His breathing sounded louder from within his helmet. There was a dampness accumulating along the metal. He watched with big eyes as the battering ram began to splinter the gates. He gripped his greatsword all the tighter. The time was drawing near when blood would have to be shed. Warden blood. It had, very unfortunately, proven true that the Wardens were in collusion with the Venatori. The Grey Wardens were slipping under the control of demons. They were becoming abominations; their blood the fuel for dark magic. They had to be stopped before they tore the world apart. Before they covered the world with darkness and Blight. So Fay had ordered the attack. If they would not stop, their actions would be forced to a halt.

"Ready yourselves!" Cullen shouted. Fay had deferred the role of command to somebody who actually had experience commanding troops. Fay had his own particular purposes in this battle. But if there were demons to be fought, he would take as many of them down as he could.

"Stay close to me. I anticipate this will be chaos." Fay said to his companions. Blackwall, Vivienne, and Varric braced themselves. He had purposely put Dorian as far away from him as possible. Fay intended to go into the thickest of it. He didn't want Dorian to get hurt. But he accepted the possibility that he might, no matter where he was in this battle. Fay's bowels felt like water. He was scared shitless. Whatever about skirmishes with very terrifying enemy, he had never had to wait to enter into a pitched battle of this magnitude.

"We will be with you, Inquisitor." Vivienne spoke softly enough. But she was gentle in her tone. Not very usual for the mage. This made Fay all the more nervous.

"If you die, Inquisitor, then I am outta here." Varric said, as he strung his crossbow.

"As always, Varric, you are the definition of comforting." Fay said through gritted teeth. But there was a giddiness about him. A nervousness for what was to come. He felt like a horse trapped in a burning stables.

"Well I am small, warm, and fuzzy. What could be more comforting?" Varric said sarcastically. Fay grinned wolfishly, and watched as an aperture emerged in the heavy oaken doors.

"HOLD THE LINE! HOOOOOLD!" Cullen roared. A silence of anticipation fell upon the troops. They collectively held their breaths.

"Forward march!" There was a great surge forwards that carried the small group. They had breached the fortress. All around them were the rallying cries of the men and women of the Inquisition. Fay's voice joined in the distinctive cry of the Elvhen. His heart was racing, and there was a slight tremble to his hand. He was terrified. But he ran in all the same. He ran for his life. He ran for the lives of the Elvhen. He ran for Dorian's life. He ran for Naja's life. His teeth flashed in the moonlight as his blade sunk into the form of the first demon. Their foul ichor sprayed upon him, hitting the small piece of flesh that his helmet didn't quite cover. Time disolved into a meaningless entity as demon upon demon threw themselves at him. It seemed like seconds. It seemed like eternity. He cried out when the demon's claws parted his skin. But he continued to fight. He gritted his teeth against the pain and the exhaustion and he fought on.

A moment came in the battle as he was fighting his way up onto a battlement. It was an arduous struggle uphill against the hordes. What had the Grey Wardens unleashed into the world? A brute of a demon held his sword clasped in his claws and Fay was struggling with all his strength, all his weight against the demon, desperately trying to free himself. A shade bore down on him, moving to strike him down. A whisper of the forest, of the voices of his people, their singing, their cries, the language, brushed past his ear. The shade was struck down, an arrow protruding from where it's heart would have been if it had one. It gave Fay that extra moment of time to free himself and cut the Shade down properly. Vivienne dispatched the larger beast with a flourish. Fay looked back in the direction the arrow had come from. His brother Dúl stood atop a crenellation, his head bare, his face smeared with blood. He looked at his brother for a moment before he disappeared back into the chaos of the fray. He sent a silent prayer up to the creators that he would be okay. That he would survive this. His precious twin. They had shared a womb, and nearly all of their lives together. He couldn't imagine a world without Dúl in it. The Wardens, Corypheus would pay if any harm came to him.

"This way, Inquisitor! I think I hear them!" Blackwall called. Fay could hear them now too. Voices. Human voices that cut through the sound of the demon horde.

"GO!" Fay shouted. His small group ran towards the sound. This would be put to a stop. Somehow.

Falling. In breathless agony. Tearing. Reaching. Cold chaos.

Fay tried to drag breath into his lungs. But something wasn't quite right. His lungs filled, but it was all wrong. He gasped more of this strangeness in as his eyes flew open. His mind could not process what he was seeing. There was a nightmarish quality to his surroundings. He blinked, hoping that would help his mind make sense of this somehow, but it didn't help. He looked down into an empty void. Into eternity. He yelped in fear. He started to fall upwards until he made contact with something solid, rather forcefully. Whatever was filling his lungs was forced out. He lay in pain for a time before opening his eyes again. He clung to the ground. This nightmare realm seemed to be righted at least. It seemed unlikely now that he would fall into what he assumed was the sky.

"Creators..." he muttered. Great and angry clouds filled with green lightning swarmed in the distance around tall black peaks. Islands of black rock hung suspended in the sky. Fay felt dread grip at his guts. He was starting to remember. An archdemon, falling, the anchor pulling apart the fabric of the veil. Falling. He gasped and looked around him.

"VARRIC! BLACKWALL! VIVIENNE!" he called, in panic. He could not see them. But he heard something. A gurgling, a growling. "Oh shit." Fay drew his sword. It seemed lighter here. Well that was something.

He fought back the demons for what seemed like hours, but his arms didn't grow tired. In fighting them, he felt no fear. This was something he knew. Something familiar.

"Stop." A deep echoing voice rolled across the sky like thunder. The demons stopped in their tracks, watching him with rage-filled eyes. They stood for a time, before they began to withdraw. Fay panted, watching them. He didn't understand this. This couldn't be… It was not physically possible. But there it was in the distance. The Black City.

He was in the Fade.

The realisation hit him like a brick wall. He stared around him in a blank panic. He didn't know how he had gotten into the Fade. And he didn't know how he was supposed to get out.