The Exalted Plains (aka Dirthavaren) and Weisshaupt

Ellana fell into a briskly moving river. She saw a green flash behind her, reflected in the waters. She turned to face it … putting her left hand up to protect her eyes. A green beam of force shot out from her hand and connected with a green swirling oval. She cried out in pain, but the pain was short. The oval shrank and disappeared.

"You look like no spirit I've ever seen." A kindly elf spoke to her and helped her to stand. When he noticed her vallaslin, he looked surprised and added, "Da'len, you will have quite the tale to tell us, I think."

"Thank the Creators!" Ellana cried out. Then, she stumbled in the water and the kindly Dalish helped her to stand a second time.

A young warrior standing next to him spoke. "Keeper, there was a shadow through that portal … could it have been one of the Creators?" The warrior turned to Ellana. "Have you been sent by Mythal … Mythal'enaste? Sent to help us?"

"Come, we'll show you to our camp. I am Keeper Hawen and this is Olafin." The Keeper faced Olafin and then nodded further down the river. "Run ahead and have a pallet made up in my aravel."

"Right away, Keeper!" Olafin said as he turned and ran along the riverbank ahead of Hawen and Ellana.

Ellana stepped onto the riverbank with the help of Hawen. "You are most kind, Keeper. I didn't think I would survive. I … think I was actually in the Beyond."

"Why don't you save the telling until we get to camp, da'len. It is not far." He kept a hand on her elbow to steady her. "We have found several of those green swirls in the area, some with demons circling around them. I'm afraid there are also Orlesian troops around." He chuckled. "Fortunately, they seem more intent on killing each other than bothering us."

Ellana looked down at her hand. "The memory of how I got this is on the edge of my mind. Perhaps after some sleep that you were wise to suggest. I am Ellana of Clan Levellan, First to Keeper Deshanna Istimaethoriel." She smiled at Hawen.

He returned the smile. "I thought I recognized you, lethallan. I saw you as a young girl at the last meeting of the clans years ago. I know Deshanna well. You were north, were you not?"

"We were, but I was sent on a journey to Haven." She smiled when she saw the camp. Not too large, but not too small, either.

Olafin stepped out of an aravel. "The pallet is prepared, Keeper." He smiled at Ellana. "And, Nissa put some bread and fruit on a plate if you're hungry."

Ellana looked around the camp and smiled at all the curious faces. "Thank you so much. Allow me a nap and I'll tell you all I can remember about how I came to be here."

As it turned out, taking the nap was what she needed. When she awoke with a start, she sat up quickly. She took a few minutes to orient herself and reached for the fruit. She was horrified at how shaky her hands were. After a few bites, she felt much better. As she stepped out of the aravel, she guessed she had slept only an hour or so. She also saw the clan sitting around a center fire, waiting for her story.

"Now, da'len, please tell us what happened." Hawen smiled and patted a log next to his.

After sitting on the indicated log and looking around the group, she began, "I am Ellana of Clan Levellan, First to Keeper Deshanna Istimaethoriel." She took a deep breath. "With all the troubles between the mages and the Templars, my Keeper thought it better to find out, first-hand, what this Conclave in the Temple of Sacred Ashes was going to entail. The rumors we'd been hearing about the witless drive of the Seeker leader to kill all mages was disturbing."

"One of the reasons we're here in this Creator-forsaken land is to avoid those witless Templars." A female with dark red hair grinned. "Orlesian shems are easy to kill. I'm Emalien, by the way."

"Let's allow our sister to finish her tale, Emalien. Then, we can ask her questions." Hawen patted Emalien's shoulder.

Ellana smiled. "I hope my tale will answer my own questions, Emalien. The Temple was so large and the number of people in attendance barely filled half of it. I found a chamber in the lower levels that no one used … or, at least, I thought no one used it. One night, as I was getting ready to go to sleep, several Grey Wardens marched in … but they looked unlike any wardens I had ever seen. Their eyes glowed and they held Divine Victoria in some sort of force field. Then, a chaotic swirl appeared … like a rip in reality ... not green like that portal I fell out of … it was more black and purple. Several humans stepped through. Actually, one of the them looked more akin to a darkspawn than a man. The others were wearing robes. After that, my memory is …" Ellana cried out in pain as green lightning crawled up her arm.

"Creators!" a dark-haired young Dalish male shouted. "Shouldn't we move her away from the halla … away from the camp?"

A gray-haired male looked toward the halla pen. "No, Loranil. The halla are not shying from this. They grow closer to our sister, to comfort her if they can." He kneeled in front of Ellana and held her other hand. "I am Ithiren. Try to concentrate and remain calm. Draw from the strength of the clan and the halla."

With tears in her eyes, Ellana looked toward the near-ethereal halla edging closer to her. "I shall try." She took a shaky deep breath. "The darkspawn-kin held an orb of focus. I had been content to only watch until a human ran in and asked what was going on. Two others followed him … one, a horned Qunari and the other, a dwarf female. The interruption was enough to allow the Divine to knock the orb out of the darkspawn's hand. It rolled toward me. The newcomers ran toward me … we all tried to pick it up at the same time and …"

Ellana screamed again. This time, the clan did back away from her as the lightning surrounded her entire body. Later, she was told that there was a large flash in the southeastern sky before she lost consciousness.

...

First Warden Calbard Barewold had the best office in Thedas. It was atop Weisshaupt with a balcony overlooking the griffon roost. And, he still couldn't believe the wardens actually had griffons again.

Of course, there was a significant trade-off … finding the preserved griffon eggs cost him some good wardens.

After hearing about the real reasons griffons went "extinct", Cal had it well documented in many places … including chiseled in stone with lyrium at the entrance to the roost … that griffons were NEVER to be given the Joining concoction or any blood-magiked version of the Joining!

Stupid, shortsighted idiots. Other Blights had been stopped without sacrificing the one thing that put wardens in the air on level with the sodding Archdemon. Cal grumbled that they could have found some other "whatever" for it to take. The warden who found the journal of Garahel's sister agreed with him.

After reading the journal the young mage warden had found, Cal had to agree that they were desperate back then. However, he believed strongly that with a little more organization, they could have won the battle anyway. Not to mention that the wardens forgot about the vigilance part of the motto! They'd been taken by surprise. "It had been so long," they whined. Sodding derelict wardens. After four hundred years, Duncan hadn't been taken by surprise.

The few records that remained showed a distinct lack of strong leadership. Garahel was brave and a hero, no doubt. But, they needed someone else in charge of the overall strategy. He wondered what a difference it might have made to have Duncan and Loghain back then.

Of course, Cal had to begrudge that if he hadn't failed in his mission to kill the Old God Lusacan before it arose as an Archdemon, it wouldn't be an issue. But, Cal did fail and it was a vital issue now. Locating those preserved untainted griffon eggs was nothing short of a miracle … whether guided by the Ancestors, the Maker, the Creators … or even Koslun and his Qun nonsense!

However, Cal's thoughts soon soured. Bartrand Tethras was the reason Cal failed. The epitome of the Orzammar surface dwarf. All greed and no sense. Some of Varric's friends couldn't understand how Varric could kill his own brother. After all, even though Bartrand collapsed the main passage and left Varric and the rest of the expedition to die … Varric did find the thaig's sodding vault and a small crosscut to squeeze back up to the surface. Varric was more wealthy than the Empress of Orlais right now.

Two years into Cal's expedition, they came upon Bartrand's cave-in a few weeks after he had escaped with his red lyrium statue ... the first seed for all the red lyrium growing everywhere now. There were no other Deep Roads on any map to reach Lusacan. The road that Stone-forsaken Bartrand collapsed was the only way to get to Lusacan without an infinite army of darkspawn to dig and brace a new tunnel.

When Varric and his people crawled out of a nearby hole in the ground, Cal thought they had another route … just before that tunnel totally gave way and blocked the whole thing up permanently. They spent weeks trying to see if there was a way to open it back up or find a way around, but the rock and soil were just too unstable and all the side crosscuts were dead ends.

Fiona had the idea that maybe Bartrand was blightsick and Lusacan told him to do it. When Varric sent word about the red lyrium in that ancient thaig being blighted, Cal had to admit that maybe she was right. Fiona was already in Cumberland causing trouble with the mages by then. He could hear her smug "Hah!" all the way in Weisshaupt.

So, Cal was not one of those naysaying friends about Varric killing his kin. If anything, the fratricide made Cal appreciate the storyteller even more. And, he already liked Varric a great deal. A storyteller you could trust with shit … another miracle.

Unfortunately, it was too late to stop the spread of red lyrium. Kirkwall's Knight-Commander bought Bartrand's stolen red lyrium and made a sword with it ... made her crazy. Tevinter's Warden Commander Thelius reported that a number of the magisters had some apprentices using the stuff already. Cal had gotten a few reports of the idiot renegade Templars in the south using it as well, to quench their addiction. Served the damn Chantry right for getting them addicted in the first place.

The Carta would soon be richer than Varric.

So, the Grey Wardens had even more darkspawn to kill now ... the lyrium was blighted, so the idiots drinking it were darkspawn as far as Cal was concerned. He sent a warning to the Archon in Tevinter and the Chantry — White and Black. To all his commanders, he said that if it sensed like darkspawn, kill it. He wasn't looking forward to exterminating all of Tevinter. Hopefully, they weren't all idiots.

As Cal walked into the griffon roost courtyard, Mansar — the giant-of-a-man Anders roostmaster — walked out with the griffon who had imprinted on Cal. "First Warden, Rooxy is ready to go. I've detailed her care for Valya to help handle." He patted the saddle of the griffon.

Cal loved Rooxy and the feeling was mutual. The young hatchling started to follow Cal around almost immediately whenever he was in the roost … and he went there a lot. Her tawny coat, white main, silver-tipped feathers and golden eyes were impressive to anyone who saw her.

"Good … now where's …" Cal looked around as the roost handlers stowed all his gear and papers in the griffon's sizable saddlebags. As soon as he spotted High Constable Wills heading his way … along with his Antivan shadow, Zevran … he added, "There he is."

"This is your last chance to let me go in your place, First Warden." Wills had a grin on his face. He was itching to go home to Ferelden, but Cal needed to face Sereda himself. Ferelden had several mages who could shapeshift and Cal wanted to start training mages across Thedas to shift into griffons before they ran out of time. The one thing Cal knew about it was that a mage had to see and study an actual creature before they could shapeshift into it. Valya would be in charge of that … once one of Ferelden's shapeshifters taught her how to do it.

Rooxy could stay away from the roost for a few months to a year — until she exhibited the signs of wanting to mate. Then, they would need to come back. Something about the Anderfels drew them to go home and mate every couple of years or die. So, other warden compounds needed shapeshifting mages to fill in.

Cal liked his Second … now given the High Constable title as they traditionally called the Seconds in the past when griffons were around. "No, I need a vacation from this shit and you'll do fine." He nodded to Zevran with a smirk. "I think all your 'problems' have been … eliminated."

Zev bowed. "I serve at the wardens' pleasure, First Warden."

"The advance patrol should be at Soldier's Peak soon, so, hopefully, our arrival won't be too much of a surprise for Sereda. I ordered him to keep the griffons a secret." Cal laughed and was about to say more, but his traveling companion arrived at that moment.

Breathlessly, Valya ran up and handed her overflowing packs to the handlers to stuff into her share of the saddlebag space. "Cal, you need to go to the front gate first. A patrol came across a Qunari in the plains, calls herself Herah Adaar, a mage from that Valo-Kas merc group we hired that one time. She fell out of one of the green portals. They said she's got a green thing in her hand that closed the portal behind her. They said she fell unconscious after that flash in the sky."

Cal turned toward Mansar. "Everything ready to go?"

"Yes, First Warden," he replied as he readied the reins to hand to Cal.

Cal just grinned at Wills. He didn't have to say a word. Wills sighed, turned and headed toward the front gate.

"Come on, Valya. Let's head out before some other shit happens." Cal mounted Rooxy. As soon as a laughing Valya got strapped in the back saddle, they took off.

Nothing. Absolutely nothing in Thedas was as incredible as seeing the world scroll by beneath a soaring griffon.

Strange as that might be for a dwarf to think.

AN: Most importantly, I hope everyone is safe and taking care at this time. That said, there are many worlds here to explore on FanFic to pass the time! Thank you all so much for choosing WHWH as one of yours. Next week, our snarky Loghain and others in Denerim make their reappearances! :)

IAMLORDTHORNE, I very much appreciate your follo

w and favorite! I hope you continue to enjoy the story.

Judy, Thanks for your continuing good vibes! :)

Paul Lenzen, I appreciate your kind words so very much. They keep me going. :)