A sharp intake of breath woke her. Not her own, for her own labored breathing was slow and constricted due to the sharp jagged edged rocks and debris pressed into her back and legs. A sharp pounding covered her head and pain throbbed on her back. The fall had knocked the wind from her, the cold crept across her skin. Aside from that she couldn't feel anything. For all Lena knew, she was incapacitated.
Another breath followed by a whimper roused her again a moment, or perhaps much later. She wasn't sure. The dark recesses around her were swimming. She couldn't see. Was she blinded? She wheezed as her fingers twitched, feeling and movement returning. It was cold, too cold. The air moist and musty, a dank quality to what she lay against. Her body shivered.
It was wet below her. Wet and cold and hard. Her body wracked with quivers had rocks and debris shift and plonk into water, falling off her.
Correction. She can feel. Lena shifted her neck to see more but another whimper had her pause, with bated breath.
She was sinking. The water felt deeper each second but she remained above. She sunk and sunk, dread clawing inside her as she tried to see.
Another whimper. "Heel…" A sharp breath and she heard rustling. "Helll…" Something twisted inside her, guilt and her conscious twirling as she considered the possibility. Had she died? Was she in hell? If Hell existed, she certainly belonged. She'd never believed. She'd been agnostic atheist to a fault. Was she now doomed to an eternity of suffering? "Help."
She wiggled her fingers again. Wet, cold, hard. She concentrated on those three feelings. She listened to her breath. When she was certain of them, of her existence among the living, she tried to look again. Rock scraped against her cheek and neck, warmth seeping against her as the sweet tangy smell of blood covered her.
Why was there no pain?
That was when the purring began. It rumbled low, echoing around the darkness, distant and distorted.
"Help." The faint cry tried again, but she ignored it - him.
Selena tried again. Wet, cold, hard, hairy. No, that wasn't right. Where did hairy come from?
A long hairy spindled leg pushed through the rocks over her. Sticky and greasy, it pulled out again and back in, scuttling and purring over her. It's murmur a hum as it reached for her over and over.
It shrieked. Loud, cacophonous and jarring. Her body stiff and jolted, rocks slid away. Cold, wet, hard, and drafty. The hairy fled, scuttling, crawling, crippling her with fear and dread. A slimy milky trace back. It grew sticky under her fingers as she stretched and stretched it. Her eyes flew open.
It wasn't dark, she wasn't blind. Had her eyes been closed this entire time? The light that filtered in was an iridescent glowing blue that faded in waves. Particles, dust, floated in the air. It too was blue, or perhaps it was colored such from the glow. The source of the celest bloom was from the rocks around her, on her, in front of her. They were interspersed with normal rock and were broken apart, their crystalline innards were ground and crushed into powder. She let out a shaky breath. The powder rose in a puff and carried up and into her lungs as she breathed in.
And breathed out. Breathed in. Breathed out.
Lyrium. She should have been panicking, especially as the raw form touched her exposed skin, the Titan's essence infecting her bleeding arm, where rocks had cut deep. But she found herself unable to adequately react.
"Help, please."
The voice pleaded again and she turned, cringing again toward the sound. Another body, strewn about, legs twisted, warped, and burned like a gnarled branch. He too was covered in rocks, both stone and veiny. Their chest rose only on occasion, she strained to hear their breath but she only heard it when he called out again, whimpering.
How was she to help him when she could barely feel?
Breathed in. Breathed out. The dust flowed inside her.
Seconds, ticks, drips and blink- time passed. It felt like night, the sun was below and the sky so far and around. She was tall and short, new and old, ancient and reborn. She was as tall as a mountain, shifting and quaking beneath plates like sheets. Deep below and under ground where it was warm and hot.
"-please."
The dust swirled and whirled. Breathed in. Breathed out.
The thump thump rumbling of her heart echoed around, pulsing deep inside her and under her. The best of the veins ran rushing, pumping and bleeding for so long until it slowed and dulled. A hollow echo as the pitter patter of a thousand rushing feet marched around, on top and underneath searching for something that slept. It dwelled in the south. Their corruption bled into her, tainting but she withstood. She knew she was dying so she had slept, slowing her descent. Now she was free. Rejoicing, so she sang.
When next she woke, she was no longer bound by fleshy chunks of earth, the stone no longer trapping her. She was so small. Smaller than she could remember but if she listened and closed her eyes she could feel herself, truly large and wide and tall, reaching toward the skies and the center of the world. She'd been stone, mineral, and metal held together by molten earth and heat. Yet now, she was made of meat.
She ground the crystals beneath her hands until they were dust. Crystals that used to be inside her. She observed her hands. Their pinkish digits and nails brittle and thin. They were weak yet when she closed her fists tight they left indents. Tighter still and she bled bloodstone tears. This meat was pitiful.
She sang sweet arias but she was too small, too tiny. Her voice was too quiet, a single infinitesimal voice in the abyss. This shape and form was weak but it's inner song was loud, almost overpowering as it fought and clawed all on her own. She was not ready to relinquish it yet.
This meat was ravenous. She forced more dust into the water and up- up until she breathed in and breathed out. She could hear the deep rumbling of her old heart, throbbing, thumping, and pumping. It quaked and quivered and called. The stone wept at her loss, but she was not gone. Not really.
Lena watched as she cupped her hands into bright cyan water. Her lips tingled and twitched as she drank. Lena could do nothing as it slipped down her throat, quenching the thirst and hunger. It had been too long.
"Please." Her voice escaped between mouthfuls. "Stop." She tries to stop her body but she drank, consumed, and guzzled until she was full, sated and energized. She watched the particles, glowing and bright in the air. Stretching and breathing, she reached a fleshy arm and the one below made the ground quake and tremble.
Celeste rivlets pulsed beneath her skin, stitching and fixing. Soon she would be bigger, stronger and her lilt would echo. A new city, a new land. Where were her creations? They would hear her voice, they would hear the old hymn of their people. They would come.
" - please you have to help, my family."
Lena stumbled aware and clawed across the rocks to it. No. Him. She climbed and perched staring down. The lyrium surrounding them made her flinch but the man. What was his name? He was twitching. Dark blue veins webbing across his neck. She tracked it and saw the exposed bloody stump where she had hacked his hand off, lyrium leeching into him. He twitched and his lips slackened, drool dripping.
"Please." He slurred, eyes unfocused as he looked around. Lena's stomach churned and churned. She forgot to breathe as she stared him in the eyes. He was dying. He was dying and she had made him suffer.
She choked with sobs and coughed. Lyrium puffed and whirled. The rumbling and purring grew louder. Skittering and scraping as the song echoed. Bile rose in the back of her throat. The call intense and fevered. Lena blinked and slumped.
She drank of the water again. More. Must stay. Must become more and taller. This meat was weak but her verse was strong. It would not be silenced so easily. The meat's will cried and yelled, fueling each counter note. She did not wish to descend. She turned her back on the whimpering flesh. It would die soon enough.
No. Him. Came the rebellious cry, it chanted and clanged until she was drowned out.
Lena gasped and clung to herself. She fought herself and clung to the dying man. "Brekker." She shook him, waking him. "Your family?" She rasped, exhaustion tearing at the edges of her stamina. "What do you mean your family?" She managed to say coherently, watching as he twitched and snapped to but faded. He mumbled the name of a town and the name of a city, once, twice and then a mantra until she shook him again.
"Do they live there?" She shook him, staring him down. He didn't register her face and Lena feared he was becoming addled. "Do they live there?"
"No… no."
"Then why?"
"Crowns in a box - field." He whispered. "For family. Please…" He sobbed. Lena freed his good hand and he grasped hers. "Promise. Need to know. I-if you survive."
"If I survive." Lena nodded. Large hairy things skittered around them. She was certain if the lyrium did not take her, they would. But comforting the dying soul was more important.
"What field?" She asked him but he faded in and out, mumbling nonsense words. "What fied?!" She pressed and he stared past her, trying to remember something but he couldn't for the words.
"Pocket…." He managed, but his jaw slackened and he twitched away. Lena reached into his pocket, a wooden amulet with some kind of crest. She couldn't make it out in the dark but she could feel it, the hum and call of an enchantment.
She stayed with him, clanged inside her head so as not to hear the song that would make her sleep. The lyrium ate at his mind. He mumbled more and more. Gibberish and strings of words that made no sense and then it was nonsense words quickly followed by him until speaking in tongues. One word -or name- stuck out amidst the mass. He repeated it over and over until she could take no more. His suffering and pain was too much. She granted him mercy where previously she'd had none. She covered his mouth and nose until he was silent.
It was mercifully quiet but Lena was now alone. Alone with the rumbling. Alone with the skittering hairy things in the dark that shrieked and purred. She sat amidst the lyrium and gazed up into the void. Lena recalled the explosion.
Bright blue and orange flames burst from the boxes. Ceramic shards went flying, she only had enough time to throw herself to the ground but the force of the explosion sent her smacking against the cave wall where she watched as the entrance was blocked by falling stone. The cave shook and trembled, . The ground began to chip and snap until it slipped away in chunks below. She only remembered Brekker as she tried to free him.
The world fell away under them before she could do much else for him or herself. He fell, fast and bashing against rocks. Legs arms, the table broke under him freeing him but he would not be walking again. Further and speedily they fell and she followed him into the dark shaft, reaching with one hand to grab him. If they were to die she didn't want to die alone. His eyes spoke the same in the dim fleeting light.
Tucking her chin to her chest, she protected herself as she fell. The air whizzed past loud and the fire that had spread calmed. But as she got closer to the end, the lyrium bright and blue her descent slowed as something hot flared between her breasts. Shakily she eyed the necklace as she felt as light as a plume. The Hawke may have slowed their descent but it did not protect them from the rocks.
They weren't buried but a layer blanketed them. Battered bruised and broken they lay. Too tired, too exhausted and finished. They waited for death but it would only find one of them.
Clutching the amulet, she added it to her necklace with shaky fingers. A silent promise in the dark. She checked Brekker's other pockets. A coin purse and a slip of parchment, she slipped them into her own pockets as the song returned. It tore at the edges of her, Lena shook her head to clear it. Hypnotic and lethargic, it lulled and soothed her nerves. She fought it. Away… away from the lyrium. She fell, scraping her hands and knees as she crawled forward. The veins and dust was endless around her. Eyes watching her from the dark. It was their shrieks that halted her. Met with dripping pincers and the bulbous abdomen puffed out behind it, making it appear bigger as it concentrated on her with eight large eyes and it's hairy body twitched and jerked its spindled limbs. The crawlers that creaked around it were smaller.
The damp cold of the shaft sent shivers up her spine as their screeches echoed. It fought off the hymn even as she tossed herself back onto the lyrium. Lena was stuck. Spiders, large and monstrous surrounded her, glowing eyes staring into the center lying in wait for her to get close. But the lyrium was just as hazardous.
She was tired. So tired of fighting, she just wanted to go home. She wanted...she wanted… her eyes drooped and blinked shut.
Lena watched as the lyrium crystal shattered inside the husk of the queen crawler. It's form thrice as large as the others. It's blue-blue blood dripped. Her hands tore a leg out and meat unbound by bones dribbled out. Her mouth watered but her mind yelled, No no! It's death rattling shrieks echoed and jangled inside her, fighting the song.
Heaving, she stumbled away from the dead queen. The darkness of the cavern was no issue as she spotted the hordes, the hive of spiders watching her but not moving. She lay in the center clutching the lyrium crystal like a blade. She glared at it and dropped it, crushing it.
"Away… away from the lyrium." She stopped breathing, held her breath and ran. Where, she did not know but she had to get away. Lena needed to be far from the lyrium before she lost time again, before the tune dragged her down and made her the mountain's puppet.
When her lungs burned, did she exhale and take a sharp inhale, holding it as she ran again. Lena had half expected the spiders to give chase and attack as she was not fast. They did follow her, but stopped when she stopped and slowed when she slowed.
"Back!" She yelled but her voice was wrong. It purred and trilled. Something was in it. The spiders scuttled back away but they remained close. Her throat tightened and clenched as she stumbled and covered her mouth. It wasn't her voice. It was melodious and hummed silent arias.
Sinking, she gave up and lay still as the call came over her. Her own flesh and bone moved with the song. She observed her hands, watching as the thing inside her tore at the spiders with lyrium blades and drank it's meat and sang, sweet - somber calls for the others. The spiders drew closer, twitching, fearful and hunched low, fighting the melody. She commanded them closer to their deaths.
Lena grit her teeth. "NO!" Her voice echoed as she snarled and spun. Lena found herself where it was frigid. Blue eyes glowed in the dark at her, watching her. "Who are you?!" She shouted but the eyes were still, unblinking. She focused on them, their form taking shape in the dark. She hid peeking out but the eyes remained. They burned and brightened, blinked when she blinked and turned when she turned.
The figure approached, slow and steady. Wet footsteps, cold puffs of breath stained the air. They stood before her, staring. Those glowing orbs that burned. She reached out with her left hand and they with their right. Lena stilled and touched the glacial surface. It was smooth, reflective. She stared at a stranger.
Mangled hair that hung limp, the iridescent eyes, and cracked glowing skin. Lena's lips quivered, head shaking. Enraptured by the woman in the ice, she was taken by the lulling tones within her.
"Puvyq bs fgbar naq frn, tnmre bs fxvrf, jvryqre bs entr. Lbh ner gur qrfpraqnag bs Byq, ornevat bs n erfbyhgr jvyy. Jvguva zl qbznva, znepu gb zl fbat, qevax bs zl oybbq naq erfg." The woman in the ice spoke, deep and guttural, like rocks grating and scraping. Lena couldn't understand but the words repeated, webbed veins glowing in her hand as she caressed the ice.
"Stop it." Her wrong voice whispered. Her hands slapped over her ears as the singing ascended and echoed in her. "STOP IT!" She cried, pressing against her ears. "STOP IT! STOP! STOP STOP STOP!" She needed to drown it out, combat against it. Sounds. She stomped around and kicked rocks, it disturbed each rippling note. And then she sang, the sound traveling through her bones, reverberating and deep. She sang the first thing that came to mind.
"OH I WISH I WERE I WERE AN OSCAR MEYER WEINER." She bubbled with laughter at the lyrics but when she stopped the song grew louder. She swallowed and began anew "That is what I truly wish to be cause if I were an oscar mayer weiner, everyone would be in love - oh everyone would be in love - everyone would be in love with me…" She sang it again and again, blocking out the earth's cadence. When it quieted, she stopped singing and looked around her for the source, but the icy cavern was empty save for her. The spiders had not followed her here.
The only light was her, where she walked she glowed. The wall of ice was thick and made the cavern appear bigger than it was. She tracked the wall and found where she had come from, or she hoped.
Lena followed the winding tunnels, some deep sense telling her where to go. All the while she sang the jingle until she came across a ravine. There was a crack far up above letting in light but she could neither tell if it was night or day. She turned back.
Her muscles were sore, her stomach ached, and she felt ill but there was a surging energy beneath her skin that drove her. She only took a break from singing to drink water dripping from the ice, soothing her throat and stomach. The humming rumble of pure silence was comforting, nothing but the pulsing of her blood in her ears. Lena thought - hoped - she had drove it away so she took a moment, examined herself.
She still had her necklace of plume, with the added amulet from Brekker. The slip of parchment and coin purse. Her trousers, shirt, and boots were blackened from the explosion and she imagined her hair was a mess. But what was most worrisome was her skin. There were no scars, no open wounds, not like there should be given her descent and fall. Instead there were cracks in her skin where the lyrium pulsed in waves. It rippled with each heartbeat, a heartbeat she did not recognize. Her palpitations all but soothed and calmed with no skipping of a beat.
To add to her worried, her skin glistened with sweat that glittered. "Look ma, I'm Edward fucking Cullen, I glitter and glow blue." She laughed, bitter and sobbed. "I'm blue - haha. I'm blue da ba dee da ba die," she sobbed and laughed, and then cackled. The sound echoed around her. Even her tears glowed and glittered. The lyrium so entrenched in her system. She lapsed into silence for too long.
"Fuck…" she groaned as the melody began, her hands clapped over her ears. "STOP IT!" She squeezed her eyes shut and began belting lyrics. "Yo listen up here's a story about a little guy that lives in a blue world and all day and all night and everything he sees is just blue like him inside and outside. Blue his house with a blue little window and a blue corvette and everything is blue for him and himself. And everybody around. 'Cause he ain't got nobody to listen to…" She scrambled up as her singing was drowned out.
She had to keep moving, she had to find a way out. If not for herself, then for Brekker's family. "I'm blue da ba dee da ba die…" She repeated the song as she traced her way through and back caverns and tunnels. Some sense leading her back the way she came as though she could feel the way.
Lena came across the spiders' den. She stilled as the arachnids sensed her but neither reacted nor attacked. The corpse of the larger one that she had killed remained, as with the others. She would have liked to loop back and avoid this particular cavern but all other passages had been dead ends. The only tunnels she hadn't explored connected here. Though in other tunnels and dead ends she had found old webs and spider sacs, emptied, dusty, and forgotten. There were spider exoskeletons left behind, dried and easy to crack open. She managed to pilfer through the remains finding belt buckles, daggers, coins, and what looked like half torn and half digested trousers. Amidst some of the more human remains leathers, cloth, furs, a water skin, long abandoned backpacks with cloth rotted. She found a half rotted wooden staves, crates, barrels and boxes. She searched everything she came across using herself as a light source.
Staring into the spider nest, she stepped in carefully and slow. "Spiderman, Spiderman…" Of course the most inappropriate - or perhaps appropriate - of songs would come to her now. "Does whatever a spider can. Spins a web, any size, catches thieves just like flies. Look Out! Here comes the Spiderman," she sang as she reached the center. None of the spiders disturbed her, though a few of the smaller ones crawled over her boots as she dodged hanging webs and large objects trapped in silk, she didn't want to think what was inside those. All the while she refrained from shrieking and kicking the smaller arachnids, afraid to anger any of the larger ones.
She would have continued past the large spider but she was curious about something with all the hanging web around. Using a pilfered dagger that hung at her waist, she cut open it's abdomen by its spinners and eyed the spider's milk. Dipping the dagger into the milk she stretched it. It began to harden the moment it stretched, the proteins aligning. She meant to pull a single string out, create twine and then rope from it but movement caught the corner of her eyes. Large white bubble like sacs that moved. Tiny black spindly legs poking through and trying to get out as they shivered and shifted. There were dozens of tiny sacs on the spider's back.
"Oh no," she dreaded what it might be. "Dear god please don't be-" One of them burst open and a small slimy spiderling crawled out. "Oh no." Soon the rest of them began popping out of their sacs. She slapped her hand over her mouth as a swarm of them began eating the corpse of its dead mother. She screamed into her hand and shook, stumbling back. The dagger dropped to the floor with a clatter as her breath heaved.
She stumbled away from the swarm that consumed the meat in the dead spider, leaving only its stomach contents and exoskeleton behind. Lena's anxiety and fear was at an all time high when something hairy brushed against her. Lena jerked away at the close proximity of one of the larger older spiders, when another brushed against her. Her heart banged against her ribcage and she shivered.
"They are going to eat me," she whispered, curling into herself to hide. More and more hairy twitching spiders brushed against her when the deep rumbling purr surrounded her. Warmth and slimy goo covered her as their palps ran along her neck and back.
"Ugh gross…" She murmured confused as none of the spiders seemed to attack her. No pincers or venom injected or spat, as she recalled some spiders did that in Thedas. Instead their palps ran along her exposed back, their husks purring and their legs clicking created a soothing beat that calmed her. It was a song of its own, deep and chiming. Lena wasn't sure how long it went on but she knew it was too long when the guttural harmony inside her rose up trying to clasp control.
She began singing with the spiders again to fight the serenade. "Oh this is the song that never ends! Cuz it goes on and on my friends! Some people started singing it, not knowing what it was, and they'll continue singing it that's only just because…" The beat to the song were simple and easy, the words repeating. She sang it slow so as not to tire herself. It disrupted and disturbed the lyrium's song. Over and over she sang it, for minutes? Hours? She wasn't sure but long enough the spiders had wandered away from her. She wiped at the goo at her neck and came away with spider silk. She scrunched her nose, intent on wiping it on the ground when something unusual happened. The lyrium's rhythm changed. It matched the tune she sang and she felt herself drifting, eyelids closing.
The stone was hard and coarse against her fingertips. Sharp edges leaked rosy sap that left the meat weaker. She had to make it stronger. She needed more lyrium, more stone, more worker drones. Her voice lifted high and bellowed low, the only things that could hear were eight legged beasts that feared her essence. They stayed far away but they could not refute her call. They would do, for now.
"Urne zl pubve, sbe V orpxba gurr, oevat zr veba naq gbbyf bs guerr." With arms extended she sung to the crawlers. Her cadence low and chirping, reaching the frequencies that made them twitch, bodies pushed low. They fought, oh they always fought, but she was stronger in voice. Though the meat's chords were inadequate to reproduce her true song - they would suffice until she could make this meat more. They left at her command, she could feel them work and toil the caverns and tunnels. Where they went, so too did her song, it spread and called more. She would have an army, a legion at her command and then she would find her people, her kin and children of stone. She would rise again, no longer forced to sleep.
Lena snapped awake when a crashing rumble disjointed her song. Quickly Lena belted out any song. "What's new, Pussycat? Whoa, whoa." She sang it exactly seven times. She knows because she counted and quickly followed it up with, "It's not unusual to be loved by anyone…" She giggled - still terrified, but through most of it she could barely form each word. The lyrium and her could not match her disjointed singing if she changed it. She switched back and forth from both songs. She sang to drive the hum away, to drown it out and remain herself. Her voice wasn't hers but she would not let the mountain have her, not again. For the cadence was not auditory, it rang in her blood and in her head. She droned out words and lyrics, anything anything to quiet the storm raging that surged.
When Lena felt the dulcet tones taking over she switched. "It's Friday, Friday. Gotta get down on Friday Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend, weekend." She used to hate herself for knowing the lyrics but it was handy as the song was dull and broke up the lyrium's song. "So la da di da di. We like to party, dancing with Molly, doing whatever we want. This is our house. This is our rules and we can't stop. And we won't stop. Can't you see it's we who own the night? Can't you see it's we who 'bout that life?" She muttered, hands pressed to her ears. "And he waddled away, and he waddled away, till the very next day." Lena wailed. "Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down." She rickrolled herself multiple times. "Narwhals, narwhals, swimming in the ocean. Snake, it's a snaaaakkke." She huffed but sang different tunes. She wished she could remember the lyrics to songs she actually liked instead of these nuisances and annoyances that jingle jangled in her head. They will forever be branded into her head.
There were less spiders in the den, she noted. The older spiders moved out of her way as she walked around keeping count of the tunnels she had come from. The smaller newborn spiders trailed after her as she sang. At first they swarmed and stopped but when she stopped and stared at them they formed something a bit more organized.
Curious. Squinting, she switched it up. "The ants go marching one by one, hurrah, hurrah." She spread her fingers out and made lines in the air. "The ants go marching one by one, hurrah, hurrah," she marched backwards watching the spiders inch closer slowly but in a disarrayed mess. She tried again. "The ants go marching one by one, hurrah hurrah?" She wasn't sure what she expected but the spiders didn't do anything special. They just followed after her.
"Well that was anti-climatic." She frowned, then glowered at the spiders still following her. "Itsy bitsy spiders." She clicked her tongue and the spiders drew back. "Squawk?" She clicked and cooed like a bird and some of the larger older spiders shivered and retreated from her. "Hoho. Scared of bird sounds eh?" She refrained from making bird sounds, incase it caused them to be less docile. Lena drank from the water skin. She ventured back to the dead queen spider and noted there were some egg sacs that hadn't hatched. She poked them and they sagged. Another one she poked and it poked back but didn't hatch. "Why are you still in there?" She switched to speaking with a singsong quality, if only to give her mind and throat a break.
She left it alone and took one of the tunnels. It was long, winding down. The sound of silence began to fill up, not with singing but rather with a rumble, rushing and crashing. Her legs ached, her feet were pinched in her boots but she walked faster down the tunnel. It was at the end of a long winding way down that she found the source of the rumble. It was a deafening waterfall that fed into a large underground lake. And it was warm. Heat and moistness pervaded the air as she walked in and breathed deep. She couldn't hear herself think much less talk.
It was glorious.
She stayed silent, minutes, an hour, she wasn't sure but the lyrium's song couldn't reach her conscious while here. She sighed, the physical act of her chest heaving the only sign. The rocky shore of the lake extended around with many - many more tunnels. She marked them in her head and returned back to the one she came from.
There was rotted wood from caravans long abandoned. Had dwarves once been here? Had humans? She didn't care, it was relatively safe, and it blocked out the song. She tried to make a fire, but the wood would not catch. It was enough though, so she found a jutting rock and placed her bag down. She felt safe enough to sleep.
Athenril rasped against the floor as Harlan dug his heels into her back. He gripped her hair and pulled her up until her back arched. "Did you think I wouldn't find out, my little rabbit?"
"No-" She cringed as the force around her neck tightened.
"I didn't say you could speak." Harlan's voice darkened as he held his hand out. He didn't need a staff to practice. Chuckling, he sent a blast at her leg where it twisted and snapped unnaturally. "I raised you, and this was how you repay me."
"Sorr-" She cried out as Harlan twisted his hand in the air, his favored dagger cut through her shoulder, blood dripping down and splattering but it rose in the air as the power became thick.
"Not as sorry as you will be," his voice echoed and his eyes glowed red. "You better hope my men are able to find their way to the tunnels." He chuckled low and dangerous. "Or you're going to wish you'd died at the explosion."
Notes: Rather than attempt to create some sort of Ancient Dwarvhen Language to have the Titan speak to Lena, I just encoded what it was saying using rot13. Because Lena isn't supposed to understand what it is saying but I didn't want to not put it out there. So below is the translations for those that are curious.
Puvyq bs fgbar naq frn, tnmre bs fxvrf, jvryqre bs entr. Lbh ner gur qrfpraqnag bs Byq, ornevat bs n erfbyhgr jvyy. Jvguva zl qbznva, znepu gb zl fbat, qevax bs zl oybbq naq erfg. - Child of stone and sea, gazer of skies, wielder of rage. You are the descendant of Old, bearing of a resolute will. Within my domain, march to my song, drink of my blood and rest.
Urne zl pubve, sbe V orpxba gurr, oevat zr veba naq gbbyf bs guerr. - Hear my choir, for I beckon thee, bring me iron and tools of three.
debatable-cerealkiller: I love suspense and I facilitate it with cliffhangers! Thank you for reading as always, I love your comments! (PS: It made sense so no harm done?)