14. The Power of Three
In the short time it took them to make it to the bridge, the wind had picked up. Tasha's robes whipped around her legs, and the hurt was barely registered against the tingle she felt against her magic. Rain began to fall, slowly, although the drops stung bare skin with the force with which they struck and pounded against armor. Her heart began to beat faster. She rubbed her fingers into her wet robes.
"Let's head to the Tower of Ishal quickly so we can light the fire!" Alistair shouted. Tasha felt a building pressure against her empathy, distinctly separate from the lightning forming in the clouds. As they began to cross, the pressure swelled and the small figures one could see below the bridge charged toward the other side.
"The battle has started," Medb said solemnly, watching the two armies.
Alistair too looked down. Nausea coiled in his gut though Tasha suspected it was because of the distance to the valley below. Still, it wasn't quite enough to distract her from the weight of the battle and she blinked the rain out of her eyes, shaking her head as she did so. The motion did nothing to ease the feeling of emotional claustrophobia. She took deep breaths, trying to relax. "We need to go," he told the elf quietly. Neither of them noticed Tasha standing, knees locked like a frightened colt, or at least they hadn't until she bolted, alarmed and overwhelmed by the press of battle emotions from below and the energy from above. "Tasha!" he called after her. Medb twisted around and jumped into action, chasing after her friend.
"Tash, it's okay." Medb grabbed her upper arm and dug her heels in. Sparks skittered along her gloves, raising the hairs on the back of her neck, but she ignored them. "Tasha!" She didn't understand half of what the mage was babbling about but Medb pulled her into a hug. The height difference presented a bit of an obstacle; Medb, while naturally shorter as an elf, was not tall for her people and Tasha was not on the short side of humans. Tasha had to bend low to bury her face in the crook of the elf's neck and trembled. Strangely, Medb felt a faint, though intense, panic fluttering through her, making her belly squirm.
Suddenly Tasha recoiled, eyes searching the sky. With a strength that startled Medb, she gripped the Dalish hunter's shoulders and forced her to the ground. Seconds later, a massive fireball slammed into them.
Medb sucked in a breath to scream as she ducked and braced for the impact as well as the pain that would accompany it. When nothing happened, she slowly lifted her head to see Tasha, hands raised in a warding motion and freezing cold around them, made more uncomfortable by the rain that had started to fall harder.
She blinked, trying to wrap her head around why she wasn't dead, injured, or somewhere in between. "What? How?"
Tasha straightened up and lowered her hands. A faint shimmer in the air that Medb hadn't noticed faded away. There was a cautiously hard look in the mage's eyes. "Sensed it was coming. Got a shield up. Sorry it's cold," she added, noticing the elf's goosebumps. But her empathy was back under control, now that she could expect it to be worse. Small mercies in an uncaring world.
"The cold is you?" Then she winced, the tips of her delicately pointed ears flushing in embarrassment. "That didn't come out right. I meant, you can manipulate temperature like that?"
The guarded look didn't leave her eyes but it did lighten a little. "Not exactly." Her eyes flashed to Alistair when he bounded up, out of breath with a burn on one cheek but otherwise unharmed. She didn't acknowledge the other Warden otherwise. "I'm sensitive to cold energy and I weave it into my shields. Hence why it was so cold inside it. Outside, it was probably fairly warm. Not that I've ever been in the position to be able to tell what the outside of my own shield feels like really."
"Are you two alright?" Alistair asked them, hazel eyes landing between the two of them. His hair had started to flatten a little from the rain and Tasha dreaded to think of what her own must look like in a flash of odd self-consciousness.
"I'm good now. Medb?"
"Not on fire so it could be worse."
As Alistair tried to pass them, Tasha reached out a hand and gently touched his cheek. A distinctly cool sensation washed over him, numbing and easing the pain he'd pushed away.
She studied him and blinked slowly. "I'm good with burns," she said by way of explanation. "Those I can fix."
For the rest of her life, Tasha would only have a comparative handful of days that made her wish she'd stayed in the Tower. This first day as a Warden was one of them. Tasha's ability to sense the darkspawn hadn't come into effect yet, but she no longer had a barrier in the form of the Taint between her mind and Alistair's, protecting her from the buzzing at the base of the skull.
When they found out that darkspawn had invaded the Tower of Ishal, Tasha groaned. "You've got to be kidding me."
They all looked at the mage, a mixture of expressions on their faces. "We're Grey Wardens. That's kind of what we do here," Medb reminded her, puzzled.
"I know that. Did I mention I had a bad feeling?"
"Tasha are you okay?" Alistair studied her, brow furrowed in concern.
"Never mind, let's just go. Because, let's face it. This was never going to be easy." She gave a snort and began rolling her sleeves up. "Damn, I wish I'd kept that staff. I was worried about getting the Taint, you know. Ridiculous in hindsight. Oh, well. Let's go kill some darkspawn like good Grey Wardens."
The addition of the soldiers who had been stationed around the tower proved to be helpful when cutting down the darkspawn. And even though they approached battle like Alistair, she was distinctly reminded of fighting alongside Daveth and Jory in the Wilds. Her heart thumped painfully in her chest and for just a moment, she let one of her hands slide down the chain to the pendant. Never forget those who didn't make it.
Then she used the energy of the storm to direct lightning strikes into the darkspawn. Unused to that level of control, it took her several moments to gather focus and her magic to force the energy where she needed it to go.
Through Alistair, she picked up a different thrum and turned her head to see a bigger-than-usual Hurlock bearing down on her. She had enough time to snap a shield around her body and had the Hurlock tried to run her through, it might have worked. Either it had known what she was going to do, or perhaps had been blessed with ridiculous luck, because the darkspawn instead slammed its shield into her chest. The barrier she had up stopped it from actually making contact but the force behind the blow wasn't softened and she was thrown off her feet to land awkwardly on her back in the mud.
Pain spiked through her entire body, carrying with it the metallic taste of blood in her mouth. Rain poured down onto her face, making it difficult for her see. Dimly, the analytical part of her mind diagnosed at least several possible broken ribs, a probable concussion, and a variety of other injuries. Before she could move again and force herself to her feet, the Hurlock appeared in her field of vision, its disgusting face leering at her as it raised its sword to drive it into her chest. The only act of defiance she could muster through the pain was to stare into its soulless black eyes unblinkingly.
Sharp anger and fear slammed into her, temporarily driving back the pain. The Hurlock looked down at its chest almost as if it were surprised. Then the tip of a sword appeared, causing black blood to drip onto her robes.
Alistair yanked his sword out of his kill and it promptly fell on top of her. The new pain from her already abused ribs woke her up and by the time the other Warden had hauled the body off of her, she was already feeling better from the healing magic she'd sent coursing through her body.
"Tasha! Tasha, are you all right?" Alistair asked overly loud, kneeling into the wet mud beside her. A clap of thunder boomed through the valley, the sound reverberating in Tasha's bones.
"You'll rust your armor, idiot. Get up," she coughed out, hoping she wasn't doing more damage to herself.
"Don't you dare die on me. You just survived the Joining. How unfair would that be to have you die so soon?"
"I'm not dying."
"You could be delusional. Let me find-"
"Alistair." At the sound of his name, the man paused in his panicked shifting through of his pack. "Mage, remember? Just because I don't heal very well doesn't mean I can't."
"Oh. Oh, right."
Medb shoved him aside when it became clear he was just going to stare at her instead of helping the mage up. She gripped her forearm, and pulled her up.
Pain danced along her nerves, but her magic was already there, numbing it. The shorter woman searched her eyes. "Can you fight?"
"I'm not dead yet. Although when we light the beacon, I'll have to spend some time just healing." Medb seemed to weigh those words, almost as though she were studying them for truthfulness before nodding and stepping back. Then she closed her eyes. Tasha felt the shift in her emotions as they were shoved down and away, but not before she felt anguished grief. It was enough to put tears in her own eyes.
"Into the tower we go. Come on, shem," she added, nudging Alistair. He glared at the elf but his gaze softened when it shifted to Tasha accompanied by soft ripples of relief that made Tasha flinch. Medb went to follow him as he headed for the door when Tasha grabbed her arm.
"Are you okay?" She asked, frowning at the screeching fear in her fellow Warden.
"Fine. I just don't have particularly good memories of being inside."
Tasha gave a snort. "Me neither. At least you weren't trapped in one for twelve years." Instead of making her feel better, as Tasha had hoped, the words only produced more of the pain that she hadn't expected.
"No, that's true." The elf's green eyes slid to watch Alistair carefully make his way up the muddy hill. "He cares about you, you know."
"What?"
"Not sure how he managed that in such a short amount of time but he cares about what happens to you at least twice as much as he does about me." Then she returned to Tasha, who was startled to see vehement decision gleaming in them when there was no clue on the emotional front. "I think you care for him too, or you could." Those expressive eyes narrowed. "Do not let that go to waste."
Tasha exhaled on a sigh. "What happened to you?"
Again, there was that grief that lurked so close to the surface yet was only beginning to show itself. "I'll let you know if we survive this."
The two male soldiers hanging back glanced at each other, then both shrugged. Warden business. The five of them stepped out of the rain and into the dark interior of the Tower of Ishal. The door shut behind them with an ominous thud.
AN: I'm so excited to be getting back to this story. Good stuff. Also, I'm settling in for the long haul with this.
Let me know what y'all think. Good, bad, ugly. Thanks, you lovely readers you.