Chapter 17:
They had been walking for an hour, Alistair leading them, when suddenly he stopped. "We won't be able to get around them," he said quietly to himself. He looked back at them and sighed. "Alright, there are darkspawn ahead. We will have to fight them to get through. Be ready."
Sylina looked at Daveth and Ser Jory. Ser Jory's face was white and, though Daveth looked calm, he gripped his bow with white hands. She took out her staff. She assured herself that she was ready. She had fought demons and spirits. She could defeat darkspawn. Her heart beat fast and she felt her palms get sweaty.
Alistair nodded and they began walking forward. When they rounded a bend Sylina saw the darkspawn. There were three of them. Large. As tall as humans, with horrible wide mouths and black eyes. Their skin looked like rotting flesh and, even from where she was, she could smell their reeking stench. The darkspawn saw them at almost the same moment and a howl was sounded. The three darkspawn ran at the humans. Alistair had sword and shield in hand and Sylina took a few steps back to give her spells room. On the nearest one, she cast a simple ice spell which froze him in his tracks. Alistair took two quick steps and sliced open his midriff. The other darkspawn descended on Ser Jory and Daveth. Sylina cast an arcane bolt at Daveth's darkspawn when she saw an opening and the darkspawn went down. She turned to help Ser Jory, but he had dispatched the thing's head. Alistair nodded.
"Three darkspawn. Three vials." He handed them each a vial and Sylina grimaced. Alistair grinned at her.
"Not feeling squeamish, I hope?" he teased. She glared up at him and took the vial.
They continued walking, encountering a few more darkspawn which were dispatched as easily as the first three. Sylina was starting to feel confident that these things could be killed. She even laughed at a joke Daveth told about Duncan being fast for an old man. As they walked, Sylina noticed a structure up ahead. "Is that the Warden base?" she asked, pointing to a structure on top of a hill. Alistair followed her gaze.
"I believe so…or, at least if my directions were any good, it should be," he said. As they began walking up the hill, Alistair stopped. "There are quite a few darkspawn up there." He closed his eyes for a second. "Ten, I believe. Maybe more."
Sylina scoffed. "Only ten." She glanced at him, smiling. "Are they clustered?" she asked.
He looked curiously at her. "Yes, about twenty paces up ahead."
She nodded. "Perfect. Now stay back and watch what mages can do." She advanced, and Alistair and the other two stayed back behind her. When she looked around the corner, she saw them. She could almost laugh except she was much too nervous. She had never performed a spell this large, but she knew how. She took a deep breath and stepped out into the darkspawn's line of vision. The darkspawn immediately turned to her and she threw up her arms and began summoning a fireball. The darkspawn were running toward her and Alistair leapt out of cover, afraid they would overtake her, when she released the fireball. It was about the size of her person and rolled along the ground, running over the grouped darkspawn.
For a second, Alistair could only stare at the huge ball of fire as it demolished the darkspawn in its path. Then he saw Sylina, slumped to her knees, obviously exhausted. He also saw two darkspawn who had not been hit by the flames running toward her. Sword and shield in hand, he managed to get himself between her and the darkspawn, cutting the first down. He rounded on the second as it was inches from him and saw it fall to the ground an arrow in its neck. He nodded at Daveth who was scanning for more darkspawn. Alistair turned to see Sylina getting up.
She had a small sheen of sweat on her forehead and was breathing heavily. That aside, she was absolutely grinning from ear to ear. "Did you see that!" she yelled triumphantly. "It was huge!" She laughed and Alistair couldn't keep himself from grinning.
"Well that's one way to kill darkspawn," he said. "Are you going to be alright?" She was still a little wobbly, but she nodded and continued to smile.
"Let's find those documents and get out of here, shall we?" she said, walking up the slope. Alistair put his hand out to steady her, but she just laughed and waved him away.
They walked into the ruined fort and Sylina saw a chest that had obviously been broken open. She walked toward it. "Is this the chest that is supposed to be sealed and protected?" she asked, looking expectantly at Alistair.
"Well, well, what have we here?" Sylina heard a voice from above and jumped back from the chest, alarmed. Alistair stiffened and looked to the stairs where a woman was descending. "Are you a vulture, I wonder? A scavenger, poking amidst a corpse whose bones were long since cleaned?" The woman finished her descent and walked closer to the party. "Or are you merely an intruder, come into these darkspawn infested Wilds of mine in search of easy prey?" She was looking directly at Sylina. The woman had dark hair like hers and golden, animal like eyes. Sylina also knew immediately that this woman was a witch. "So what will it be, scavenger or intruder?"
Sylina hesitated, confused that this woman would address the question to her. She looked at Alistair, whose eyes were narrowed, but he said nothing. "I believe the Grey Wardens owned this tower. As I come in Grey Warden company, I am neither."
The woman gestured to the ruin. "This is no longer a Grey Warden tower. It is merely a desiccated corpse." She watched Sylina, her eyes not even straying to the others. She folded her arms and fixed Sylina with an intense gaze. "I have watched your progress through the Wilds for some time. Where do they go? I wondered. Why are they here?" She pointed to the broken chest. "And now you disturb the corpse of something long since forgotten. Why?"
Alistair shifted and Sylina looked at him. "Don't talk to her," he whispered. "She must be Chasind and that means there are others nearby."
The woman sneered at Alistair as if seeing him for the first time. "You fear barbarians will appear and swoop down upon you?"
Alistair glared at her. "Yes. Swooping is bad."
Daveth came closer to Sylina. "She is a witch of the wilds," he whispered. "Very dangerous."
The woman turned her sneer onto Daveth and chuckled. "Witch of the Wilds? Mere legends and idle fancies. Do you have no mind of your own?" She turned back to Sylina. "But women do not frighten like these boys. Tell me your name and I shall tell you mine."
Sylina looked at the witch. She knew she was powerful. She could feel the magic emanating from her. And it was likely that the witch could feel the same from her. "I am Sylina," she said simply.
"And I am Morrigan," the witch replied with an amused smile. "So shall I guess your purpose here? You seek something that was in that chest, something here no longer?"
Alistair took a step forward. "Here no longer? You stole it, didn't you? You're some kind of...sneaky...witch-thief!"
Sylina and Morrigan rolled their eyes at the same time, but the witch spoke first. "You are very eloquent. But tell me, how does one steal from dead men?"
"Quite easily, it seems," Alistair retorted. "Those documents are Grey Warden property and I demand you return them," he said, his voice hard.
Morrigan scoffed. "I will not, for 'twas not I who took them. That name means nothing here any longer and does nothing to frighten me."
Sylina sighed. "Perhaps we should just go, Alistair. We can tell Duncan that the documents were not here."
"If you wish to know who removed them, you merely had to ask. 'Twas my mother," Morrigan said, looking at Sylina with a spark of curiosity in her eyes that was quickly extinguished.
Sylina looked at the witch, contemplating what to do. "Perhaps you can take us to your mother then?" she suggested.
The witch smiled. "A sensible request. I like you. Follow me."
Alistair moved closer to Sylina as they started to follow the witch. "Be careful. First it's: 'I like you,' then zap! Toad time." Sylina couldn't keep a laugh from bubbling up and she grinned at Alistair as Morrigan started to walk away.
"Don't forget I have my own zapping I can do," she said, chuckling.
"Point taken," Alistair said, grinning back at her as they followed the mage.