As Elissa waited, the rain and winded started to get heavier, and the whispers invading her mind started to get louder. She began to feel an overwhelming darkness approaching. It wasn't too far away and it seemed to be getting closer.
By the time Alistair returned, she was sure that it was almost on their doorstep, so to speak.
"You feel it, don't you?" Alistair asked with a frown as he approached.
Elissa nodded. "It's the darkspawn horde?" she asked, even though she knew the answer.
The other grey warden just nodded.
They walked over to the edge of the ruins and looked down on the valley below. They could just make out the figure of the king, resplendent in his armour of gold plate. Beside him stood the stoic figure of Duncan. Around them stood hundreds of soldiers, and between each line of soldiers walked a small figure in the red and gold of the chantry priestesses, a small trail of smoke following in their wake from their incense burners.
The whispers grew even louder and both Grey Wardens turned their eyes to the other side of the valley, where a mass of darkness and fire approached. It was too far for them to make out any real details, but they could see the sheer size of the horde and feel the fear and hopelessness that seemed to radiate from the creatures.
Suddenly, a tremendous roar rang out across the valley and the approaching horde charged forward.
The king gave the order to ready the archers, then a moment later had them send a volley of flaming arrows across the valley and into the incoming troops. Next, he sent the hounds, who charged across the field in all their snarling glory, snapping and tearing at any darkspawn they came into contact with.
The king's final order was given, with his sword held high and his voice filled with passion. "For Ferelden!"
His army met his cry with a war cry of their own and charged forward.
They met the darkspawn in the middle of the valley, the sound of metal clashing and arrows flying filling the night air.
Just then, a massive flaming rock flew from the darkspawn side and hammered into the side of the ruins. The crash was enough to break the two Grey Wardens on top of the ruins from their trance and Alistair grabbed hold of Elissa arm.
"Come on!" he shouted, over the noise of the battle. "Let's cross the bridge and get to the Tower of Ishal!"
They started running. Just as they reached the halfway point on the bridge, one of the giant flaming boulders suddenly crashed into the side of the causeway just in front of them. The soldier that he been standing there was thrown into the air. He crashed into a statue on the other side of the bridge and fell to the ground, unmoving.
Once the bridge had stopped trembling, and Elissa was able to regain her footing, they continued along the bridge. They bent low and sprinted as fast as they could, ever wary of another boulder heading their way.
One of the giant statues to their left crashed down beside them as they ran and to their right more soldiers were being shot down or flung around like rag-dolls as another boulder crashed into the side of the bridge. Just as they were reaching the end of the bridge, she saw one of the flaming balls heading towards them. She braced against the far wall and called out to the group of archers that were standing in the rock's path.
But they either didn't hear her or the warning came too late, and the projectile scattered them before they even had a chance to move. For a moment, she froze. All those people, killed in an instant. And she hadn't been able to save them.
"Come on!" Alistair shouted.
She felt him grab onto her arm again and yank her up. She stumbled forward, but followed him, trying not to look at the crumpled mess of bodies beside her.
A few more paces and they were across the bridge and nearing the gates to the Tower.
A knight and a mage stood at the base to the entrance and both rushed towards them the moment they saw them.
"You!" the knight shouted over the dim. "You're Grey Wardens, aren't you? The Tower … it's been taken!"
"What are you talking about, man?" Alistair snapped. "Taken how?"
"The darkspawn came up through the lower chambers, sir!" the knight replied. "They're everywhere! Most of my men are dead!"
Alistair turned to Elissa. "Then we have to get to the beacon and light it ourselves!"
"I have to stay down here with my men," the knight said.
"I'll come up with you," the mage offered.
Elissa nodded and the group hurried through gate and into the courtyard at the base of the Tower.
In an instant, they were set upon by darkspawn. She had fought them before of course, but this time was different. Elissa could sense where they were and in a horrible way she felt more connected to them. She could feel the anger and darkness radiating off them, even more so than before. She tried to use that connection to make them focus on her and Alistair rather than the mage, and used their anger to fuel her own attacks.
One of the creatures with a mace managed to get a hit through her defences and caught her in the side. Pain radiated through her side and she was sure something was broken. Anger bubbled inside of her, how much of that was her and how much was the darkspawn she didn't know, but she pushed forward. She stabbed one blade into the beast's chest and used it as an anchor to send the other slicing through its neck. She didn't even have time to see where its head landed before the next creature was upon her. It was partly on fire, so the mage must have already gotten to it. Elissa blocked its first attack out of the way and used the momentum to push her hand past its blades and into its face. She didn't even notice the burn of the creature's blood on her hand or the horrific scream that it made as she pulled every last drop of life force from it.
It crumpled to the ground. She paused. Her new Warden sense flared and she stepped to the side, pivoted, and sunk both of her daggers into the torso of the darkspawn that had been about to bring its giant sword down on her head.
The creature almost seemed surprised for a moment, then it too fell to the ground.
She stood there, breathing heavily, waiting for another attack. But she couldn't sense anything nearby.
Alistair came running over to her. "Are you all right?" he asked, giving her a once over.
"I'm fine," she answered. She didn't bother to do her usual routine, because she knew there'd be more creatures soon enough, but she did give herself a moment to relax.
"It looked like that Hurlock got in a pretty good shot, you sure you're okay?" he looked down at where the darkspawn with the mace at gotten her.
She looked down as well and found a nice dent in her armour. She'd need to get that fixed sooner rather than later. But she could feel the flesh and bone knitting themselves back together, so knew that at least for her there wouldn't be any lasting damage. Nevertheless, she accepted the health potion that Alistair was holding out to her. A little extra healing help couldn't hurt. "Thanks."
"When you're ready, we really need to keep going."
Elissa nodded. She made a mental note to ask him what he meant by 'Hurlock', then gestured for him to continue.
They ran up to the doors of the Tower and creaked them open. Inside, the main lobby had been turned into a war zone. Spiked barricades criss-crossed across the room. The moment they stepped into the room, something roared and the lines were set ablaze, so now there were fiery spiked barricades criss-crossed across the room.
Elissa cast her eyes around until she spotted a break in the line. She ran towards it.
She heard a click and realised too late why there had been a break. The trip-wire snapped, tipping over a barrel of oil. It covered the stone and at the speed she's been going she didn't have time to stop. She slipped into the puddle, lost her footing, and tumbled to the floor. Fortunately, Alistair and the mage had been a few paces behind her and managed to stop themselves before also careening into the slippery pool.
Alistair called out to her and she raised a hand to say she was fine. Slowly, she pushed herself to her feet, using Loki as a balance, with the dog using his massive claws to dig into the grooves between the broken stonework. When she was finally upright, the group continued. Although, Elissa was going decidedly slower now, mindful of the oil still coating the soles of her boots and not wanting to slip over again.
They were once again set upon by darkspawn and the fighting continued much as it had done outside. Soon, the band of creatures was down and the group were quickly downing health poultices and other potions to rejuvenate them for the next fight. At one point, Elissa stood in a puddle of blood and a part of her mused that at least she wouldn't have to worry about the oil anymore.
They cleared the first floor of the tower. In the second to last room it looked like the entire floor had sunk into the earth, leaving nothing but a giant hole, and Elissa assumed that this was how the creatures had gotten in.
Just before they reached the door into the second floor, Alistair pulled them up short. "Marker's breath! What are these darkspawn doing ahead of the rest of the horde? There wasn't supposed to be any resistance here!"
Elissa smirked. "You could try telling them they're in the wrong place," she suggested.
"Right. Because clearly this is all just a misunderstanding. We'll laugh about this later."
Elissa chuckled and he rolled his eyes. "At any rate, we need to hurry. We need to get up to the top of the tower and light the signal fire in time. Teyrn Loghain will waiting for the signal."
"Onward then," she said.
They hurried through the door and onto the second floor. The creatures on this level were cleared out, just like the ones below had been. Although, in one of the rooms, Elissa did find a couple of old ballistas and with an odd satisfaction sent a few giant arrows whizzing through a band of darkspawn, pinning them to a nearby wall.
The further up the tower the got and the more and more darkspawn that they had to fight their way through, Elissa began to worry that they might get to the top too late and miss Duncan's sign. She voiced her concerns to Alistair, but he didn't seem concerned.
"We'll get there," he said, in such a tone that told Elissa he truly believed it. "But Loghain better be ready to charge as soon as we light the signal. The king is depending on us."
They were quiet the rest of the way up, quickly dispatching whatever came their way.
Finally, they reached the top of the tower. They ran into the room, and froze. In front of them, between them and the signal pit, stood the biggest creature Elissa had ever seen. It was easily twice as tall as any man and probably twice as wide. Giant horns curled above its head and it's lips were pulled back over a mouth full of tusks and very sharp teeth. Blood was dripping from said teeth and the body it had been gorging on dropped to the floor with a wet thud as it turned to face them.
"An ogre," Alistair breathed.
The creature, the ogre, roared at them, so loudly that Elissa had to force herself not to cover her ears, spittle and blood flying across the room at them.
Then it charged, the ground shaking under its enormous weight.
Elissa only just managed to dive out of the way. Alistair held his ground, stepping in and out of the ogre's reach and slashing across the purple skin with his longsword. While it focused on him, Elissa side stepped until she was behind the creature. She sliced one dagger across the back of one of it's knees and the other dagger across the other. The beast howled and stumbled slightly, then it slowly turned around. It swung an arm out and again she only just rolled out of the way in time. She took a few quick steps backwards, but the ogre was focused on her now and it was coming for her.
She fumbled at the pouch on her belt. Some of the sand fell to the ground as she frantically tried to gather enough to stun the approaching beast. By the time she finally had a decent enough handful, it was close enough that she could feel the heat of it's breath. Without time to aim, she threw the pile of sand in its face. Again, the creature let out an infernal howl.
It swung its arms out as it panicked with the pain. One arm back-handed Elissa and she flew several strides across the room, landing hard, her left elbow crashing into the hard stone floor with a sickening crunch. Pain flooded through her and she let out a strangled cry.
But she had to get up. The ogre might have been stunned, but it would come at them again soon enough. Trying to ignore the pain in her arm she looked back at the beast. Even now it was pawing at its eyes, working out the offending grains. Just then, Alistair, having noticed its distraction, ran at it waving his giant sword with steady movements. The moment his blade connected, the ogre let out another howl, this one filled with pure anger. In an instant, it dropped its hands from its eyes and charged at Alistair, head first.
Its horned head collided with Alistair's plate metal and the soldier was thrown backwards.
In horror, Elissa watched as the ogre continued to advance on the man. She could see the mage off to the side, sending spell after spell at the creature, but none of them seemed to do much damage. Even Loki's giant bites at the creature's ankles didn't seem to be anything more than an annoyance. Without realising what she was doing, she ran towards the beast. On the way she thrust her arm out, draining some of its life force and healing her elbow. Then it was like time slowed down. She leapt into the air, her daggers poised above her head. The creature must have sensed her approach and spun around, just before she landed on it, both daggers plunging hilt-deep into its chest. Blood spurted in great torrents, its dark warmth splashing her face and oozing over her hands.
It let out one final gurgling roar, then went limp.
Silence.
Then, all the sound came back at once. Elissa looked down at her hands. The dark red, almost black, liquid, pooling all over them. She scrambled backwards, away from the creature. Her breathing came out in ragged gasps and she tried frantically to scrape off as much of the goop as possible.
A hand on her shoulder startled her and she looked up at Alistair's concerned face. "You really don't like blood, do you?" he asked. He handed her her daggers, but not before wiping them down on a relatively clean part of his own armour.
"Thank you," Elissa said, her voice rough.
Alistair gave a nod. He then looked up and gestured to a wall off to the side. "The beacon's over there."
She took a deep breath, pushing her nerves and fear down, and stood up, wobbling only slightly. "We've surely missed the signal," she said quietly.
"Then let's light it before it's too late," Alistair replied.
Elissa looked around the room until she found what she was looking for, then hurried over and grabbed lit torch from the wall. Quickly, she placed the head of the torch into the wood pile of the beacon. The pile instantly flared and there was a woosh as the flame continued into the stone tunnels that made up the beacon atop the tower.
She turned and looked at Alistair. His face told her he had the same concerns as her. Beacon's lit. Now we wait. I hope we were in time.
Suddenly, the whispers around them rose in an almighty crescendo. Both Grey Wardens frowned. She open her mouth to ask Alistair what it meant, when the door to the room crashed open and at least twenty darkspawn swarmed in. The group spun around to meet them, but instead were face with a volley of arrows. At least four of the arrows made it through Elissa's armour, before her vision went dark and she fell to the floor.