Fight scenes are odd. I find them stressful, and yet oddly enjoyable, to write.

Couple of translations at the end.

Trapped in the Nest

Whatever the monster was expecting, us - well, just me, initially - entering its rift was no part of it.

Sound didn't come through, I noted, as I took stock of both my surroundings and what little I could see of what I had left behind, but I hardly needed to be able to hear to know there were several people beyond the rift swearing at me and the monster and fate in general. But the monster was still distracted by them, and so I had time.

The place in the Fade at which I had found myself was only marginally less awful than the lair of the Nightmare, but it was more or less exactly what I had expected to find in the waking world: webs strung across rock, with bodies encased in more web hanging at intervals. Deflated husks that had once been people were scattered across the floor. The only thing that I hadn't entirely anticipated were the rotting corpses split open and filled with eggs.

All right, then - Ysabeau and Crespin had been correct. Like most web-building spiders, the monster was draining living bodies for sustenance. It had brought corpses back to its nest as a place to lay its eggs.

That implied, however, that the hanging bodies were still alive.

Many were too high off the ground for me to reach - or for me to bring down safely even if I could climb up and cut the webs holding them - but two hung near the ground, and with some effort I was able to cut them down without dropping the occupants of the webbing on their heads.

With exquisite care, I opened a notch in the web that encased the first of the figures and slid my dagger in, parting the strands from chest to chin before gently pulling at the silk around its face, using my dagger only where absolutely necessary. As I slid the web away, I let out a breath, recognizing the discolored - but still living - face of Bonny Sims. Then I turned to the other figure, giving it the same treatment, though I could tell almost immediately that I was dealing with a Qunari woman.

And that was all I had time to ascertain before my time was up.

Ysabeau was first through the rift, and though I didn't see the manner of her arrival, the discharged crossbow she immediately tossed away upon landing gave me some idea what she was doing. "It's coming!" she shouted at me.

"The hanging ones are still alive!" I shouted back.

Then the monster came through, shrieking as it dripped ichor from a number of wounds, the muttering of the Saarebas forming an eerie counterpoint to its arachnid chitter. Following close behind were Crespin, Gils, and Endris. Now we were all here. In the Fade. Beyond a rift none of us had any control over.

I realized something with a sinking feeling in my stomach: my nonexistent left hand was still buzzing. That wouldn't have been normal even if I still had a left hand, and even if this were the period of history when there had been a Breach in the sky allowing all sorts of Fade rifts to open everywhere. It had only buzzed this way while a rift was actively opening, in the process of spewing forth more demons.

There was a very real possibility that the monster was holding the rift open.

Why it didn't simply let the spell go and trap us all here, I had no idea. A spider's instinct to herd enemies away from its nest, perhaps? Or perhaps maintaining the rift was easier than opening a new one, and the monster felt the need to hoard its energy.

Whatever the reason - if we killed the creature, we might be trapped here. More to the point: they, my companions, and all the victims of the monster who yet lived, might be trapped here.

I ran to Ysabeau as the monster turned to face the three men. "I think it's holding the rift open. The four of you have to cut all these people down and get them out. I can distract it - I think - but I can't kill it until you're finished and gone, so you'll have to work fast."

The objections that rose to choke her were clearly reflected in her eyes, but this was the first that slipped out: "We can all make it out - draw it back into the real world after us."

"The eggs," I reminded her. "Someone has to stay behind to dispose of them. Besides, we can't know if that is possible. If we all leave, it may not follow us. It may retreat, to protect its nest. It may be able to open Fade rifts elsewhere. And then - how will we find it again? No - we cannot throw away this chance. We kill it now."

"Then I will stay," she said. Beyond her Crespin shoved Endris out of the way, narrowly saving him from a strike from one of the spider's legs.

"No," I said again, dusting off the voice of command I rarely had reason to use anymore. "I am the ranking officer and protecting my people is my duty. You have your orders. Get these people out of here." Without waiting, I brushed past her and threw myself at the creature, slashing at its relatively unprotected back, catching it off-guard just in time to make another blast of fire go astray.

"Help Ysabeau cut down the hanging ones!" I ordered the three men over the roar of the flames. "Take them through the rift!"

All three hesitated, and then two obeyed. Gils stood his ground.

"Gils!" I shrieked, ducking under the ponderous swing of a leg. The spider might have eight of them, but it was slow. I dodged a second without particular effort, but it was turning toward me, and the Saarebas had magic at its disposal. Also - and considerably more difficult - I had to keep this fight going but not actually kill it until everyone was gone.

Gils grounded his staff. "No," he called, raising his voice only just enough for me to hear. "I am not Inquisition, and my orders are to protect you."

Of course they were. Fiona.

His barrier came up around me just as I failed to entirely escape the next blast of fire. "Fenedhis!" I swore, dropping to the ground beneath the flames before the barrier could collapse, and then having to roll away as another leg came for me.

There was a sharp crack and the smell of frost - a combination I knew so well from standing beside Solas as he cast a cold spell that for a brief, mad moment, this desperate fight for almost a dozen lives, my own included, took on a tinge of nostalgia.

Thankfully, nostalgia didn't noticeably dull my reflexes, and I yanked myself to my feet, catching one of the spider legs just above the foot on the way up. The chitin broke with a satisfying crunch, and the monster keened in pain, the attention of the Saarebas wavering momentarily between me and Gils.

Luck was with us, and it chose to focus on me.

I dodged as it lunged at me, fangs glistening with poison, and kept an eye on the Saarebas gathering up more magic. It was clearly easier to do so here, in the Fade - the fire attacks were coming faster than any mage should be able to cast them. As its hands began to glow, I rolled the only direction I really had left. Taking advantage of the leg I had injured, I dodged beneath the monster, keeping low - and a good thing, because directly above my face was a solid carapace of red lyrium crystals.

I certainly wouldn't be gutting it from below.

The monster seemed confused as to where I had gone, and so I scrambled out before it could realize and attempt to crush me with its sheer bulk - not to mention poisoning me with red lyrium - catching another leg near where it joined the body on my way up. The legs seemed like good targets to me. The creature wouldn't die from losing them, but it would be considerably slower, and have many fewer attacks, if I got it down a few legs.

I spared a glance toward my three companions following orders as the monster shrieked again, and saw that Crespin had already dragged one of the bodies I had cut down from the Fade, and was returning for the second. Ysabeau, meanwhile, had just finished cutting someone down, and was waiting for Endris to ease them to the floor before she went on to the next. Good - that left only three more hanging, and once they were all down, everyone could begin helping with removal.

Very good - another minute, perhaps two, and this fight could begin in earnest. Now I just had to survive that long.

The monster turned, seeking me - but it found Gils first, and he threw himself aside as it released another gout of flame. I was beginning to think fire was the only offensive spell it had at its disposal, which was...better than a range of spells, I supposed, though fire was certainly dangerous enough.

I scratched the creature's abdomen with my dagger - just enough to remind it I was there and that Gils hadn't been the one to damage its legs, giving him time to pick himself up as it turned towards me. In spite of my fury regarding Gils's unwillingness to take my orders, I had to admit that keeping the creature distracted was easier with two than it would have been with me alone.

The monster roared in pain and fury as I dodged another swing from one of its legs, and then it leapt at me with a speed it hadn't before demonstrated. I only just had time to drop to the ground as it sailed over me, and I managed to cut off another of its feet - but it was also jumping toward our rescue operation.

Thankfully Gils was on it, as there was nothing I would have been able to do from the ground. He did - something unusual with a lightning bolt, sending little traceries of current into a number of the lyrium crystals poking from the monster's flesh, causing them to emit horrible, discordant notes as they vibrated and smoked. A few burst, leaving gaping wounds behind.

"Don't kill it yet!" I exclaimed as its keening reached a new, even more headache-inducing pitch.

Gils spared me a glance and a quick nod, and then ran toward me, drawing the spider creature away from the rest of our group. I, meanwhile, made it a point to be somewhere else, to avoid the two of us making too tempting of a target for anything else it might be keeping in reserve. If it happened to be capable of keeping things in reserve, anyway - I hadn't seen much to indicate actual intelligence. When facing red lyrium-corrupted spider-constructs topped by fire-throwing Saarebas, I thought it prudent to assume the worst so that I could be pleasantly surprised if my fears proved unfounded.

The Saarebas cast yet another flame spell, this time singeing the back of Gils's robes as he fled - but I happened to be looking at the rift as it released the spell and I saw it waver. That - couldn't be good. "Gils!" I shouted. "It's losing control of the rift! We have to keep it chasing us, but we can't do any more damage!"

His only reply was a grunt - fair, as his clothing was still smoldering.

I spared one more glance for the rescue team. Ysabeau was cutting down the last of the hangers, Endris waiting below to catch it. Crespin was nowhere to be seen, probably on the other side of the rift. I had no time to count bodies still on the floor. They were going fast, so fast - and I feared it might not be fast enough.

"Focus on protective spells," I called to Gils, diving toward the monster and thrusting the hilt of my dagger into one of its wounds. No more damage - but that didn't mean I couldn't take advantage of the damage we had already done to it.

The spider mouth and Saarebas shrieked and bellowed in an uncanny harmony, and the monster left off its pursuit of Gils to turn on me. Useful, how easily distracted it was - an argument against it having anything beyond rudimentary animal intelligence. I skipped backward, out of range of its legs, and felt another barrier surround me as the Saarebas shot flames at me - but this time I was ready, and I swiftly changed direction, diving back the way I had come to duck beneath one set of its legs, where it could neither see nor hit me with any real force. All I had to do was avoid the barbs on the feet - easy enough, while it remained befuddled and uncoordinated. I even had time to punch one of its leg-stumps on my way past, reminding it why it was chasing me.

If it weren't for the rift and the rescue operation, this would actually be a fairly easy kill, I reflected. The monster was slow and still hadn't shown much sign of intelligence - the only real dangers were its ability to drop suddenly out of the Fade and its use of fire. Since we had been forewarned about the latter, it hadn't taken us by surprise, and I had surprised it by making use of its rift for my own purposes.

I supposed there was also the red lyrium corruption. Sad, that fighting things corrupted by red lyrium or the Blight had become so routine that I hardly even remembered to count it as an additional danger anymore.

I continued on past the monster, and again looked toward the rest of my team as I waited for it to find its way around to face me. Endris had a body hoisted onto his shoulders, and Ysabeau and Crespin were half-dragging the last of the live ones - probably a Qunari based on the sheer size. "You should go with them!" I called to Gils, shifting my weight to narrowly avoid one of the monster's barbed feet as it turned.

"Orders," he replied, still as terse as ever.

Fine, I decided - I couldn't force him and it would take much longer for me to kindle fires from my tinderbox to burn the eggs than it would for him to simply call down fire or lightning on them.

"Ysabeau!" I shouted instead, readying myself for a final assault on the creature. "Don't assume I'm dead until you see the body!"

I caught a glimpse of her eyes widening slightly before the monster was on me again. The already-flickering light from the rift danced a little more wildly, and I knew the rest of the party was leaving the Fade.

"Lasa em sule'ghi'la na din," I told the monster - and this time when it swiped at me with a leg, I thrust my dagger up even as I ducked, and its own momentum severed the limb. It also sent me rolling, but that was fine - Gils immediately had another barrier around me, and though I came up in a wash of flame from the Saarebas, I also came up near enough to sink my dagger into the abdomen of the magic-wielding deformity. Which I did.

The fire stopped.

"Bring it down," I growled at Gils, and sudden lightning streaked across my vision, targeting every wound left by the previous bolt. I leapt back, averting my eyes to avoid being momentarily blinded - but it hardly mattered. The thing groaned and then crashed to the ground, where it lay twitching, blood and ichor slowly pooling together as the life drained from it.

Remembering, I turned to look at the rift - but it was already gone.

"Closed when you caught the Qunari - part - in the stomach," Gils told me, noting the direction of my gaze.

I glanced at him and he tried to straighten, but I could see how he sagged against his staff. "Spent?" I asked.

"One lyrium potion left," he replied. "It will not give me a great deal, but I have some reserves."

"Well," I told him apologetically, "we're going to need that reserve sooner rather than later." I gestured toward the eggs.

He grunted. "I am not a fire-caller."

"I have a tinderbox," I told him, "and a few scraps of kindling - in case we got lost or trapped. There's a lot of web. If we pull it down, lay it around the eggs, set up the tinder and kindling - you could ignite it with lightning. Still a lot faster than me trying to strike sparks until it catches."

He nodded without a word, and turned toward the nearest curtain of web. Following his lead, I did the same.

It took some time, but eventually we had pulled down enough of the web strewn about to fully surround each nest of eggs. "Wish I knew Andrastian funeral rites better," I muttered as I tucked the sticky silk around eggs and corpses alike. "At least they'll get a pyre."

Gils made a grunting sound, and, after a moment of astonishment, I interpreted it as a laugh. "Herald of Andraste," he reminded me in response to my confused glance.

"I never claimed that," I retorted. "In fact, I've been claiming otherwise as loudly as my advisors would let me since the very beginning. I'm Dalish. What care do I have for Chantry ceremonies of any sort?"

"Commend their souls to the Maker," he advised. "It will serve."

He took his last potion as I arranged the contents of my tinderbox. Lightning streaked from his fingers as I stepped back, and it worked precisely as intended - the tinder sparked to life and soon flames were spreading across the web, blackening the eggs and gagging us with the smell of burning flesh. "May your Maker guide you to whatever exists beyond this world," I whispered. "Nuva eraan atishathe."

Lasa em sule'ghi'la na din: "Allow me to guide you into death," imperative form

Nuva eraan atishathe: May you (pl.) dream peacefully