Flora inhaled an anchoring breath, put her palm to the wood and gave a tentative shove. The door shifted a quarter-inch in its frame but yielded no further: by lock or by spell, it was sealed fast. There were no discernible key holes within the door itself, nor any bolt or bar. Flora took a step back and stared at it. Her breakfast was curdling in her stomach: the bitter aftertaste of fear beneath her tongue. She did not want to confront whatever lay in the Harrowing Chamber alone.

Look for the light.

Obediently, Flora swept her gaze the length of the door: from base to arching lintel. A glint near the tiles caught her eye and she squatted to inspect it more closely. There was a gap between the doors where the wood had warped, no wider than a finger. A skeletal finger of light beckoned through the crack. The light was suffused with a ghastly pallor, like the face of a dying man.

Can you remember what to do?

Flora, reluctantly, could. Still squatting on her heels, she reached out a hand, one bitten-nailed forefinger extended. The distortion in the wood was just wide enough to accommodate the tip of her finger. She took another deep breath - it felt as though she could not fill her lungs - and let her magic surge from beneath the nail. Two sails of aureate light billowed outwards from her finger: the rapidly expanding barrier splintered the wood more effectively than Qunari gatlock powder. The doorway to the Harrowing Chamber disintegrated in fragments: each door hewn in pieces as though struck by an axe. The violence of the door's breaking frightened her; the noise shattered the silence like a broken window at night. She recoiled and almost lost her balance, the heel of her boot dropping over the edge of the stair.

"Another guest to join the festivities! How fortunate we are, truly!"

The voice called her inside, genial and welcoming, laced with madness. Flora felt a deep gloom settle over her.

At least Darkspawn don't talk nonsense before they kill you.

Go on.

Flora inhaled again; the air within her lungs igniting into the luminescent aether of her magic.

To the whale boats, to the whale boats.

Her boots carried her into the Harrowing Chamber; the footsteps sounding far more confident than Flora herself felt. Then, at last, she allowed herself to look around and take in the scene before her.

For a single bewildering moment, she believed herself back in the Fade.

Am I still dreaming?

You are awake.

This… this is real?

It is.

The Harrowing Chamber was unrecognisable. The octagonal walls contained within them a scene more suited to the nightmarish depths of the Fade. Several hulking creatures, part-man and part-monstrosity, loped mindlessly around the chamber. Their flesh was a mass of tumorous growths; their faces unrecognisable. Pulsating masses clung to the columns like some malevolent organic growth. Untethered magical energy circulated overhead, restless and volatile: the eaves seethed in an electrical storm. An overpowering odour of rotten blood washed over Flora like a foul tide: her stomach churned in horror. In the centre of the chaos stood a man with a demon's shadow: his robes blooded and his back to her. His hands were aloft, fingers making strange shapes in the air. At his feet lay a shuddering and prostrate figure. Neither made any acknowledgement of the door's shattering; the sound lost in the electrical discharge.

Flora, mouth agape, decided to make a hasty retreat. Before she could reverse through the broken doorway, she felt an irritable thrust between her shoulder-blades; as though a formless palm had given her a shove.

Onward!

She stumbled forward, putting a hand to a column to stop herself from falling. The monstrous beings ignored her entrance, continuing their oblivious circuits around the chamber. One deformed creation shuffled past only an arm's reach away.

WHAT ARE THEY?

Abominations.

Flora had heard the word before - it was part of the standard Templar lexicon - but she had never seen one, nor would she ever have envisioned them like this. The twisted features reminded her of things that lived in the deep parts of the sea and never saw daylight.

Monsters!

Just demons. Calm yourself.

She could feel her jaw start to vibrate in her skull and made herself take another anchoring breath, slowing the frightened patter of her heart. The aether stirred within her again, reassuring.

What can I do, she thought, what do I do first.

The figure lying in the centre of the chamber was twitching in a spasm that she had seen in her earlier days as a mender: when death had crossed the finish line first and stole victory. Flora swallowed bile and then turned her eyes reluctantly to the being that stood above it.

It turned to face her: a creation caught halfway between mage and monster. It had the outer form of a man, but the skin seethed with darkness beneath its surface: the eyes were hollows of colourless light and one arm had transformed entirely into the clawed appendage of a demon. When it spoke, the echo of each word had a guttural edge.

"I bid you welcome, mage. Have you come to join me willingly, or- "

As it spoke, it turned to face her, slow and triumphant. Then, the moment it set eyes on her, the jaw dropped and - for a heartbeat - the creature seemed more man than monster.

"The vase?!"

Flora was astonished that her derogatory nickname was known amongst the upper echelons of the Circle. She was not entirely sure how to respond: with the deference due to a senior instructor, or the revulsion deserved by a maleficar?

"Hello, Mildred," she said at last, vaguely.

Her eyes followed the perimeter of the chamber. Everywhere she looked limp mages were slumped against the walls; some clad in the crimson robes of a senior instructor, others still in their nightwear. Flora recognised an elderly elf who used to frequently berate her in the corridor for getting underfoot. At some earlier point in the evening a woollen cap had been pulled down over his ears to prevent a chill. Now he lay bruised and battered against the tiles and she felt a lump rise in her throat.

Meanwhile, the abomination that had once been Uldred was staring at her: and there was enough left of his human face to register confusion.

"What are you doing here? Surely they are not desperate enough to send an incompetent child to stop me."

Flora noticed then that the senior mages were pinned against the wall by a black mesh of energy: it crawled over their skin like a spiderweb, and seemed to emanate from the centre of the chamber. Whatever magic it held, it immobilised them save for the blinking of their eyes. It was not immediately obvious which was Irving: some had their faces turned away; others were bloody beyond recognition. Some were hidden behind one of the half-dozen chairs strewn about the chamber: the only furniture it held, intended for the observers of Harrowing rituals.

"Where's the First Enchanter?" she asked, wandering towards the nearest toppled chair and returning it upright.

"I have no use for this useless one," replied the abomination, and it was not speaking to her. "What need have I for a girl with no capability? She is no better than Tranquil."

Flora remembered where she had seen this particular instructor before: he had taken a class that she had been removed from after a single lesson. It had been about the history of mage-Chantry relations, and she had spent the session inking made-up fish in the margin of her parchment.

Beauty does not compensate in the slightest for the lack of a brain, Uldred had hissed before elbowing her from the room.

The class had been abruptly stopped once the Templars had learnt of its subject matter.

"Your name is Uldred, not Mildred," she said, wincing as the feet of the chair scraped across the tiles. "Isn't it?

"Innit," said the senior instructor who had become an abomination, mocking the commonness of her accent. "Ha!"

Flora eyeballed the creature in disapproval: she believed that senior instructors ought to be above such jibes. Still, she thought, Uldred had fallen to the lure of blood magic, so he had a general lack of good judgement.

"Why is this," she said, not concentrating on her words because she had just spotted Irving.

The First Enchanter was spread against a column as though pinned there, tethered in place by the same dark energy. His breathing was laboured and his heartbeat dangerously irregular. Flora recognised the wavering rhythm that she had first felt as a tap on her wrist on the lower foyer. Her spirits had not misled her: he was a man with one foot through the Veil. Yet she did not dare make a move: the webbing of malevolent energy crawled over his skin, attached to the abomination by a dark and pulsing vein. An abomination kept guard nearby, one red and liquid eye rolling around in search of enemies.

Uldred was incredulous: 'why is this'?!

"We should kill her now - what? - no, you are mistaken - she has no more power than a gnat."

The blood mage was now mid-argument with the demon that dwelt within. His head snapped back and forth, the jaw hanging loosely: the clawed arm writhed restless at his side. It reminded Flora of a bloated crustacean struggling to escape the confines of its shell. Having returned the adjacent chair to its upright position, she sidled unobtrusively across to the next.

"Back to the old man - he is about to yield - aren't you, 'First Enchanter'? Yield to us! Your Circle is lost!"

The words curved around a mocking smile; Uldred's face swung like a pendulum towards Irving. There was a long pause, and then a noise of guttural defiance slid from the mage's throat. Flora took the momentary diversion to return the next chair upright, sliding it towards the wall. Her knee sounded out a sudden protest as she moved: it had not taken well to the Circle's many steps. She inhaled sharply, fingers clenching on the back of the chair.

"Girl!"

Flora braced herself, almost summoning her shield in reflexive panic. Yet no assault followed the query, no ball of black flame or stream of electricity was launched in her direction. She dared to look round at the abomination; Uldred was staring at her with traces of human perplexion on the demonic visage. Less of his old face was visible now.

"I am warned," it said, and shook its head. "I am warned of you. Why? Why? This one was known for incompetence. Or… perhaps not? What do you mean?"

The maleficar's words were limned with frustration: the unravelling human mind unable to comprehend the demon's warning. Flora, realising that her reprieve was limited, finished her lap around the chamber. She had avoided the patrolling abominations but the mindless creations of mass and energy had ignored her; blind to all except what their master showed them. The last chair was lying on its side a few yards away; she limped towards it.

"If she has ability, then let us have her. She will make a fine pet. Let us - what are you doing?"

Flora released the chair abruptly, heart seizing. Yet when she turned her face towards the maleficar, the high bone, cold eye and sulking mouth gave no hint of the alarm within. The finely hewn architecture of her features had not been crafted to reveal fear.

"My knee hurts," she replied, blandly. "There's a lot of steps in this tower."

The maleficar's oily eye rolled, taking in the circle of wooden chairs positioned between the centre of the chamber and its perimeter. The eroding brow furrowed in confusion.

"How many chairs do you need, girl?" Uldred snapped, once again the contemptuous senior instructor who had expelled her from his class. "You've only one hind."

Flora looked around, appraising.

"Mm, I think I have enough now."

The demon within the maleficar must have shrieked a warning. The torn flesh of his face twisted and he lifted an arm; but Flora was faster. She felt the magic unspooling from her like a thread yanked from a fraying sleeve: her barrier surging from one wooden chair to the next. In the time between the two halves of a heartbeat, the perimeter of the room was severed from the abominations at its centre: shielded by gilded mesh.

Good, murmured her general, who never shied away from bestowing approval when it was earned. A standing shield channeled between organic matter.

The bloody veins that had been draining the mages of their vitality were amputated; the webbing melted away. Irving slithered to the ground in a greying and crumpled heap, no longer pinned against the column. Flora hoped that one of the senior instructors would leap up and begin blasting fireballs at the maleficar and wandering abominations. No one stirred: either too weak or barely conscious.

"Helpful as a blunt hook," she observed at last, when it became obvious that no aid would come from that quarter. "Eh."

Uldred let out a malignant shriek of rage: the sound emergent as a demonic rasp. The last vestiges of his humanity were rapidly receding; one recognisable eye buried within a seething swarm of flesh. Both of his arms were clawed now: the leathered palms moulding a mass of energy. The magic was black and shot through with brownish red; it smelt like stale blood.

Flora realised that the missile was intended for her. Her shield clung to her like a second skin; she hoped fervently that her perimeter barrier would not collapse. It held firm, extending from one chair to the next like an ethereal cordon.

"I need these mages," she said, raising her voice above the discharge of malevolent energy. "To help me save Herring."

There was a flicker of irritation from her general.

"And also Ferelden," Flora added hastily. "You can't take any more of 'em."

The missile seared the air like a thrown coal; though a thousand times hotter and far more toxic. It hit Flora's shield and disintegrated into ashes, each fleck of falling grey leaving a bloody smear on the tile. Flora scowled through the filmy barrier, aware that she could offer nothing in retaliation. She had no offensive spells in her arsenal; indeed, she had no arsenal at all.

"You're a scabby beg from Skingle," she said at last, resorting to verbal assault.

The demon gave a guttural command and the abominations lurched around; their mindless eyes focusing on Flora. They were not fast - they moved at a lumber, their limbs too malformed for speed. One made a lunge for Flora, and it was all gaping mouth and rancid throat. It hurled itself against her barrier and fell back with a crash, stunned.

Flora flinched, but her shield had held firm; and a memory from long-past Ishal rose to the surface of her mind.

Didn't my shield once keep an ogre at bay? At the top of the tower of Ishal?

It did.

She gazed at the translucent strands of gold with new respect. Each fibre was as thin as a strand of hair; the net finer than the most delicate lace. Beyond, the maleficar had now become something otherworldly: a creature more suited to the darker recesses of the Fade than the physical world. The shadow of the Pride demon clung to it, so vast that only a fraction was visible within the confines of the Harrowing Chamber. It had ignited a maelstrom of black flame in the air before it: the voidfire blistering the tile beneath its feet.

Flora turned her back on it. The tap-tap of Irving's heartbeat had faltered against her wrist: she could accomplish more with the old man than she could with the enraged demon. Her shield felt like cool water flowing across her skin; it rippled when the torrent of flame hit it, but yielded not an inch.

Irving was slumped on his back near the pillar where he had been pinned. His skin had the greyish pallor of a three-day corpse; his limbs leaden. Flora thought that he looked more like an sickly grandfather than the First Enchanter of Ferelden.

The improvised barrier between the chairs proved no obstacle to its creator. She stepped through it and knelt beside Irving, ducking her head beside his. He did not look well - he appeared still in shock - and Flora felt sorry for him. She adjusted his lopsided collar, fastening the top button of his robe.

"HELP ME SAVE HERRING," she then said loudly into the moaning and barely conscious old man's face. The volume was necessary: Pride's frustration and anger was deafening.

Irving opened a pained eye and gaped at her, mouthing a voiceless warning. He jabbed a limp finger to somewhere beyond Flora's shoulder. Another of the demon's assaults hit the barrier and melted like hoarfrost at dawn; neutralised in a heartbeat.

"And you need to come to Redcliffe," Flora added, in sudden remembrance. "There's a demon in the castle there, too - "

She broke off and eyed him beadily, hoping that the First Enchanter would prove more useful with the Guerrin boy's abomination than he had done with those within his Circle. She supposed that Uldred had taken Irving by surprise , and -

The man is ailing, foolish chit!

Duly chastised, Flora bent down and fixed her mouth to Irving's; the aether stirring in her lungs. She exhaled and it blossomed into creation, surging up joyfully through her throat and into the fading mage. The first breath melted the cobwebs of exhaustion from his skull; the second purged the demon's poison from his veins. Her fingers beat an even lub-dub against the stained fabric of his robe; after a few moments the stuttering heart below copied the steady rhythm.

"The Circle ain't lost," Flora informed the limp old mage as she returned upright, recalling Uldred's taunt. "There are survivors. A lot of them."

It was almost too much for the First Enchanter to comprehend: Uldred; Pride; the abominations grown from his former colleagues; the barrier and the breath of the girl renowned for her utter incapability.

"And Instructor Wynne is with us," Flora continued, scowling over her shoulder at the abomination hurling itself repeatedly against her shield. "She'll be here soon."

With my brother-warden. Is he still with you?

No longer. Look to the door.


AN: Ahh it's nice to have Flora redeeming herself slightly in this chapter - since the last time we saw her, she was being seduced by not-Duncan! Not her finest moment, lol. But she's back on form now, fortunately... I liked the idea of her using the chairs to channel her barrier, since in the last chapter it was revealed that she can use anything organic to do so. Don't ask me what a 'scabby beg from Skingle' is supposed to be, lol. I like how Flora is very aware of her own limitations - she has no way of actually doing any damage to Pride or the abominations, so she just focuses on what she CAN do well. Also it makes me laugh (in a slightly mean way) to envision her yelling into the barely-conscious Irving's face: HELP ME SAVE HERRING!1111

Hope everyone is well and having a good day! I'm quite impressed at how quickly I wrote this chapter, granted I only work 2.5 days a week but I do have a toddler and that's a full time, 24/7 job ahahhaa. Especially since she's simultaneously teething and suffering from a cold at the moment, fml.