(Konous, that is a very fair complaint. Occasionally, I have to make a decision on who gets the POV light in a chapter when there's no clear person running the show, and sometimes that decision is essentially just throwing a bone to a character who doesn't get a really good chapter for a while. That's kinda the case with the last one. But if you're worried about Kazar not getting enough time, have no fear... he gets plenty down the road. His arc has barely begun. :D
As for this chapter... I don't usually translate Elvish, since context is usually enough to go on. If you're curious what she's singing, plug the lyrics into youtube. It'll pull up a familiar scene.)
25. A Calling
All she knew was fire.
It was a burning, all-consuming heat, roaring through her until her muscles spasmed with it. Meila felt trapped by it, hedged in by disorienting red and thrumming pain.
At some point, she had fallen to the ground. Above her, she could see shapes moving and hear the sounds of battle. She knew she needed to get up, but the pain made it hard to focus. It was hard to see with everything so bright. She scrabbled for her bow, certain she had dropped it nearby.
A genlock growled right above her, and she forewent looking for her bow to draw her hunting knife instead. She slashed wildly at the looming shape. Something cold and sharp slashed into her arm, and the knife dropped. Still, she refused to cry out, despite the stinging pain that flowered from the wound.
Something else growled behind her, and a brown blur tackled the darkspawn, tearing into it despite its own wheezing breaths. The dog.
Meila had not thought much of the creature at first… seeing in it the same twisted deformation of domestication that her own people had undergone at the hands of the shemlen. It, too, had once been a noble creature, now doomed to serve the shemlen because it knew nothing else.
Except that this creature was still certainly noble, in its own way. It fought on, despite the pain of its illness, and made protecting its clanmate—the human named Percival—its top priority. In that, Meila saw something Dalish in the dog.
"Felicity, 'ware your flank!"
"What? I… EEK!"
"Got it!"
The two humans were running around above her, though Meila saw them as little more than blurs at this point. Her arm wound stinging, she felt around for her knife.
The mabari's heavy four-legged tread approached, and she saw the knife drop in front of her with a metallic glint of sunlight. Gratefully, she retrieved it. "Thank you, brave creature," she managed hoarsely.
The dog barked, then coughed.
The sounds of battle had wound down; it seemed the humans had proved victorious. Felicity's dark form appeared in front of Meila. "You're bleeding!"
"It is a flesh wound."
"Exactly. That means your flesh has been wounded. May I?"
Meila sighed and held out her arm, knowing she couldn't afford to be any more of a detriment than she currently was. The human grasped her arm, and healing magic flowed into her, knitting it up. "My bow… I think I dropped it."
"…Meila, it's on your back."
"Oh." She frowned. Her head felt muzzy, and a fresh wave of hot pain sliced through her, flowering out from her stomach in a pulse of agony. She hissed, but did not cry out. Crying out was weakness.
"Come on. We're almost there… Ostagar is in sight."
"I… cannot tell," she gasped between gritted teeth. Visions of dark shadows and red hot rivers swam before her eyes. "It is far… too dark."
"J-Jory!"
"Here, my lady. I'll get her."
The knight's large form knelt over Meila, and she felt herself be lifted and borne like a child. In the wake of the pain, she was too weak to do much but struggle feebly.
"Hurry!"
There was a bouncing sensation and a sense of movement, but those were just distractions when compared to the seething darkness that seemed to creep in on the edge of her awareness. That darkness had voices… thousands of them. They were there, watching her. Hissing and laughing. One of them had Tamlen's face.
"Vir sulahn'nehn," she chanted as the world faded around her, trying her best to keep the shadows at bay. "Vir dirthera… vir samahl la-" She gasped as another spike of heat swam through her. Somewhere, the dog whimpered. "…vir samahl la numin… vir lath… sa'vunin…"
Voices broke into her awareness, one of many now… all of them dark and twisted, beckoning for her.
Come to us. Join us, little lethallan.
"Wynne! Wynne!"
"Felicity? What's the matter?"
You are weary, da'len. Come and rest. Submit to the dreams and join us.
"Oh dear. Yes, I see what you mean. Lay her here."
"Can you do anything?"
"We will see."
Come to your new home. Your new kin need you, lethallan.
Vir Assan. Vir Bor'Assan. Vir Adahlen.
I will not submit.
And then all was blackness.