Chapter Eighty-One: Eclipse over the Halys
Two thousand, eight hundred years before I arrived on Thedas, a battle was fought on Earth between the Median Empire and the Kingdom of Lydia. These were regimes so ancient to my time, that only a small proportion of the population would have ever heard of them, yet they ought to be more famous.
Media was the precursor state to a much more famous name: Persia, from whom Western civilisation received its first real lessons of universal empire.
Lydia was the kingdom in which coinage was invented for the first time, revolutionising human affairs in a way that nothing else has.
Media was an empire on the rise, having conquered the fertile plains of Mesopotamia, one of the places where farming itself had emerged for the first time and itself home to many old and more famous states; Babylon, Assyria, Uruk.
Lydia thought to defy the Medians, newcomers that they were. Two criminals fled Media to Lydia, and the Lydian king refused to return them. A six year war followed.
In the sixth year, their armies fought near a river called the Halys, in what is today the country of Turkey. It was indecisive, with no side having the upper hand.
The historian Herodotus describes what happened next:
"Just as the battle was growing warm, day was on a sudden changed into night. "
A solar eclipse passed just as the battle was happening. This was a terrible omen, for everyone. The gods were greatly displeased, according to the beliefs of both armies.
The two sides stopped fighting at once, and a peace treaty was agreed, to soothe the anger of the gods.
Now, dear readers, I am sure you are asking why any of this is relevant, especially the Thedosians among you. Well, it is a story that illustrates perfectly how cosmic events can reframe everything you thought was important, and force those who were enemies to end that state of affairs.
In our case however, it was not the darkness that brought about such a change, it was a baleful green glow pouring from scars in the sky. It was not the coincidental alignment of the Sun, planet and moon either, it was the machinations of one who would be a god and one who used to be a god.
The Breach would put many things on hold.
From the birth of my first two children to the start date of the final offensive against Starkhaven, there were two weeks of preparations.
Two legions under Gaius Tiberius made it to our positions south of the Minanter a couple of days afterwards, bringing our total numbers up to ninety thousand.
The little shit was not glad to see me, but eager to prove himself. His grandfather, Tiberius Senior, could not spare any more troops as the Nevarrans were backed into a corner and fighting to the death. This was Gaius' chance to prove himself, and I was going to make sure he got it, if only because I had stolen his bride.
The factories of Mithril turned out weapons and ammunition at an ever increasing rate. We had found new sources of required raw materials thanks to peace with Antiva, and we had the funding to corner the market entirely thanks to the terms of that peace.
With every firelance or cannon produced, more refugees were allowed to come to Troy. They signed the papers of enlistment and their citizenship certificates were given to them in return. Fresh regiments were soon drilling, made up of Orlesians fleeing the war, Avvars fleeing poverty or clan vendettas in the western Frostbacks, and ex-slaves from the Tiberian estates.
The latter in particular were very eager, and since all of them were part of the Foreign Legion until they learned Orlesian, I had the distinct honour to command them personally.
Morale grew and grew, as the realisation that Starkhaven and its lickspittles were doomed began to dawn on everyone. Soon, we would have victory, and then an honourable peace.
A week before this certainty was to become a reality, we had our elections at last.
It was a new political scene to start with. The Jaderites had formally merged their fraternity with the Aequitarians, an arrangement that would last some time.
The Libertarians and Lucrosians created a joint slate of candidates.
The Libertarian leader was now officially Louise de Villars, following Julie's quiet resignation from political office, but it was agreed that putting forward a chevalier as the candidate for Chancellor was not the best idea. Seven in ten of our population was elvhen. There were still then-unsubstantiated rumours that in order to become a chevalier, you had to kill an elf, as a rite of initiation.
Irony is that the rumour was true, and such a cruel and brutal tradition was the reason why so many chevaliers from the border country with Ferelden were eager to follow us in the first place. Whatever the propaganda, it was hard for these more geographically detached nobles to completely ignore the sentience and suffering of elves just because.
Ciara could've stepped into the leadership vacuum if she had been older and more experienced, but it would be a good few years before she would. Same problem with Armen. Soprano, Mike and Isewen had all been elected, but they were active military officers and didn't want to quit that just yet... Though Mike was elected as an independent.
So, Leha became the leader of the joint ticket instead. Adam Valle, the original leader of the Lucrosian mage fraternity, reclaimed his place of its political equivalent.
The election was a Libertarian landslide, to the surprise of many.
The Grey Constitution created a National Assembly of 301 representatives, with each one elected by a scaling number of people depending on the total electorate enrolled, except for the Chairperson of the Assembly, who ran its business and would be re-elected by default as the 301st member.
The Libertarian-Lucrosian alliance won just over half the vote, winning 152 seats. The Aequitarians won 99, and the Impera won 50.
It is generally thought that the excellent progress of the war and the surrender of power by both myself and Julie contributed to the spectacular victory, as well as the fact that most of the Impera's core supporters couldn't vote yet as they did not yet speak Orlesian.
However, this did not lead to a change in government. With battle about to commence, such a thing could not be tolerated.
In her capacity as Empress, Tam immediately declared a state of national emergency and ordered the creation of a government of national unity. Velarana was to remain Chancellor, and her cabinet (minus Julie) was to remain as well, until we had won the war.
Since this left the new Impera out, they got Julie's seat as Secretary of State for War and the new position as Chairperson of the Assembly.
Other things happened too.
The delegation to the Conclave at Haven departed with little fanfare, making its way to Redcliffe via an eluvian dispatched for the purpose on board a Tevinter-flagged merchant ship.
It was led by the Minister for Magic, Valeria Marable, first-enchanter of the Isolationist mages. Along with her went five other mages of the same fraternity. We trusted them as neutral spokespeople for our position, as the Libertarians and Aequitarians did not trust each other enough on the subject of how magic ought to be handled and the place of Templars in the new order we were creating.
What compromise the Divine could possibly hope to forge between Mage and Templar was anyone's guess, but since the Divine's agents seemed willing to sacrifice Antiva's dignity and treasury for the chance to get our delegates to the Conclave, we were in no doubt that the Chantry was deadly serious about ending the conflict.
So things went.
Every day and night, I made sure to spend time with my daughters.
Truth be told, even as I was organising the matters of war, they were ever on my mind. It was like falling in love, that wonderful first stage where your beloved(s) can do no wrong. When I was apart from them, my chest clenched and I had to force myself from the distraction.
It helps, I guess, that many of the inconveniences of early childhood upon a parent did not fall on us. We were obscenely wealth by this stage, and Aurelia's family had every reason to want to protect my bloodline, even the non-mage branches of it. The Tiberii provided all sorts of assistants and nurses, to change and clean them.
Tam insisted on feeding Helen herself, while Julie had trouble feeding Roxane. Often Tam would feed both, seemingly refusing a Tevinter wet nurse near either child to Julie's eternal amusement, though there were times where that could not be avoided. Julie took any help she could get and was grateful as can be.
As Empress, Tam had duties that occasionally needed to be attended to, and in these she brought either Helen or Roxane along. It's quite something to watch a diplomat from the League try to splutter a response while Tam breast-fed a baby and made decrees at the same time. The idea of a Qunari Empress was bad enough. This was not something that was done in polite society anywhere... except under the Qun, it seems. And now, Troy.
One such matter she was involved with while doing this was of grave importance, incidentally.
We got word that the Tevinter force under Magister Alexius had finally set sail for Ferelden the day before our attack was to commence. They had been tied up in Estwatch for the better part of two months, for reasons we couldn't quite understand. Of course, we know now why; he was waiting for confirmation from his would-be master about the location of events soon to happen.
Admiral Fisher requested permission to intercept the Tevinter convoy that was to sail through our waters, but Velarana refused to allow it and Tam as Empress saw no reason to overrule her on the matter. The Tevinters were our ally, and it was no business of ours if they wanted to land a small force anywhere else. Alexius' legion was not enough to conquer anywhere, not least Ferelden.
We should have let the galleons loose though, because none other than Ianto was involved in that affair.
At any rate, all of this flashed by like I was using a time machine, and before I knew it, the night before the big attack had arrived, the sun setting in the west below the Vimmark Tail-Hills after a wonderfully sunny day.
All duties were off for the evening, and I was one of the few in the Army that had been given leave for it. My arrival at the front line would announce the beginning of the final battle, and everyone else had been rotated home through the eluvians before that night. Better that everyone know what they were fighting for and then be given time to think about it sitting in our fortifications.
Tam, Julie and I watched the sunset with our daughters atop the Mont de Mars, Valhalla sprawled out before us; Camp Jerusalem, the Bay of Dolphins, the Isle of Dogs, the gigantic forest and in the far distance, Last Mount.
We said nothing for a very long time after dark finally descended. The sky remained bright orange beyond the mountains and hills, until it wasn't.
Eventually, I couldn't take the silence any more. Or rather, the not-talking-about-things. There was plenty of cooing at the babies and noise from them in return.
"A lot of people are going to die tomorrow," I said turning to the others, mentioning the thing that no one had yet.
Julie breathed out, and smirked. "A lot more of theirs than ours," she said, "Barely any of ours, if the gunners use my cannon the right way."
The sheer amount of ordnance we had dragged through the Crossroads to attack the 'havener forts was obscene. It wouldn't have been out of place at battles towards the end of the American Civil War, or the early days of the First World War back on Earth. Unfortunately, our weapons weren't as advanced as the latter.
"Maybe," I replied, "But Prince Vael has fortified in depth. We will need to dig him out with more than cannon. And I might have to be the one to lead the troops back in to do it if the first assault doesn't make progress."
McNulty was leading the first attack, as his Grenadiers were the best suited to punch the hole we needed. The biggest, scariest guys and gals we had, armed with the tools and knowledge to take earthworks over, as easily as pushing dominoes over. At the cost of lives.
"I can command you to stay behind," Tam said, in a tone of reminder, "But I probably should not. If you refused to lead, then the troops would know it was extremely dangerous."
The whole reputation of the Army would have collapsed. The weight of command is knowing that any particularly bad decision or lack of spine can lead to such an outcome. I could not weigh my life against those of my troops and be respected if I valued my own more.
The possibility of this leading to my death, of not seeing any of them again, was like carrying around a sixty pound pack, particularly now that I had kids.
"You worry too much," Julie said, with absolute confidence, "The Chantry loyalists will feel the sky fall on their heads, and won't get back up."
In retrospect, I really wish she hadn't said that. After all, who said it had to be us that made the sky fall?
"Hopefully the mages will make this easy," I said, "With Gaius' reinforcements, we have all the walking flamethrowers and engineering tools we could need."
"Now you're getting it," Julie winked, "We're days away from absolute victory. Hopefully, we can conclude it before the Conclave ends, and throw it in the face of the Divine. The next war can be one we prepare for properly."
All true, to our minds. The last minute doubts were more a consequence of my new circumstances as a father, I realised to my embarrassment. Count on Julie to dispel the doubt.
"The next war?" Tam asked, "Shall Troy conquer the world? I do not recall saying that should be our objective, nor has Lady Velarana."
Asserting a little Presidential authority there, but smoothing it over with a kiss to Julie's cheek.
"One of two things will happen, sooner or later," Julie replied, holding up a finger, "Either we will be betrayed by those we will have peace with, because we are too big an ideological threat to ignore."
Another finger joined the first one.
"Or, the Impera fraternity will win an election," she continued, "And declare war on anyone not making nice, friendly noises."
The Impera winning an election at some point in the future seemed like an inevitability at this point. Many of the newcomers from Orlais were from regions that were not as deeply touched by our Libertarian message, and preferred familiar messages of imperial splendour and glory along with the new diet of liberty, equality and fraternity.
I wasn't sure how I felt about that. I had fought in what many called a war of empire. Interfering in other people's affairs was offensive on some level, but so was allowing them time and opportunity to prepare war against us. A common problem for modern Americans to chew on, now one we would be forced to consider given our growing military strength.
"We will have to work hard to prevent either event," Tam frowned, "But you did not think of another possibility, my love."
"Which is that?" Julie asked, an eyebrow raised.
"That those we have made peace with decide to murder our supporters within their own borders," Tam said gravely, "We cannot stand by and let that happen, if we can prevent it."
Julie shook her head. "They'll probably just deport them to our lands, we're a nice convenient dumping ground," she said, "Which is horrible, but not something the Assembly will declare war over, I think."
I would argue for intervention myself in that particular scenario... Ethnic cleansing wasn't kosher in my view. I had not lost all my values, though perhaps it seems that way to many.
"Probably," I shrugged back, "One war at a time though. Let's win the one right now, before worrying too much about a future one."
Another long period of no-talking-except-to-the-babies occurred, during which I thought of nothing else but them. I was clearly not alone in that.
"It's getting cold," Tam said after a while, "The sea breeze."
"Is that normal?" Julie asked, looking up and around the sky for clouds, "We haven't had a storm for a few weeks."
It certainly wasn't normal. The humidity that should've retained the heat of the day had suddenly gone away, and there was indeed a wind blowing onto shore which seemed to dodge the Isle of Dogs entirely. The air had been heavy before, now it was thin and chilly.
I looked in the direction of the wind, which began to pick up enough to make me squint. I saw something glowing in the distance, to the south-west. I thought it was just the light of the fading sunset reflecting off the sea for a moment... but the colour soon put paid to that notion.
It was a luminous green, a disturbingly familiar sight to me. Light of that colour had flashed through every porthole and window of the helicopter that had crashed through the Fade with myself inside it. And that hadn't been the last time I had witnessed it.
"Look!" I said, pointing off in the direction of it, "What is that? Looks like raw fade magic?"
Aurelia had demonstrated some ancient Fade techniques that her family had kept documented from the very earliest days of Tevinter, though she did not know how to crack open the Veil or bring through anything from Earth like her ancestors had done. They too had the green-glow lightning about them, when used.
Julie and Tam turned their heads that way, narrowing their eyes against the wind as I had to.
"Definitely magic," Tam said, with absolute certainty, "I saw that light many times on Seheron, during battles against the magisters. They dropped boulders from the Fade on our soldiers. I believe Chancellor Velarana can use the same spell."
The good Lady had indeed used that very attack on me when I invited the mages to try their best to kill me at L'Ambassade, to prove my magical immunity and silence the then-Revered Mother Brandon's objections to me.
Then Julie just had to say it.
"But it's at the edge of the horizon?" she questioned, "Doesn't that mean it has to be massive or high up in the air?"
Tam and I exchanged glances, as recognition turned to horror, making me feel far colder than the wind had been. A portal to the Fade that large could not be a good thing, and it seemed unlikely that a small one would appear in the middle of the sky for no reason.
It seems whatever dark and false gods oversee such things were not done playing with us either. As quickly as a lightning strike and as bright, the glow coalesced into a swirling, glowing mass. It was shaped like a wound from a sword or axe, like a tear in skin or leather, and flashing lights spun around it at random every split second.
It was god damn enormous, as it had to be for us to see it with any detail at all, though we could not truly estimate its position at the time.
"Hold on," I said, walking away quickly "I'm going to fetch binoculars."
"Bring Aurelia," Tam commanded, "She must give us answers about this at once."
I didn't bother confirming it, I just ran as fast as I could to our residence, still attached as it was to the headquarters building. The guards seemed positively terrified as I approached... If I was running that madly, the thing in the sky must be very much something to worry about. None of us knew just how badly we should have worried.
"Get Aurelia Tiberia out to the west fence!" I said to them, "Tell her it's urgent!"
I rushed through the HQ section and shouldered my way through the doors adjoining to our home so hard that one of them slammed against the wall and bent the door handle slightly, the ping of the metal ringing in my ears.
Cursing, I grabbed my binoculars off the table... and thinking quickly, pulled the box of Earth weapons from under our bed, taking the precision firelance up over my shoulder by its strap as I moved. I made to leave, then remembering Tam's other comment, I grabbed a few more linen blankets for the kids and put them over my other shoulder.
Satisfied I had everything I needed, I ran out of the place just as quickly as I had arrived. One of the guards I had passed was gone, presumably running off to the Tevinter embassy as ordered.
I returned to Julie and Tam, skidding to a halt on the dry dust underfoot.
"Any change?" I asked.
"It might have gotten slightly larger," Julie said, not sure, "Or brighter, at least."
I looked and couldn't really tell the difference. It might have just been the even increasing darkness that made the effect, or so I thought at the time. Of course, we know better now.
I handed over the binoculars to Julie, who shared them with Tam, while I brought up the firelance
"No single mage could do that," Tam commented, her lips twisting with thought, "Not even the most powerful saarebas in Qunandar, fed with lyrium until he sweated it, could do that."
She was trying to make sense of it, not patiently waiting for the expert to arrive to explain it. This was a sign of just how nervous she actually was. Normally, she would not have speculated, not aloud.
"How do we know?" Julie asked, "Perhaps Aurelia could do it?"
"She's had the power of Outlander blood for months now," Tam said, with a grimace, "She has incredible, dangerous power... but not the power to do this unaided."
The look of the thing through my rifle scope was not hugely better defined than without it, though it was clearly very far away. Far away meant safer, to my mind. Which is probably why I suddenly remembered that I had blankets for my daughters.
I moved to Julie first, pulling one off of my shoulder and wrapping it around Roxane tightly. She gave a little cry as I moved her about in Julie's arms, but soon she was settled back in. Julie gave me a kiss on the cheek for my reward, and gestured with her elbow to Tam.
Our beloved Empress was engrossed. I had to tap her to get her to stop looking at the damn thing through the binos, and she looked down at me like I was crazy for doing so... until she saw the blanket in my hand. Her gaze met mine and the warmest smile I had ever seen from her erupted on her face.
"You are a good man," she said, holding Helen out so I could wrap the blanket around more easily.
"All I can do is try," I replied flatly, completing the task.
Voices from behind alerted us to the presence of an expanding audience. Tam frowned, and pulling Helen back to her chest, returned to her watch on the anomaly. She already knew who was coming.
Aurelia had arrived on the scene with an entire retinue of Vints, all of them mages if their crystal-tipped staves were any clue.
They were all wearing, for lack of a better word, pyjamas. It was only maybe 9 o'clock at night, but given what was supposed to happen the next day, it was no surprise that even the Vints were getting an early night.
Aurelia looked like a grizzly bear cub, covered head to toe in brown furs, and used her naginata like a walking stick, the crystal tapping on the stone as she came.
"What has happened?" she declared from the maximum possible range she could be heard from, "Did you feel it too?"
I opened my mouth to shout back, but stopped myself before I set the babies crying their lungs out. I waved Aurelia closer instead.
She obliged without complaint and with great style; she gathered some magical force, her naginata glowing down its length, before she unleashed it. In the single largest Fade step I had ever seen, she flashed into existence beside me, leaving an icy trail behind her.
Her attendants scrambled to rejoin her, like puppies suddenly discovering their mother has wandered off and making it their mission to catch up. Some even started off with their own, far less impressive Fade steps. I was extremely pleased for the comic relief, particularly as it didn't disturb my daughters.
"Good evening," Julie said politely, not as pleased to see Aurelia, "What was that you said?"
"Did you not feel something?" Aurelia asked, "Like being hit by a wave, the pressure of it?"
Not even slightly. I wondered if it was a mage thing, scratching my chin.
"...No?" I said, "Did my runner not reach you?"
"I haven't received any messages tonight," Aurelia replied, before noticing that Tam wasn't paying attention to her, "What is she... her Excellency looking at?" Almost forgot her diplomatic language there.
Aurelia side-stepped us and finally got a good look at the glowing green scar on the horizon. Her eyes went as large as oranges, quickly watering up because of the breeze and forcing her to rub them with the outside of a hand.
"Holy Maker..." she breathed, "Holy Andraste... Gods old and new..."
Without a word, Tam waved the binoculars in front of Aurelia's nose. "Get a closer look," she commanded.
My Tevinter bride snatched the binos at once and examined the anomaly for a good minute before lowering them again, at which point she was biting her bottom lip. Definitely not good news then.
"Do you know what it is, Lady Tiberia?" Tam asked, as she accepted the precision firelance from me to use its scope, "It looks similar to some of the Fade-summoning magic we have seen demonstrated by your kind, and by others."
Aurelia suddenly remembered we were there with a start, and her face returned to its default.
"It's a Fade rift," Aurelia said, "A breach in the Veil between the real world and the world of dreams and spirits. There is one like it at our estate in Treverorum, at the place where my ancestor summoned the first Tiberius from Earth... but this is far, far larger."
"What does that mean?" Julie asked, "Is it any threat to us?"
"Oh, it is most definitely a threat," Aurelia replied, half interrupting Julie's last word, "Wherever that thing is hovering over, that place will be fully exposed to the Fade. Demons and spirits will be able to come and go as they please there. If it's left unattended, it could grow and the demons would be able to wander further and further."
"And you have one of these things at your family home?" Tam asked, lowering the firelance scope from her eye and rubbing the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger, "Basra saarebas..."
"Ours is only the width of a large coin now," Aurelia retorted, clearly insulted by Tam's words in Qunlat, "No demon or spirit can exit through it due to the warding around it either. Our family has used it to document the behaviour of Fade-reality interaction zones. It has provided many insights over the years, into both the Outlander phenomenon and magic more broadly."
Not information to be used for the greater good of humanity, I thought rather cynically, but rather for the good of the Tiberii. What I didn't know is that they could use it to track things coming straight out of the Fade, particularly Outlanders.
"This one is definitely not the width of a coin," I mused, "What could have caused it?"
"It is not my area of expertise. I am a soldier. I would've been fully inducted into such mysteries after completing my first military service..." Aurelia thought aloud, "But it would have to be a ritual. I have the power to achieve such a thing alone, easily, but it would require specialised tools, something that greatly increased the efficiency of mana use. Most spells are actually horrendously inefficient in their use of Fade energy. Such tools are very uncommon, almost all of them are relics from the days of Arlathan."
In other words, thousands of years old specialist items that were probably fragile. Not something you pick up at a flea market, you would think, but it depends where you are. Or who you are, given who we now know gave such a tool to the thing responsible.
One of Aurelia's attendants cleared his throat, an older man of about sixty by my guess. "Sacrifices might even be necessary to weaken the Veil beforehand," he said, in an upper class accent I would have said was from England if we had been on Earth.
He rolled his tongue in his mouth, which seemed to indicate he was thinking of something, before adding, "Such things have been done in the past to increase mages' ability to access the Fade before battle, particularly during the Exalted Marches against the Qun or during the Blights." Done by Tevinter mages, anyway.
"A ritual means someone is responsible," Tam said, "This is not an unintentional weakening of the Veil caused by extreme violence or abuse. But why?" Leaning on her training as part of the Qun's religious caste, Tam knew quite a bit about the dangers of such things.
"We can guess from where it happened," Aurelia explained, "Ferelden. That is the only land in that direction close enough for us to be able to see it like this... And what is going on in Ferelden at the moment?"
There was only one thing it could possibly be.
"The Conclave," Julie answered.
There were a lot of eggs in one basket at the Temple of Sacred Ashes. It would be a perfect target.
"The Chantry leadership are all there, along with the Templars..." I thought aloud, "Maybe Grand-Enchanter Fiona decided to let demons get rid of her enemies. The mages were not winning the war. Even if the Divine survived a demon attack, the cost to the Templars and those other forces following Pentaghast would be huge."
Julie scoffed, as she repositioned Roxane in her arms. "It isn't just the mages who could be responsible. The Templars would have access to many ancient magical artifacts, and they are well suited to fight demons too," she countered, "It just as easily be them creating a demonic mess so they could be seen to clean it up, then they'll blame the mages for the unleashing of magic while wiping out the leadership."
"You're both wrong," Aurelia stated, growing impatient, "You don't seem to understand what has happened. The energy required to breach the Fade to that extent requires concentrating it in a single spot and then unleashing it. Without the proper wards, it would create a titanic explosion."
She pointed at the green scar on the horizon with her naginata.
"Whatever was under that thing is no longer there," she concluded, "The Divine, the mage and Templar leadership, the diplomats, the guards... all of them have either been dropped directly into the Fade if they were at the centre of the vortex, or obliterated by it if they were beyond its edge."
We gawked at the sky-scar in disbelief. She was describing a sort of bomb. A weapon of mass destruction.
"Jesus... Marable," I said, "The delegation..."
"Your Minister for Magic and her entourage are almost certainly dead," Aurelia nodded, "Given what time it is, I doubt that negotiations were happening. Since I doubt they were the target of whoever did this, it is most likely that they were caught in the explosion rather than being sucked into the Fade."
Valeria Marable and her Isolationists had been with us since we first stormed the Wolf's Lair, and they were viewed by all to be objective and responsible monitors of magic use in Troy. They effectively replaced the Templars as our magical investigation organisation, with the Army's gendarmes being the enforcement wing.
Now, that magical fraternity had been decapitated, some of our best people killed, and the neutral force in magical affairs neutered.
"We must have vengeance," Tam said, through lips drawn back into a vicious smile.
"You still do not understand!" Aurelia snapped, slightly panicked, "The Veil is shredded. Unless someone closes that Breach in a few days, we will all be up to our eyeballs in demons eventually! Secondary breaches will spread outwards from that place if they haven't already."
And like we were in some cheap dark comedy play, an Army runner approached at full speed, having escaped my notice until she came to a halt beside us. She caught her breath, and it didn't take long for me to realise that she was as pale as a ghost despite her exertions.
"General, the forward operating base is under attack!" she said, "There are creatures everywhere, pouring out of portals in the sky! The mages think they're demons!"
I stared at the girl, for a minute, working out what the hell to do. Our entire offensive force was waiting in trenches and foxholes for dawn, waiting for the moment that the attack against Starkhaven would begin. Their officers were there. Demons are not generally known to operate with strategy and coordination, and our people had some briefings on demons from the Templars before they were recalled.
Our soldiers could handle it, if their morale held. And there was only one thing I could do to help that.
"Private, go to Block 3 and wake Mariette de Villars," I said, "Inform her of the situation, and that she is commanded to report to the Crossroads at once, armed for battle."
No reason why the other person with the Outlander talent ought to be slumbering in bed at a time like this, after all. The private ran off without saluting at once.
I exhaled, and turned to Tam.
"My Empress, we should go immediately to our Army," I said, "And kill the demons."
Five minutes later, the kids were with the nurses and we were in the Crossroads, in front of the many eluvians leading to our lines south of Starkhaven, strapping up, layering ourselves with weapons.
A mace and a combat knife for me, a warhammer for Julie, longsword and curved daggers for Tam, Earth firelances for all of us, and ammunition hanging off every piece of combat webbing we could attach to ourselves. Aurelia even took a firelance.
Armour we mostly ignored, save for the kevlar vests that made for good ammo-carriers and some gauntlets in case something tried to bite us. Simply touching us caused demons to disintegrate, albeit not immediately, and their ranged magic dissipated too. We didn't know if that was still the case if the Fade was leaking all over the place, though.
I was certain about one thing; there was no point trying to convince Tam and Julie to stay behind for the sake of their health, even if the danger was basically non-existent. They had the same magical immunity that I did. The same reverence that had sprouted up when I emerged unscathed from a magical barrage at L'Ambassade now applied to them as well.
We were bulwarks against the tyranny of magic and the terror of demons.
But there were plenty of people who didn't have the same protection, and it was our duty to stand with them. Which is why we should've guessed who'd turn up, we weren't the only ones who felt we had such duty.
Mariette came wandering up, in Army uniform rather than harlequin garb, her own daggers at her waist. I noticed her as I loading my weapon,
"That's yours," I said, pointing at the pile of Kevlar, firelance and bullets to my right, "Gear up."
"If you insist," came the amused answer from Mariette, "Demon hunting is not really what I signed up for, but since they can't really harm me now, who am I to object? Oh, and I picked up some stragglers on the way here."
The three in question were marching through the eluvian from home as she spoke. Armen, grinning like a fool, Ciara, crossing her arms over her own firelance, and Leha, hefting her old crossbow over her shoulder and adjusting her helmet.
"Ah no, you're not going," I said, "The four of us are immune this demonic shit, and Aurelia is a walking nuke. You're not either."
"You go, we go," Armen sighed theatrically, "After all this time, did you think we would let you have all the fun?"
"Besides which, our comrades are through there," Ciara added, pointing to an eluvian, "I'm not going to sit here and do nothing."
As touching as it was, this was insanity. I had asked much of both of them, but I wouldn't let them walk themselves into a death trap. I grabbed Ciara by the scruff of the neck, getting a surprised yelp out of her, along with Armen by his arm, and began dragging them back towards the eluvians leading home.
"Let them come," Tam growled in protest, "They'll just follow us through when you're not around to send them back. We don't have time for this."
Sensing the truth in that, I stopped and exhaled through my teeth. Ciara stuck out her tongue in defiance, and skipped over to Tam to give her a hug. Traitor.
"That's the way it's going to be," Armen shrugged, patting me on the shoulder.
"Just like old times," Julie agreed, "Well, except the hangers on." She nudged Mariette with her elbow as the harlequin was throwing her Kevlar on, getting a glare in return. The harlequin ignored her, not out of spite. Perhaps out of shame.
The whole thing with Mariette being the last thing I wanted to think about, I ran out of patience.
"Let's go," I said, finally ready. Everyone moved.
Aurelia activated her tornado-like barriers and led the way, going ahead first.
Ciara, Armen and Leha followed her through the same portal.
Julie, Tam and Mariette went next. For some reason, the eluvians didn't automatically shut behind them. As magically immune as they were, their anti-magical aura didn't extend beyond their bodies. The fact demons weren't pouring into Troy itself is more or less proof that mine did, even if the eluvians' reaction to me walking through wasn't enough.
Finally, I joined my companions.
The portal closed behind me, the usual crack of air being torn rattling behind me. At once, my ears were filled with the sounds of gunfire and the acrid smell of burning sulphur. There wasn't much to see either, the eluvians were placed behind palisades so an enemy couldn't just shoot arrows at them directly, and to control traffic coming in and out of them.
"Where do we go?" Tam asked me, firelance following wherever she looked. She hadn't been to the front yet, there was too much to do in Troy. The new Assembly still needed its hand held.
I marched off in the direction in question, the others falling in behind me. The sound of Aurelia and Armen spinning up their magical barriers was the only sound any of us made above the din of battle beyond.
The sight when I cleared the eluvian site was something I'll remember to the day I die.
The forward operating base was situated atop a hill overlooking the main Starkhaven forts we intended to attack, with our line curling out from behind it. In the darkness of the night, scars in the air glowing rancid green hovered all over the plains; behind our lines, between us and the Vael camps, and behind them too.
Whole clouds of gunsmoke drifted around, seemingly pushed about by unnatural air currents coming out of the rifts.
In our own camps, you could make out platoons or whole companies huddling together in clumps, forming squares or schiltroms with bayonets fixed, as shadows made flesh advanced not by walking or running, but gliding along the ground. In support of these shades, anthropomorphic lava bubbles flung fire and roared, while hooded figures flitted about, summoning icy blasts like a water cannon.
Vael's people seemed to be in even worse shape; their camps were completely ablaze, and while we were too far away to make out details, there were no large troop formations visible taking the fight to the demons that we could see.
"Rage, despair, shades..." Aurelia muttered beside me, before speaking up, "No Pride or Terror demons. Strange."
"You have names for them?" I asked, incredulous.
"Demonology is a well developed area of study," she replied, "This was to be a battlefield. I would expect to see Despair, Terror, Rage and Pride attracted to this place, drawn to the emotions for the fight that was to come. Yet two are absent and shades have come instead. Strange."
"We can worry about that later," Julie said angrily, "What do we do? There's too many for us to handle even if we stayed here for weeks."
"Go to the nearest one of those glowing rips in the air," I said, "See if we can do something about it, and make sure as many people see it as possible."
I looked to Aurelia for confirmation, which she gave with a flourish of her naginata above her head. The sky lit up, as the cloudless sky suddenly crashed with lightning bolts. They raked a path across the battlefield in a line, homing onto any demon nearby.
Dozens of shades and a couple of despair demons were sent twitching to the ground, wreathed in electrical discharges, before their existences bled off like melting wax, pouring towards the tears in the air they had originated from.
Troops on the hill were beginning to notice we were there, but their officers kept them in line, pouring volleys into gathered demons at the foot of the hill. For some reason, the demons were not advancing towards us, just hanging around below, like they were chained dogs. Strange. Maybe there was something we were missing.
I tuned my radio to broadcast in the clear to all channels.
"This is General Hunt," I declared over the shooting, "We're at FOB Mars, status report on all divisions."
The answers I got back were testament to the professionalism I had beaten into the officer corps.
"1st Division, holding fast," Soprano answered first, "The demons don't like lead, but they keep trying. Require immediate reinforcement."
Soprano's troops were the ones right beside us, leading eastward down the hill and across to the centre of the line. A tributary of the Minanter lay on the other side of the hill, flowing towards Starkhaven itself, which was a decent flank guard for us.
"2nd Division with the Foreign Legion, we've had to abandon our section of the line for the forest," McNulty declared, "Those fucking things came out right on top of us. Looked like Starkhaven were preparing a night raid though, so we were all awake and ready. Managed to pull out, though we couldn't bring most of our logistics."
McNulty had originally been at the centre, reinforced with fresh regiments to push through the hole his Grenadiers would make in the Starkhaven line.
Now, he was in the forest to the rear, and we could see the muzzle flashes and smoke of his troops' firelances along the treeline, as hundreds of shades made their way at him. Lightning bolts and ice projectiles were also in play, as the Tevinter mages under Gaius and Aurelia's household troops were there too. The abandoned camps were illuminated sickly green, the hooded figures stalking through them, possibly hunting stragglers.
"3rd Division, I'm here with the 1st Cavalry," Mike reported, "The demons have us surrounded and the chevaliers' horses are going crazy in the stables, but we are not under direct attack. They are just wandering around on our perimeter. We're shooting them down whenever they appear, but they don't seem to be stopping."
Mike was the anchor of the right of our infantry line, her job was just to keep the enemy in place. Yet it was pretty inconvenient that the demons weren't attacking her, as she was in worst position to help anyone else.
"2nd Cavalry Division, our allies have run for their lives," Isewen snarled, "The demons aren't anywhere near us and the cowards are still riding away. Request orders."
Isewen was the final link in the chain that was to close off the loop in the Minanter south of Starkhaven. There was a lot of land directly to the east that they could've used to escape out of, but we had a huge cavalry advantage and it was great cavalry country, being flat and open save for a few fences or small hedges.
But that didn't matter any more.
I ordered Isewen and Mike to attack from the east and McNulty from the south, to retake the latter's camp. Without the ammunition and medical supplies there, the 2nd Division and the Foreign Legion wouldn't last the night.
"Soprano, do you see the portal nearest the FOB?" I asked, "The one at the foot of the hill? I'm taking command of your troops up here, we're going to try and take it. That should relieve you from this side. Concentrate on the others to the north and north east as soon as you see us make it through."
I figured with the firepower Aurelia was packing and the anti-magic I was walking around with, we'd be able to close the rift no problem.
"By your command, Imperator," Soprano intoned gravely, "Good luck, and may God watch over us all." God being a nicely ambiguous term that was spreading in popularity over 'the Maker', as were other syncretic practices that merged Chantry ideas both northern and southern with Avvar ideas.
"Amen," I replied, turning to my companions once again, "We're going down the hill."
"Great," Leha said sarcastically, pulling back the string on her crossbow, "Right at the fucking demons, why not."
"Rangers!" I shouted to the troops guarding the hill, "Form column of battle!"
It took a while to get the soldiers in formation, as they were afraid and their officers had a hard time coaxing them out of their foxholes. The plan was simple; my companions and I would be at the head of the column and the Rangers behind us would keep up.
The attack was signalled by the artillery battery atop the hill shooting a star-shell straight up into the sky, bathing the entire field in a bright white light; one of the surprises we meant to use on Starkhaven. The things were rare though, so we only had limited time. They would shoot up another every time the one before burned out, so that we could all see without night vision goggles.
"Advance!" I called.
We all started walking forward. The slope was just steep enough to force us to watch our footfalls most of the time, so we took turns moving and firing.
Our Earth weapons perforated the demons with satisfying effect, sending them spinning off and fizzling out of existence. Aurelia occasionally swept the board with a spectacular fire or lightning spell, while Armen preferred precision shooting with his own bolts against the larger things that came out.
Yet more demons always seemed to arrive. We were clearing the way, sure, but there was no sign of them running out of creatures to throw at us. And the closer we got, the more frustrated they seemed to get, screeching and roaring at an invisible line that we could not see.
Until we could see it. A clear delineation you might miss if you were from anywhere else but Earth, like a laser field hitting the ground in a perfect circle at a certain distance the scar in the sky we were headed from.
"See that?" I said to Aurelia, kneeling down and catching the light with my hand, "The demons can't leave the bubble."
"Fade-reality interaction zone," Aurelia grunted, spinning her naginata above her head to turn a dozen shades into a foul smelling pile of dark ashes, "They'll grow if the main breach in Ferelden isn't closed soon."
"Forward!" I ordered over my shoulder, reloading.
The demons were finally able to reach us, and although their numbers were now too few to overwhelm us, they did not stop coming. Those that had been looking to press Soprano's other positions came swinging back towards us instead. Another wave slunk around to the sides as we kept up our rapid advance, trying to get around us to hit the Rangers instead.
It took a lot of bullets to stop that, because the shits were actually using cover, mostly by accident, as there were bushes and stones obstructing our fire lines. The Rangers too were having a hard time of it, particularly in the intervals between star shells providing enough light to see targets.
"I'm dry," Ciara declared beside me, slinging her firelance again and brandishing a short sword and buckler from her belt.
"As am I," Tam said. She produced a nasty looking longsword from her scabbard, one I hadn't seen before. I realised it was a new one made of silverite, a Grey Warden weapon, rather than the one I had seen her use during our early association.
Julie and I were better shots than Tam or Ciara when it came to firelances, but they were just good enough to try potshots. They had gotten a little too enthusiastic with it.
I had noticed that Mariette didn't shoot at all unless the enemy was very close, to guarantee a hit, which was a wise decision given this was exactly the second time she had ever used an Earth weapon. At least she kept to the rule of not pointing the thing at anyone unless she wanted them dead, and didn't leave her finger on the trigger.
We got close enough to the Fade rift that we were sure to make it, but whether we could stay there was another matter. The regular soldiers with us were not likely to survive if we brought them right to the damn hellgate. Time to shift things a little.
"Rangers!" I shouted over the gunfire, "Form square and hold position."
The captain of the company with me acknowledged the command by dragging an overenthusiastic corporal back from following my companions onwards, and relaying the orders by hand signal as much as her own shouts.
I don't recall her name, but she was almost certainly one of Soprano's original crew from Hearth; she had the tattoos of its red light district all over her face. She could be relied upon to follow orders, in other words.
Soon, the Rangers were in a perfect square formation, three ranks deep, one of the corners pointing at the Fade Rift. Demons were closing in from all sides now, but the sharpshooters were able to bring their fire to bear on any direction. Safe, but able to draw at least some of the demons away from the rest of us without being jumped out of nowhere.
Perfect.
"We're going straight to it," I said to my companions, pointing my weapon at the rift, "Ready?"
"Go!"
We ran, the faster among us only stopping to make sure the others were keeping up. Aurelia didn't run at all, but used her magic again to Fade step, sometimes straight through shades that had gotten close, turning them into ice statues that shattered soon after she had made her way.
It was a short run, but we really got the attention of the demons. On arriving close by the objective, we went back to back, those of us with Outlander blood on the outside more or less protecting those who didn't on the inside.
I was beginning to run out of ammunition myself, to my great annoyance. Demons couldn't kill me immediately, but they could still get in my face, wound me and get around me to kill some of the others. I began picking my shots.
Aurelia gravitated towards killing any new demons the rift puked up, a task she was taking pleasure in. I swapped positions with Julie so I could talk to my Tevinter spouse with greater ease.
"Aurelia, can you close this thing?" I asked.
"I thought you might ask that," she replied, hosing down the latest despair demon with a gout of fire, "I can, but it's like a door now. There are no wards. Demons and spirits on the other side can open it again, in a few hours at best."
"Do it!" I said, "We can at least buy some time!"
Aurelia gave a thumbs up, a gesture I did not expect, and stepped out of our circle a couple of paces towards the hellgate.
She dropped her naginata to the ground, closed her eyes, and raised her arms to either side. The barriers around her suddenly dropped, and instead, the swirling blue magical energy surrounded the rift.
Terror clawed at my heart. The demons were still coming, shades by the dozen, 'rage' demons rolling along from all directions. Aurelia had just dropped all the magical protection she had, and she was not immune to what the creatures of the Fade could summon. Whether she was aware or not, it didn't matter.
There was no time to warn anyone else, I put my body between her and the largest concentration of demons and opened up on it, moving my aim point from right to left, essentially on full automatic. Thirty bullets left my firelance in no time at all, tearing down the advance of the shades. Many puked up black bile before disappearing form existence, to my disgust. They weren't even twenty yards away, and you could smell it.
I dropped the magazine out of the bottom of my weapon, and was grabbing a fresh one to reload from the webbing on my front, when something flitted into view in my peripheral vision. A trio of hooded 'despair' demons, floating into view opposite the rift itself. Their hands were positioned as if they were holding a basketball, but instead, a twirling mass of icy air grew.
By instinct, I moved to cover Aurelia, putting myself between her and the threat again, completing my reload process... but I soon realised I had made a mistake. The demons were drifting ever further apart, so that at least one of them would be able to hit her and I wouldn't be able to shoot all three in time.
I had originally not wanted to interrupt her spellwork, lest we all be jumped by demons coming straight out of the hellgate again. I should've grabbed her, pulled her to the ground and covered her with the entirety of my body instead, but that's Monday Morning Quarterback shit.
Unable to do anything else in time, I shot the demon I thought most likely to be able to hit her, the bullets flying under the rift to strike it. It screeched loud enough to shake my bones, and then exploded into icy pieces before melting in green flying ooze. But it wasn't enough.
The demon at the other end of the trio that were widening the front against us raised its hands forward to shoot, and I was too far out of position. A beam of icy particles erupted from the thing's palms, leaving a coat of frost on the ground as it got the range on its target.
The attack burst against a body, and there was a small grunt from someone.
Mariette was standing there beside me, ice-water soaking into her uniform. I didn't have any time to be surprised, as muzzle flashes half-blinded me and the sound of the bullets leaving her weapon half-deafened me. I turned my head away quickly to avoid the worst of it, though it was still dazzling.
She hosed down the despair demons in a display of obscene marksmanship and failed gun safety that would've left my old drill sergeants and range officers pissed off in the extreme. Tracers strobed through the air like someone had put lightning bolts under a clothing iron to straighten them. She hit only two times at most for each of the targets, but it was enough.
Demon Two, the threatening one, twisted uncontrollably in the air like a spinning top, until it dissolved in drips upwards. Number Three shattered and exploded, its screaming lingering seconds after its body had disappeared.
They might not be able to harm me, but demons are extremely unpleasant.
"Maker-damned magister," Mariette shouted, over the shooting of the others, "She thinks she's invincible!" She pulled at her wet clothing with annoyance, and then started reloading.
I was a little surprised she had stepped in front of anything for Aurelia... but then, it was practically unthinkable for the demons to be able to hurt her.
"The Maker-damned magister can hear you!" Aurelia shouted back, her eyes still closed, "This is taking all my concentration, shut up! Almost there!"
The air boomed, and a wave of magical energy burst from her body, a bright white. It went straight for the bubble she was projecting around the rift, and entered it. Slowly, the scar in the air began to close, like someone closing a zip on a piece of clothing. The edges of the rift came together, leaving a thin green line hanging in the air instead of the gaping gash.
The bubble of unreality created by the open rift fell in on itself. The demons around us did not explode or melt. They fell apart. The Fade energies that allowed their unnatural bodies to exist ceased, and so the normal laws of physics resumed within them.
The shades dropped to the ground as bubbling heaps that produced the most nasty smell ever to pass my nose.
The rage demons became lumps of cooling lava, setting fire to the dry grass around them.
The despair demons became rotting corpses, dropping like flies out of their flight paths and soon gathering actual flies.
Sudden relief washed over us, as Aurelia dismissed the magic around the temporary closed rift, and her magical barriers resumed. She breathed deeply, and her naginata floated up off the ground back into her waiting downturned palm.
"That was close," I said to her, "Didn't you know your defences would drop?"
"Her defences dropped?" Tam asked from behind. She pulled the others, who were paying some attention our way at last, into a defensive circle around Aurelia. Tam immediately went to the mage, looking her over for wounds thoroughly.
"I told you, I'm a soldier," Aurelia replied, slapping Tam's hand away from her robes, "Not a specialist in these things. I couldn't sense where the Veil begins and ends in the Rift with disruptive barriers in the way, and I couldn't put a new, normal barrier up while I was pouring mana into the containment barrier."
"Could've told us that before you started," Mariette complained, "Watching a demon kill you would've been unpleasant, idiote tevene. I don't need your child on my conscience either!"
Although I would not have thought that Mariette thought about it like that, she couldn't seem to meet Aurelia's eyes or anyone else's at that moment. It was difficult for her. She wasn't part of the 'family' by choice, at least not in the same way as the rest of us.
I was about to add my own two cents along similar lines, but Aurelia rolled her eyes at all of us.
"I trusted you all to protect me," she said, simply, "Or should I have interrupted my work and let the demons through to kill young Ciara or Armen?"
"Does it matter?" Leha coughed, clearing her throat of the sulphuric taste that was also plaguing my own, "It worked, didn't it? The fucking demons stopped dead the moment the thing was closed. That's all we need."
"Indeed," Armen smirked, "Though Lady Tiberia is right, that block will definitely not hold."
"Long enough to get the Army back to the hill," Aurelia countered waspishly, "Like I said, not an expert, but not useless either."
"Far from it," Armen agreed, pointing off into the distance, "But there are plenty more breaches to close."
I waved the Rangers back over, who came running at a sprint, looking like they had seen some true Houdini shit.
"We're going to gather more troops as we go and play this the right way," I replied, "One hellgate at a time."
AUTHOR'S NOTE: If anyone knows which is the more natural translation of 'hellgate' in French, I'd appreciate your input. I'm leaning towards 'porte-à-l'enfer', which is quite obviously wrong as you say 'en enfer' in real French, but that doesn't really flow well. Google translate suggests 'porte de l'enfer', which works almost as well.
I'd like to avoid another 'Mont du Mars' incident, so any help is appreciated haha