his relief – or at least hoped he managed – and followed the Inquisitor down to the heart of Adamant's fortress.
With the Inquisitor's group it did not take long to fight their way through to Erimond and Warden-Commander Clarel, who appeared on the verge of unknowingly enslaving herself to Corypheus as well. How could the Order represented by these people be the same as the one that had not only saved Ferelden but likely the entire world by ending the Blight which had destroyed his home? These people were blinded by fear, by the worst scenario branded in their minds, and willing to do the most horrible things to prevent that fear from coming true.
They weren't heroes. Just people. Stupid, weak people who couldn't see they were destroying more than they were attempting to save.
What possessed Erimond to make it seem like a good idea to summon what looked an awful lot like an Archdemon to intimidate Wardens who were desperate to kill the remaining Old Gods would likely forever remain a mystery, but that was the monumentally stupid move the magister made. The ensuing fight and chase blurred together in a haze of blood, fire and lightning. Damian was not sure whether they were pursuing Clarel and Erimond or the dragon, or that the latter was pursuing them. He did know that the Warden-Commander came very close to killing the damned Tevinter. That the dragon in return crushed nearly every bone in her body but that she still managed to move. That her final act was to send the monster into the abyss that awaited beyond the edge of the ruined bridge they all found themselves on with the chase at an end.
He learned that a falling dragon could destroy even more of an already damaged bridge. What it felt like when the stone gave way beneath your feet and there was nothing to support you, to prevent you from plummeting down, and your stomach got stuck in your throat while the rest of your body fell.
That the world ended with a flash of green light.