10 Drakonis, 9:32 Dragon
Alistair, love,
I'm so sorry I haven't written since you returned to Denerim. We still don't know any hows or whys, but I think I found the source of the darkspawn's continued organization here. When we (Oghren, Nathaniel, Anders, and I) finished asking after Kristoff in Amaranthine itself, we made a trip to the Wending Woods before returning to the Keep. There's a mine there where we found the leader of at least some of the new darkspawn, an emissary who's different from the others. I can't be certain, but I could almost swear that he's the source of the sentient darkspawn who attacked Vigil's Keep.
The oddest thing about him, though, isn't his apparent independence. There's a dwarf-woman with him that I could swear is—or once was—a Grey Warden. I can feel the taint in her, but it's different from ours. Her song is decades old, but not fatigued the same way that Riordan's was. Unfortunately, they both escaped before we could capture them and get more information, but I have a strong feeling we'll see them again sooner than later. Now, though, I have to go make an appearance and pretend to be arlessa and once that's over I have another recruit who's asked to take the Joining—a Dalish woman whose sister we thought was taken by the darkspawn, but the sister seems to be willingly staying with them now so I don't know what's happening there.
At any rate, I'll hopefully be staying here at the Keep for the next few weeks consulting with the dwarven engineer overseeing improvements to our defenses while Nathaniel and Anders go back to the Amaranthine City to speak with some hunters who claim to have found an entrance to the Deep Roads at the north end of the arling. If the information's good, we'll be heading there shortly after they return to the Keep.
(By the way, Wynne was at the city's chantry when we stopped there; she's on her way to Cumberland on Circle business that we'll definitely need to discuss when I finally have time to return to Denerim for a while.)
I miss you, love. With any luck at all, I'll be able to come home to visit, at least, soon.
Elissa