Chapter 30: Red Bride's Grave

"At the entrance to science, as at the entrance to hell, all cowardice must die" (Karl Marx).

Rillian's song is Florence and the Machine: King

Lambert's song is Laura Marling: Night Terror

Fenris' song is Disturbed: Indestructible

Justinian 9:34

The grey sky was hurrying overhead and the high moon showed as a greasy blur of brightness, rimed with smoky colours beyond the drifting blue of cloud. The tide was full out, and the brightness fell in bars of tarnished silver on the wet sandbanks of the Anderfels coastline. The wind blustered in from the north and the oily tumble of the Colean Sea. The delicate promise of midsummer was on its way.

Dawn broke over the Anderfels like drawn-out lightning. To their left was the peninsula that housed the Valarian Fields; a distant promontory beneath a smashed silver sky. The High Reaches glowed like stone teeth.

The sky lightened to the colour of mother-of-pearl. To the north there was nacreous flatness, but the south was impenetrable. If anything, the approach of dawn made the rocks and villages and distant mountains darker; they clenched themselves around the Lattenfluss River in a brooding hush.

Isabella had told them the bay was normally speckled with fishing boats and other traffic, but today it was practically vacant. Port Tallo huddled behind the beach, its cobbled streets nearly deserted. The docks were unpopulated even by the children who usually hardlined for small fish. Wisping smoke from cookfires seemed anxious to dissipate before it was noticed.

"Do you think Weisshaupt has warned them of our coming?" Isabella asked Rillian.

Rillian's feathery red brows drew together in a frown. "It's possible. I don't trust Fiona."

Isabella shrugged and grinned. "But we're going to walk into this mess anyway."

Isabella chose to sail up the Lattenfluss river, past Kassel and Hossberg and through the valley called The Merdaine. There was a lake where she would drop anchor and the party continue across the Wandering Hills, following Fiona's directions to Red Bride's Grave. It was said the land around The Wandering Hills was stained an indelible red from the blood of the millions who had sickened and died during the First Blight.

Lost in that shimmering distance was the end of her quest.

Crumpled, broken land red as blood, washed with a sky of blue and purple, rose and fell in savage obstacle to her dreams. The fierce landscape was beautiful. Yet she quailed at the thought of travelling those sere valleys, scaling those scorching slab-sided mountains, awed and drawn by their cruel splendour.

The Lattenfluss River was wide enough to take two ships abreast, and on either side the valley was a band of green, dotted by trees like spring sentinels. Scrub growth framed the river and wiry little branches clawed at the water. The unending harsh whisper of the foliage made her think of mocking laughter. Or muffled weeping. The truly bad moments were when she thought she heard Fiona's voice: the mind-words that drove her, led her, insisted on this quest. To the south of the Merdaine was the mountain named Broken Tooth, where Weisshaupt jutted like a black warning. As the sun rose, the sky heated to a silver-blue that made Rillian think of overheated steel keening on a grindstone. Of Nelaros. Adaia had taught her to set songs to music and Nelaros had set them to fire and hammer. She would forever keep the ring he had made for her: its filigree of winged vines and hope of life.

Alistair came to join her at the prow. He was no longer the iron-muscled Warden she had teasingly nicknamed, "My Prince." This man was older, sadder, wiser, his muscles padded with fat. But his hazel eyes were clear and bright as ever, his smile – the eager, hopeful expression of youth rising to challenge - melted her heart. The dawnlight seemed to emphasize the determined set of his jaw, the thoughtful frown. The last four years had ground the puppy out of him. But he still looked like her friend who tripped over his own feet and smiled lopsidedly at the results.

"Did I ever tell you of the founding of the Grey Wardens?" he asked, "The story Duncan and Riordan told me, when we rode from Montsimmard to Jader?"

It was on the tip of her tongue to say yes: the moment where Alistair – a fresh-faced recruit who had not even taken his Joining yet – managed to throw wet kindling on the fire and Duncan's beard nearly froze off still made her smile. But she caught herself and said, "No?"

He smiled – as if enjoying the memories of Duncan, Riordan, and those times when Weisshaupt was an order of heroes and the future was waiting to unfurl like a glittering pennant.

"The First Blight had been raging for ninety years...no-one was safe from the encroaching mass of the horde. And it was in an Anderfels village in the Merdaine that the story of the Grey Wardens began. Brun the Wolf was a man of forty-five, with broad shoulders and a mass of dark hair that was already beginning to silver. He was built like a farmer, with strong arms, a sturdy back, and large hands that were dirty more often than they were clean. He had the heart of a farmer, and no matter how far duty called him he always yearned for the soil of his home..."

Rillian wondered if Alistair knew he might have been describing Loghain. She thought of the former General, now stationed at Montsimmard, forever a stranger in a strange land.

In Alistair's tale Brun the Wolf and his lover, Freya the Fierce, were among fourteen people who possessed a natural immunity to taint. They came to Weisshaupt with other soldiers driven to defend their homeland – but an army with only fourteen true slayers of darkspawn would not have lasted long. It had been a Tevinter Blood Mage named Verinius who had created the Joining mixture. He did not possess Archdemon blood – Dumat would not be killed for another two-hundred years - what he had used was the blood of these fourteen along with a healthy dose of lyrium.

Alistair did a creditable impression of Verinius' dry, elegant tone, all strictest scholarship: "Lyrium will shock the body into accepting taint, will overwhelm its senses so completely it can do nothing but submit. Without lyrium the Joining would kill a man, because the body will resist taint in its slow sluggish way. The mortal form is so limited in that regard."

Fenris and Lambert joined them, fascinated. New clothes reflected Lambert's identification with Rillian's rebel scientists: white leather vest over white cotton shirt, white full trousers, soft pale boots. He looked like condensed fog. Fenris was wearing his clawed armour: the only concession to comfort being a pair of iron-hard boots and the red armband. His eyes were the colour of wet moss and they glittered like raindrops striking concrete.

"It makes sense that magisters would see mortality as limited. Danarius had in mind that once the lyrium brands took me over I'd be changeless, ageless, deathless; immortal and less alive than the poorest of the Maker's creatures. A ghost doing his bidding in the way spirits of the Fade did his bidding. Messy, recalcitrant mortals are of limited use to magisters. It doesn't surprise me the Wardens kept the Joining a secret. The Tevinter word for truth – dumat - also doubles as their word for silence."

Rillian was both surprised and touched that Fenris could bear to talk so openly about what had been done to him – what he had to endure every day from the brands – the future he most feared. It was a mark of the trust Fenris had found here – in Lambert, of course, but also in Donnic and Sebastian – the two friends who had seen and liked him as himself, not as a poor ex-slave or a recipient of the brands – and the rest of their companions. In Rillian herself: an Elven non-mage who had defied human cruelty to be where she was and was helping Lambert treat him. In Isabella, who had faced Danarius with him, and in Zevran, who had helped rescue his lover from the Gallows. In Jan and Brand, Isabella's crewmen who were veterans of similar campaigns.

Thoughtfully, Rillian said, "I know the Fade is only shadows, echoes – a shifting climate of ambiguous dreams and nightmares. It makes sense anything from there would persuade mortals not to fight taint. To fight something you have to be real yourself. But Verinius can't have added only blood from people who had immunity plus lyrium – if he was making Wardens, he'd need to have included darkspawn blood. Defeating an Archdemon requires a Warden to make the Ultimate Sacrifice. If everyone was immune to taint the Archdemons would still rise, and we wouldn't have any way to stop them. Even if Red Bride's Grave holds a cure we'll still have no way to spread it to the two remaining old gods. Unless... I wonder what Yavana wanted to do with Maric's blood..."

"Whoa!" Alistair said indignantly, "I'm not donating body and blood to that crazy witch!"

"Of course not," Rillian agreed quickly, "I'm just thinking aloud. Since The Architect and Warden Commander Bregan already tried to awaken the two old gods – and unwittingly began the Fifth Blight – I am not going to repeat their mistakes. Your blood is entirely your own."

Relieved, Alistair was cheerful again, "Did I tell you this tale included griffons?"

Carver, Sebastian and Donnic joined them. Isabella was commanding her crew and Zevran was with her. Varric and Bianca were below decks - their make-up session after their latest row could be heard across the ship.

"Oh, yes," he added, warming to the theme, "It was the Wilder Elf, Vhena, who discovered the griffons who made their homes on the topmost spires of Broken Tooth. Everyone else was afraid to approach, but she regularly made the climb" ...

... The topmost levels of Weisshaupt Fortress glittered in snow-white majesty against the pre-dawn sky. Just ahead, a rivulet of water sprang from frost-rimed rock. The silvered froth tumbled eagerly downwards - like the pale glisten of Vhena's breath in the frosty morning. An encircling arc of mountains brooded in monumental indifference. The Wilder Elf half-dragged, half-carried what appeared to be a large, dun-colored triangle. Taut rigging contributed a harsh whisper. A poem of intricate bindings and flexible strength, it was a framework of ironbark held together with animal glue and wings of the same cloth and water-resistant wax as the sails of their aravels. Vhena had first dreamed of flight among her own people, ignoring those who looked askance at such new-fangled notions. She had started small: easy slopes, soft snow to fall in. Today she would fly free, swallow-like grace shimmering in winter silence.

Dawn touched the mountain-tops in a wash of rose and gold: a dancing curtain that veiled the sun's searing light, transmuted it to grace and delicacy. It seemed the very touch of the Creators' fingers. Vhena had been raised on stories of how contact with shems had stolen the Elven immortality; but her mother had told her that perhaps it was simply that there was a time for everything - to be born and to die, to remember the past and adapt to the future. Deft, long-fingered hands criss-crossed with bow scars strapped the rigging around her body. Billowing, arrowhead sleek, the wings caught the air-currents and sped her steps toward the ledge. To Vhena this moment was always like being born from one life into another. So must the arrow feel as it leaves the bow! She had nearly completed her run - nearly plunged downward off the mountainside - when a gentle chuckle resounded through her mind:

And how will you land it?

Vhena skidded to a stop, arms windmilling as she tried to counter-balance the weight of the rigging. Awkwardness marred her usual lithe grace. Startled, she looked around: these were not her own thoughts. Nor the whispering of the dark half-men that scratched at her brain like a cat sharpening its claws. Who had spoken?

She turned - and found herself face to face with a pair of enormous golden eyes, luminous with intelligence, their dancing lights half-hidden in lustrous darkness. The white-feathered griffon was watching her struggles, head cocked in an attitude of quizzical amusement. The wonder of the discovery overshadowed everything. She struggled out of the harness, hand outstretched, simply desiring to touch a creature of such beauty. Those golden eyes fixed on hers - steadfast, unwavering - and Vhena had the sense she was walking into them. Then the griffon dipped its head and lowered its wings in invitation.

"Do you want me to…"

The griffon chirped and nudged her - as clear a challenge as Vhena had ever heard. Shaking in excitement and fear, the Elf put trembling hands upon the snowy-white feathers of the long, graceful neck and jumped easily, gently, onto its back. She slid her knees beneath the griffon's wings and wrapped sinewy arms around the neck; blended her body to the hammering beat of its heart. The wings lifted. The feathers whispered. The thin air attenuated the pounding of its feet. An alien heartbeat joined her own - her head spun with images, memories, wisdom not her own. Bonded for life, she whooped aloud in sheer delight at her defeat, her victory - felt herself lifted and taken out of her mortal body, her soul washed pure in that great aerial bath.

Each moment free from fear makes an Elf immortal…

Vhena hunched close against the griffon's neck. The wind fluttered her hair behind her. It felt like knives of fire flaying her bare arms, cut through the hide of her tunic - but she was too excited to feel the cold. She laughed in sheer abandon - a paean of delight, excitement, life - tingling all over with a wild, strange, sweet sense of exultation. The sky was bathed in a frozen whirlwind of unearthly hues; the sunlight bled across clouds in gauzy reddish curtains. Beyond the mountains lay a cloak of trees, darkly green - then miles and miles of open ground polluted by leprous patches of taint. Death glistened upon the land like grey glass. Sharp, piercing pain stabbed her. She thought of oil on water - the way it spread and spread, wringing color from above and below, altering everything it touched.

What is this shadow on your mind?

Vhena shook her head, unwilling to answer, but images, memories, knowledge fell from her like beads from a broken necklace.

The griffon dipped one wing, banked, and turned. The mountain ledge tilted towards her. The wings beat in powerful downstrokes, cupping the wind. He reached for the land - touching into a gallop, half-running, half-gliding. They came to a stop. He ruffled his wings and folded them against his sides, cupping Vhena's legs with the warmth of the snowy feathers. Vhena slid from his back. Her knees shook and she shivered. She hugged the pearly neck, laughing and crying at the same time.

After that, Vhena came to the aerie as often as she could. She told no-one of the joy and wonder of her communion, hugged it to herself like a secret treasure. She came up to communicate, to dream - and to fly. In time, her companion gave her his name - or its equivalent. He understood her language far better than she his. Others of his kind grew to trust her too. But when he asked to help against the darkness that crawled at the edges of the land, narrowing and narrowing like the tightening of a noose, she shook her head. She could not bear to think of these beautiful creatures sickened or made sterile by the corruption.

We cannot remain untouched forever. It will poison our hunting grounds too…

At last, the bitter knowledge that he was right drove Vhena to consider ways in which they might hunt the darkspawn together. Close combat was out of the question - they would sicken and die. A lance or spear could only be used once. So the glider's rigging was adapted to a harness, and she crafted saddles such as Freya's people used. She had meant to wield the bows of Elvenkind - but found the draw harshly reined in by the arc of the wings. The short-bows of Clan Closivar proved more effective .Vhena remembered her mother's words. There was a time to cling to tradition and a time to adapt.

For the pull in her blood - for her brothers' lives tapering to the grave - for the dying land - she went to speak to Brun and Freya about their new allies.

For life...

…Isabella dropped anchor at a lake near the Wandering Hills, left Casavir in charge (assisted by Anselmo and Celso) with Jan and Brand taking charge of security. They had not brought horses, meaning the journey across the Hills might take a month. They wrapped damp scarves across noses and mouths to keep out the red dust that could flay a man, and looked at each other, seeing sailors transformed to desert warriors. Lambert looked like a boy dressing up – Fenris looked as if he had been born to it. He was a warrior in the jungles of Seheron and a warrior here too, Rillian realized, I'm proud to know him. Carver looked resigned, "It's only a little worse than the Deep Roads" he agreed, and Varric snorted. "I heard from Brand the place is crawling with undead – a step up from the Profane, I suppose." Isabella hefted her crossbow and looked at the dwarf, "I still can't get Gerav's version to be the same as yours – what am I missing?"

"Gaatlok," said Varric succinctly.

"Ah - perhaps that Tome of Koslun might be good for something, after all," she smirked, "I mean – I was thinking about selling it to Tevinter – given they're at war with the Qunari they'd pay handsomely for any advantage – but then they can't pay me in gaatlok."

Fenris frowned. "If I thought you were serious about selling to Tevinter I'd leave you in the Hills," he said dourly.

"Well, cara mia," Zevran interjected smoothly, "For now the Qunari have the advantage, yes, but the Champion of Kirkwall is looking to address that. And he is working with Anders, who used exactly such an explosion in Lothering Forest. The ingredients are the same as gaatlok – it is only the proportions that are different – and now the Champion has commandeered the Vinmarks it is only a matter of time. You may both get your wish – and you, too, Fenris. Those magisters won't know what hit them."

Fenris smiled through blade-thin lips. Nobody actually saw it through the cloth – but Rillian read the flicker in his hard green eyes. As someone who had seen her family packed in crates, ready to be sold to Tevinter, she had once dreamed of fighting for Elven rights. That dream had been superseded by the need to cure taint, but she would help Fenris in any way she could.

"Has anyone actually read the Tome of Koslun?" Lambert asked shyly.

Isabella grinned. "I prefer 'Siege Harder' myself."

Varric beamed and gave an exaggerated bow. "May I offer you a signed copy?"

"I'd like to read it," Lambert decided.

"Why - are you planning to convert?" Fenris asked sarcastically.

"No - could you imagine me with my mouth sewn shut?" Lambert giggled.

"Perhaps then you would finally be able to take your former boss's advice: head down trap shut" said remorseless Fenris.

"Bah! You have a heart of stone and a memory like a steel trap! Anyway: wait till tonight and I'll remind you why you like my mouth open..."

"Ahem!" Carver cleared his throat loudly. Lambert blushed and subsided.

Thoughtfully, Rillian said, "I think I understand why you want to read it. It's like I wanted to read the copy of the Chant you found with the Dissonant Verses attached." Lambert had given the Tale of Shartan to Fenris – and he had shared it with Rillian, Jan and Brand. "Because we don't know how much of the Qunari's - or the Chantry's - versions are the truth. Just like we'll probably never know how many truths Weisshaupt have ordered forgotten."

Three exhausting weeks later, the swirling cloud of red dust choked and enfolded them, sleeting across the barren earth in an alien blizzard. By the time they reached Red Bride's Grave, it was already floating on a sea of clouds stained red by the setting sun.

"It's like the Fade," Lambert whispered to Rillian, "just miles and miles of emptiness with no top, no bottom, just an endless nightmare."

"It's like blood," Jowan agreed – the admission coming unplanned and too quietly for Fenris to hear, "When I was still using blood my nightmares used to be like this. I felt I'd just be left to wander here forever, in a universe of crimson mist."

"But you resisted the pull," Lambert said softly, reassuringly, "Whatever the call of blood magic, you didn't give in. This will not be your fate."

"I wonder how much the ancient magisters knew," Rillian murmured, "Verinius knew lyrium could persuade the body to accept taint. Taint is just another form of blood – the kind of diseased, dying blood the darkspawn possess. If Bianca is right and lyrium is alive – I have seen it grow in the veins of the earth, below Temple Mountain – might lyrium be blood too? The blood of the earth? They say the blood is always the key."

"They say the Orth people live in these hills," Bianca interjected, "But I don't think even dwarves could survive out here. There's no grass, no water – just black rocks like scabs over wounds."

"The settlements must be underground," Rillian decided. She stared into the barren, undulating landscape with only the skeletons of dead trees kissed by the low, shimmering orange sun. The red storm - aided by the absence of living trees – was blasting ceaselessly. The wind had scoured away the grassy veil that had surrounded the serene visage of Andraste carved into a cliffside. This was where Fiona had directed her.

They could see the curve of the Prophet's head, a lock of her hair, the patient, inscrutable smile. Her neck had been garlanded with the petals of a water lily.

"Anders told me the early artists in the land of his birth were so enchanted by the idea of a land so rich in water it could have flowers floating on lakes they included it in the depiction of the Maker's bride," Lambert murmured. It was the first time Rillian had heard him speak the name of his former lover.

"So 'Anders' was just his nickname?"

"Yes," Lambert said softly, "He never gave his real name to anyone but Karl – and Justice, I suppose."

Fenris merely grunted. Rillian got the feeling he was pleased Anders hadn't trusted Lambert with his real name – that the two hadn't been that close.

"Fiona tells me the caves are on the other side," she said, "She warned us to expect the walking dead. Her words were: "Walls of magic, walls of stone and walls of restless churning bone."

"Charming," Varric murmured.

"I'll go first," Fenris said.

"Ser Otto and I are Templars," Alistair reminded him. Rillian was grateful he had made no mention of Ser Otto's disability. Alistair had known him before the darkness – Ser Otto was the young knight who had trained him. Ser Otto smiled – though only someone who knew him as well as Rillian did could discern that behind the scarf he wore over his face.

"Can you reach inside a man and tear out his heart?" Fenris huffed.

"Do skeletons have hearts?" Alistair retorted. "This is Warden business – I'll go first."

Fenris subsided. Rillian was not entirely sure why he wished to risk himself for their mission – unless it was to impress Lambert – who looked like he would rather not have to worry about his overconfident lover. Come to think of it, why had Alistair insisted he go?

To the others, she said, "Alistair, Ser Otto and Fenris will head the party – our Templars and our lyrium warrior will be vital against the undead. Carver and Donnic – take rearguard with Lady and Ravenous. Archers in front of them – Zevran and Isabella to the flanks. Our two mages and I will be at the centre: Lambert, you and I will cast the Litany – break off if anyone needs healing. Jowan: Entropy spells only. That isn't a moral judgment – skeletons don't have blood."

Carver and Lambert shared an unreadable look. Carver made an unintelligible reference to 'Eye's right' and Lambert snorted and then – when Rillian looked at him – subsided guiltily. She ignored the two brothers.

They circled between the looming hills until they reached the one that bore Andraste's likeness. The top third of the steeply eroded wall opened like the missing tiles of a mosaic. Alistair was not the strongest climber among them – that was indisputably Fenris – but the Templar set aside Harvard's Aegis - the shield he had wielded ever since they defeated the ogre in the Tower of Ishal - his longsword and splintmail, and began the ascent. He clambered up – huffing and puffing but undaunted - and threw a slender web of rope and pitons behind him. Rillian came second. A clammy sweat broke out on her back as she climbed the pitted stone. Drifting red dust obscured her downward glances and she had the feeling she had always been climbing and would continue until the end of time. The wind blew as if trying to extinguish the candle of her brief existence - such a small, ephemeral thing – a dance above the void. By the time she reached the top and Alistair's strong arms pulled her into the cavern she was shaking.

She dared to look down - at her companions, still making the dangerous trek, and beyond. The forlorn skeletons of hundred-year-old huts lay below. In a blazing turquoise sky, clouds steamed south towards Weishaupt like banners. From a certain angle, the distant fortress made a shadow of Red Bride's Grave, its huge black form unerringly smooth like the side of a black ice cube.

"I wish you had seen Weisshaupt," Alistair said wistfully, "I remember when Duncan took me up there I was exhausted just plodding up the stairs. I don't suppose we could..."

Rillian sighed. Weissuaupt was a palimpsest of Warden history. To Alistair it could only ever be the culmination of his dreams – the place Duncan had judged him worthy of sharing - his belonging-place. He seemed to have forgotten that – on the orders of Weishaupt - Guillaume Caron would have stood by while Grand Cleric Iona threw her to the flames.

"When we have the cure we will share it with Weisshaupt, of course – and everyone else." Her shuttered expression warned him against pursuing it.

To Rillian, Weishaupt was a haunted ruin, scoured open like a dissected vein as if it had been chomped by a beast with many teeth. The sky was keyholed through a succession of defensible arrow slits and at the top of the black tower was a small parapet - owing to the irregular shading of its slabs and positioning it seemed to have an eerie otherworldly glow as if from another dimension. The setting sun would slip out of sight behind the fortress, thus committing their surroundings to a premature darkness in the long shadow of that massive edifice.

Yet even more disturbing to Rillian was the gaze Weisshaupt seemed to cast back at them. She thought she could see mad-eyed figures staring out from the topmost arrow-slits on a night when the moon shone with unnatural brightness and the sky appeared to contain more than its natural share of stars. The atmosphere was one of desolation; grey walls pocked like sponges, and Rillian wondered how Weisshaupt could have stood for centuries.

She thought of the First Blight – which had begun in – 395 Ancient and lasted 192 years. The Great Death – or the Pestilence as it was sometimes known – was the greatest recorded calamity ever to have struck Thedas. It was estimated to have killed between 200 million to 400 million people across the world, bowling down half of Tevinter's population like skittles. The disaster came on the back of the widespread floods that were the result of the deteriorating climate brought about by Tevinter weather magic – similar to the magic Fenris had described Danarius using. It was forever raining over Castellum Tenebris. The Blight was a force of unspeakable darkness, and many had thought they were soaking up the last glimmers of the universe's existence. But they had survived, thanks to the Grey Wardens who had defeated the Archdemon Dumat at the Battle of the Silent Plains.

"Dumat! Lord! Tell me. What waking dream is this?"

The voice of Corypheus called to her so vividly it was as if he had spoken. Rillian's eyes fell, unbidden, to the lead-lined box Bianca had created to hold the droplet of his blood and the Red Lyrium Idol.

She had thought he was the key – had thought his blood would hold the answer to curing taint. But, after three years of fruitless research, she doubted. She was no longer sure Corypheus had ever been Patient Zero. He – and all the Magisters Sidereal (Urthemiel had called them by that name) – had been no more than hosts to a disease far older. Talking to Keeper Deshanna – Lambert's grandmother and Rillian's mentor - had given her a new perspective. In –7500 Ancient, the goddess of the hunt – Andruil – had hunted in the Void and brought back the Blight. Mythal had been forced to defeat her tainted daughter and hidden the Red Lyrium Idol within the Primeval Thaig. Then Mythal herself had been murdered – some said by the Dread Wolf and some said by the tainted demons that had once been Elves. Later, in – 981 Ancient, the Tevinter Imperium had defeated Elvhenan, ushering in the dominion of mankind. In revenge, the demons who had once been Elves had whispered to the Magisters Sidereal – tempted them to enter the Black City they had believed to be Golden - drawn them to ruination and possession as they had ruined and possessed Arlathan.

In – 695 Ancient, Western Tevinter had split from the Imperium to form the Anderfels. In – 535 their fledgling empire was retaken, but the rebels remained. Two hundred years later Corypheus had attempted to enter the Golden City and returned a darkspawn. According to Grey Warden history Corypheus had been imprisoned in the Vinmark Mountains in –189 Ancient – hundreds of years later – which begged the question: where had he been beforehand?

Rillian did not doubt Alistair's story for a second – she believed in the heroism of Brun and Freya and Vhena. But she did not trust Verinius. Just how had this Tevinter Magister known to create the Joining? A mixture that merely took the blood of those naturally immune to taint and mixed it with lyrium would not create Grey Wardens. Rillian knew that because it was how she had cured Rylock of Blight sickness. She had injected Rylock with her own blood mixed with a healthy dose of lyrium, to force her body to accept it. According to Lambert – who had a cousin in the Ferelden Circle – Rylock was healthy as ever but not a Grey Warden.

If Verinius had succeeded in making Grey Wardens he would have needed the equivalent of Archdemon blood. From what – who – could he have obtained it? Rillian thought of how Weisshaupt had kept Corypheus a secret for centuries and had her answer. After Fiona's revelations there was no evil that would surprise her. The rebels of the Anderfels had captured and bred Corypheus as a means of resisting Tevinter blood magic (Adralla of Vyrantium would only create the Litany centuries later) seeing it as a necessary evil. Rillian, who had seen the depravity that 'breeding' Corypheus would have entailed, knew some evils could never be justified.

In talking to Alistair she had discovered that he, too, was haunted by that same revenant: that Fiona's voice had begun to establish itself within both and become part of their inner lives. Alistair had confided, "I'm sorry I wanted to save King Maric first. I know now this is where we should be. The woman who spoke to me - she told me she is my mother. She and Maric journeyed to the Deep Roads together. Goldanna is not my sister."

There was a trace of relief when he said it - he had not been happy when the washerwoman with an Elven husband had told him to check his privilege. He said, "it's ironic - I am going to save Maric but I want to honour Fiona first. I know she is a Circle mage now - but she must have left us something!"

His happiness was infectious but it made her uneasy too. Just how was Fiona able to speak to them? Perhaps, in her case, it was because they had both suffered accelerated taint and then been cured – the only two on Thedas. If Alistair was really her biological son perhaps there was a link. But it was certainly a form of blood magic. Ordinarily, Wardens could sense each other but not communicate - the only creatures who could do that were darkspawn. But there were no darkspawn here - only a droplet of darkspawn blood, hidden from all others within Bianca's lead-lined box.

Lambert had cast Light to illuminate the cavern, and Rillian could see the networked tunnels of the monks' caves twenty feet in. A carpet of ossified birds littered the cave, echoing the pattern of shifting sunlight. Where the sun never shone, the dead birds were thickest – undead predators that hunted in darkness. Lambert's light seemed a silent, dire challenge – Rillian half-expected the birds to swoop upon him. Backing Lambert, Jowan raised his own staff and summoned a sphere of blue light from the Fade. The colliding currents - water and sunlight - created a strange stillness of time and blankness of mind.

The light showed the ghostly outline of human feet in the red dust.

Not human... Rillian realized. Not anymore.

The mummified corpses of Grey Warden soldiers came shambling out – along with the skeletons in monk's robes. Their yellow parchment skin flapped around decayed mouths, opened wide in hideous grins. Their eyes were black pits – the souls of the demons who had been drawn through the Fade and become trapped in these dead shells. They were coming in from all over, crowding in from unseen corners, ever angry and ever hungry. The stench wasn't particularly strong. It was insidious, however, and its subtlety seemed to make it more nauseating, more corrosive.

"Stand back," Fenris told Lambert – then cast his version of Holy Smite. A moment later, Alistair and Ser Otto did the same.

Oily, flowing objects writhed and coalesced – something that may have been the raiment of the corpses but may have been simple shadow. No light shone in the center of each shade's head; the void eyes illuminating only the speed of dark.

"They thrive in the darkness," Jowan murmured, raising his staff and summoning a wisp, "And they fear the light." Clearly terrified, he held the line with the fierce determination of a man past his limits.

Carver and Donnic moved forward with Lady and Ravenous. A filthy knife struck Carver's Warden armour but barely scratched the shining mail. Whirling, sword poised, Carver looked into the white, dead eyes. Rearing, pawing the air, the mabaris tore the dead to shreds.

"Come on, you bastards!" Donnic bellowed. His bared sword struck. He swiped the dusty air in order to maintain the few metres of open ground around them as they moved. Men and mabaris charged, transformed into a tempest of destruction.

Magic erupted from the head of Jowan's staff in a series of incandescent spirit bolts. Ser Otto shouldered past him to protect him, raising his Templar shield and swinging his mace to shatter bones and smash skulls. Alistair fought beside him, his sword a radiant beacon.

In a culture that knew few mechanical objects, Varric was a machine: sighting, firing, killing. With his double bolt-grooves, he blasted holes in grouped undead. When a number bunched at the doorway, he dropped a grenade among them. Sebastian, beside him, worked his longbow with deadly precision.

Bianca and Zevran stood back-to-back. Zevran was bleeding from a dozen small wounds but his smile was razor-edged and indomitable. Sweat and blood slicked Bianca's dark hair to her forehead but she didn't lower her hand-axe to wipe it away. The skeletons were a rubble of bones around them but only the Litany – and Jowan's magic – could touch the shades or the Ash Wraith. The gaunt, bent creature of cinders seemed a pillar of smoke and bone, its midsection an enormous mouth lined with shark-like teeth. The air around it roiled, red-hot. Jowan fired a blast of wintry cold that choked the cinders with a hiss of steam. Snowflakes crowned Jowan's hair and frosted his fingers around his staff. The Wraith turned the glowering pits of its eyes on Jowan, then coiled and leapt.

A susurration filled Rillian's ears: the nightmare tongue of demons. She answered with the Litany. The seductive music beguiled her from solid reality to altered perception...

...I need my golden crown of sorrow

My bloody sword to swing

My empty halls to echo with Adralla's Litany

I am no mother, I am no bride, I am king

What strange claws are these scratching at my skin?
I never knew my killer would be coming from within

I am no mother, I am no bride, I am king...

Then Lambert began to play his lute etched with electric runes, his right hand on the neck and left hand on the fretboard. Harmonics burst out as fingers fluttered like wings. He built his pattern, slowly. His thumb struck a solid, throbbing note, the blurring fingers surrounding it with a thicket of smaller, higher tones...

…I woke up and he was screaming

I'd left him dreaming

I roll over and hold him tightly

And whisper, 'if you want him, then you're gonna have to fight me'

Oh, fight me...

The undead tried to scream through rotten vocal cords. The only sound they managed was a reptilian hiss.

At first, the atonal notes were almost indistinguishable from the whistles of the decayed fragments of human voices; random, hollow sounds like the windswept reeds around Flemeth's hut. His notes quickened and became higher in pitch, tumbling together into a dance-like melody that set the corpses listening with void unblinking eyes. Then a deep resonant call rang out from the Ash Wraith in macabre counterpoint to Lambert's lilting tune. There was something oddly like speech in the sound.

Lambert's song was in A minor. It was ghostly, ethereal, the words dark and simple, the chords skeletal. The 3rd, 6th and 7th were a half-step lower and expressed baroque dissonance: a pure, soulful cry of abandon.

Double-stopping, which on the lute involved playing two notes at the same time, evoked a third 'ghost' pitch created by their resultant frequencies. These ghost tones were unheard by the mortals but acted on the undead like electricity. They recoiled, and Rillian and Lambert kept playing.

Rillian had always been able to see colours associated with fixed musical keys: G-sharp minor was citrine and G minor was gamboge. D minor was like flint and F minor like ash. Adralla had paid as much attention to these colours as to the notes, she discovered – they seemed to act on the undead like light, causing them to flinch back. The combination tones were a waveform, like water. The only thing that did not seem to matter were the words: neither Rillian nor Lambert were using the original Tevene. So long as the vocal formants were the same, the language made no difference. The semi-tone, the E flat between E and D, was spectral, while the diatonic scale was a rainbow.

When the attack transient was started the rapidly changing frequencies caught the demons' attention – there was an almost explosive liquefaction. She heard the bestial agony of the shattered creatures. The melting, blistering, peeling sound of their bodies being desiccated at the biochemical level. The decay transient that followed decreased the vibration amplitude after the initial attack, and there was a resonance, a crackle and spark, a storm-sense. Lambert's slender fingers sparkled with electricity that equated with the brass globular whistle he used to challenge demons. He stood like an angel, sweating light.

The Litany was something Lambert only released from his caging self, a melody that might turn on him if he relaxed for a moment. The similarity heightened the temporality and fragility of mortal bodily existence compared with the immense power, durability and permanence of demons. To Rillian the Litany recalled the summer thunderstorms in Denerim's Alienage, a period associated with life and regeneration. The pulsating, underlying beats of the spectrum were bodiless electric storms. The electricity rent the Veil – for just an instant, it was as if a cloth of purple, scarlet and blue were torn asunder – then the whole glimpse was withdrawn, reality returned.

The Ash Wraith struck her friends with blinding speed. Its claws were blurred by its surrounding cloud of cinders so it actually seemed to have grown four more arms. When the whirlwind ended, Jowan lay in a pool of his own blood and Ser Otto sagged weakly against one wall. His shield seemed to be the only thing holding him upright. His blood dribbled to the floor, its scent driving the undead into a frenzy. The Ash Wraith coiled and leapt, about to crush Isabella.

Lambert stopped singing, strung out a web of shining mana, encompassing his friends in a wave of healing energy. The Ash Wraith came down and he had no chance to defend himself. Inky darkness bled from its claws. It crushed Lambert under its fury and weight.

Lethandralis altered time. Fenris did not cast Smite - that would have drained Lambert of mana which, in his present state, would have killed him. Fenris struck, transformed into a maelstrom of destruction. His brands were shafts of blue fire, javelins that pierced the decayed faces before him. Even as he leapt for them the muscles trained at Castellum Tenebris balanced his body accurately; his left hand split the darkness, cleaving for Lambert who staggered as his fractured mind returned to him. Fenris shredded the form of the Ash Wraith and pulled Lambert - burned, bloody, shaking – from the wreckage. The Ash Wraith collapsed into murky smoke and Lambert managed an exhausted smile. His eyes were enormous.

But the shades surrounded them, lidless eyes pitiless as truth. Lethandrlais arced wider, faster – Fenris was rolling forwards as if in the gravity of the Fade. He was destruction incarnate. Wherever he struck, bone splintered, shades were dissolved, faceless maws caved in. It would not be enough. Dark energy swirled towards them, drawing life from their bodies and sucking it towards the shades.

Fenris would never surrender. His sword reaped a fearsome harvest. His right hand disappeared and reappeared to crush bone, burst decayed organs, punch open vicious wounds. Nonetheless, he was unable to protect Lambert – not without casting the Smite that would harm his mage.

Fenris did something Rillian had never seen him do, although she had heard Varric's account of how he had defended Ella in the Gallows. He cast his own version of the Litany: and his mingled aura of spirituality and hard-edged concentration surprised her. She had thought she had seen all Fenris' manifestations; here was a man she had never suspected.

Fenris' song carried the command of a hunting horn – an echo of faith that made Rillian want to leap up inside herself and shout an answer. The voice unfolded like a pennant that flickered all the way back to tales of knights fighting monsters Ser Otto had shared with her in the Alienage and she guessed Lambert had shared with Fenris. They were human myths, but they were good ones. It was as if time stopped, replaced by the elemental force of the music, the darkness, the pitched weight of his heavy, foreboding timbre...

...My dedication to all that I've sworn to protect
I carry out my orders without a regret
My declaration embedded deep under my skin
A permanent reminder of how it began

No explanation will matter after we begin
Unlock the dark destroyer that's buried within
My true vocation and now my unfortunate friend
You will discover a war you're unable to win...

The Ash Wraith was gone, reduced to ice shards and cinder-flecked smoke. The nauseating stench of roasted decay rose in smoky steam from the charred creatures piled on the ground. It was impossible to move without disturbing these rotted demons, their bodies crumbling like logs hollowed out by fire. The shades were dissolved as if they had never been. The skeletons lay in brittle, useless piles of bone. Fenris grabbed Lambert's hand and placed it upon the lyrium brand on his forearm.

"Regenerate mana and heal yourself."

Lambert pulled his hand away. "You're not my walking, talking lyrium potion!"

"Foolish mage."

"It's alright – I've got one," Jowan murmured, and handed Lambert the vial. "Thanks for what you did back there."

Lambert laughed shakily and downed the vial in one. The burns healed, though the bruises and blood remained.

Alistair lowered his sword wearily, mopping the sweat and blood from his face. "That was the last of them."

Rillian said, "Fiona told me Isseya hid the griffon eggs in a dragon's lair. We'll only have to find a passage large enough to admit a high dragon and it'll lead us to them."

Lambert tried to cast a light spell but, having spent all his mana on healing, it flickered and died. Carver lit a torch and shouldered in front of his brother. His smile seemed to say: it's less flashy but it lasts longer. Holding the torch, Carver led them deeper into the abandoned shrine. Empty alcoves had once held prayer candles. Barren fonts had once held Waters of the Fade. An unlit wall depicted Andraste's martyrdom in Minrathous and now smelled of desert death. No-one ever said Andraste would come again – the Maker had abandoned them. The people of Thedas had been weighed, measured and found wanting. And yet, the mosaics had been finely made, at incredible expense.

"Did they think they could buy the Maker's grace?" Sebastian asked disapprovingly.

"Maybe they just thought it looked nice," Lambert suggested.

These were the caves where monks had made their homes. The mountains descended into stone caverns as though the world underneath were made of stone. It looked odd, a mutation of nature, as though the rock were being gently boiled by some cavernous demon below. The sunken cocoons were connected by a trench-like passageway that bore through the ancient settlement like a giant writhing worm, making the whole hotchpotch of humps and hollows a tiny eruption.

While the other halls were cramped and tiny, one was wide enough for two to walk abreast and high enough their helms did not touch the ceiling. Here the alcoves for prayer candles still held stubs of precious beeswax. Fragments of glass ranging in size from bits no bigger than an eye to slabs the size of serving trays were randomly leaded in place within a grid. Multi-coloured shards kaleidoscoped with the hues of an exploded rainbow. Flaws and subtleties in thickness caused shifts in colour. Clear glass was chemically stained to purple-blue opalescence that changed intensity at every angle.

Ahead, an enormous chamber yawned. Within was a wonder of religious expression. Scene after holy scene was etched into the rock as though there were tiny people trapped in the stone.

"I will need a mage," Rillian said softly, "Someone who can cast mana to illuminate the eggs."

"Jowan," said Lambert softly – lyrium had healed him but his mana had not yet begun to regenerate.

Jowan opened himself to the Fade and the blue-green glow of lyrium caught their eye. A faint, irregular smudge on one wall, as high as an Elven woman's arm might reach. "Behind the stone," he said softly.

"Do we just...smash it?" Alistair was dubious.

Rillian rolled her eyes. She, Bianca and Isabella traded glances. "Men."

Jowan and Lambert shrugged. "Templars."

The Warden mage reached out to the stone with magic – it came forward slightly and opened an inch. The section was large enough for a person to crawl through, and it pulled out freely at the first touch of Jowan's magic. The passageway revealed was cut so smoothly into the rock its edges shone like mirrors.

"Wow!" Lambert told him, sounding so impressed Fenris sniffed slightly. Fenris clearly didn't have good memories of Lambert being impressed by more powerful mages. Rillian thought it a foolish bit of insecurity he had better get over.

"I'm not doing that," Jowan admitted - with an honesty that clearly surprised Fenris. "It must be Isseya's spell."

"After four hundred years?"

"She was a great mage. The sister of the hero who slew the Archdemon."

Rillian traded glances with Fenris. As an Elf growing up in an Alienage, the story of Garahel was the first time she had ever heard about a hero who looked like her. It was an indelible memory. But Fenris had known nothing of belonging to Elven culture, community. Danarius had taken everything: his memories, his faith, his body, his mind – everything except the meat puppet the magister could use for his own pleasure. Rillian was glad Fenris had someone who loved him for himself – but as a human-passing half-Elf who had grown up with human parents, Lambert could not give Fenris his culture. "I will tell you Garahel's story as my father told it to me," she promised him.

After twenty feet, the tunnel ended in a rounded alcove. Shining lyrium runes held up a translucent globe of force. Rillian thought she caught a flicker in Fenris' eyes – she knew the touch of lyrium on the brands hurt him - but his face remained impassive. Within the globe was a wrapped bundle of griffon eggs.

Rillian reached out a trembling hand, and the sphere of magic opened like a flower. Holding her breath, Rillian lifted the grey blanket that held them, and passed it to Lambert, because she was used to thinking of him as her junior lab assistant. He inhaled it and said, "It smells like Incommunicado and Pumpkin in rut – they've started spraying all over our cabin."

Rillian was not in the mood to discuss Lambert's cats. The wonder and the glory of their discovery would stay with her forever. The thirteen eggs – as if the Maker had decided there should be one for each of them – ranged in colour from pearly bluish white to purple whorled with swirls of black, to pale marble.

Jowan came to stand beside her. Like Fiona, Rillian's taint had been accelerated and then cured – she would not be able to sense if they were safe, just as she could no longer sense darkspawn. She had to ask him and Ser Otto.

Ser Otto smiled, shaking his head gently. "I don't sense a trace of corruption in them. In the Order, we are taught Blood Magic is evil...but what Isseya did – cure these griffons by using blood magic to draw the taint into her own body – that was sacrifice. That was noble. I will be prepared to stand before the Maker and swear that."

A crack appeared in the black-spotted shell, thunderous in the sudden hush. Then another. The thirteen crowded around – aware they were seeing something no-one had seen for centuries. Even the ones who weren't Wardens felt the weight of history.

The tip of a stubby beak appeared, pecking with a single baby tooth. Wet feathers shivered under the fragmenting shell. Soon the tunnel reverberated with the cacophony of the others – a strange music that somehow – Rillian could not have said how or why – reminded her of the Litany.

A downy head appeared from the first shell. Its damp fuzz was dun and white and black and its wings were plump white stubs. Soon the other griffons appeared: babies in smoky black, misty white, one rosy gold like dawn. They emerged hungry and awkward, shaking off bits of shell and sticky membrane.

"What do we do with them?" Alistair wondered.

"We take them far away from Weisshaupt," Rillian answered.

AN: The codex says Nakiri of Donark Forest suggested the use of darkspawn blood in the Joining in –305 Ancient. As this contradicts the shared fanon I developed with icey cold and Shakspira in 2011 (our fic, The Grey Tales, had the Joining Ritual created by Magister Verinius) I have gone with our own version. The Grey Tales by Genespira Cold on ff dot net is canon for Death and the Maiden and Lights in the Shadow. I'm also crediting Shakespira for her brilliant 'Dark Stewards' theory from her fic The Lion of Orlais - namely, it is the idea the original soldiers of the Anderfels tried to use taint as a means of resisting Tevinter Blood Magic.

'You have been weighed, measured and found wanting' is from A Knight's Tale.