The next morning dawned cold and gray. Delilah and Cullen dressed quickly before the commander kissed her goodbye.
"I've got some things to take care of in my office," he explained. "Don't worry, I'll still come see you off. Don't leave before I see you, alright?"
"Alright," Delilah promised, amused. "I'll see you in about an hour, then." They kissed again, briefly, and then he was gone.
An hour later, everyone's bags were packed, breakfasts eaten, horses fed and watered, and goodbyes said. Cassandra, Varric, and Dorian all clambered up onto their horses, but Delilah hesitated. Cullen hadn't yet shown up.
"Are you alright, Inquisitor?" Cassandra called.
"Yes, I was waiting for Cullen," the mage replied. "He said to wait to leave until he said goodbye."
"Daylight's wasting," Varric remarked.
"I know, I just-"
"Delilah!" She turned to see none other than Cullen himself, jogging towards her. "I'm sorry I'm late, I got tied up with an important report," he panted.
"It's alright, you're here now." Delilah kissed his cheek. "We were just about to head out."
"I can tell. Here, this is for you." He held out a folded piece of paper, with a wax seal bearing the crest of a lion. "Don't read it until you're on the road, alright?"
Delilah ignored Varric, Cassandra, and Dorian's pointed looks behind her, and tucked the note within the first pages of the notebook Cullen had given her inside her pack. "Thank you, vhenas," she murmured, too low for her companions to hear. "I'll be sure to return safely to you."
"You'd better." He brushed a stray hair behind her ear, then leaned in and kissed her softly. "Safe travels."
"Dareth shiral," she murmured back. "See you in three weeks."
One week and four saddle-sore rear ends later, the arid and rocky cliffs of the Western Approach stretched out as far as they could see. An Inquisition scout, garbed in lightweight, sand-colored clothes and armor, jogged up to them. "Inquisitor!" she said formally, giving a brief salute. Her accent was somewhat lilted, placing her home likely somewhere around Starkhaven. "Welcome back to the Western Approach, as unpleasant as it may be."
Delilah swung out of the saddle, groaning softly. It had been ages since she'd been on horseback for so much time, so close together. "Thank you, agent…?"
"O'Riley."
"Thank you, agent O'Riley. Our camp is nearby, right?" The thought of finally being able to really rest somehow made her feet hurt even more.
"Yes ser. The Red Templars' camp is set up due west of here, next to an old abandoned mineshaft, and we camped a way off, so they wouldn't detect us. I can show you the way," O'Riley offered, gesturing. Delilah nodded, and they were off once more.
It was only a short walk to the Inquisition camp. A few other scouts milled about, writing out reports, doing maintenance on armor and weapons, or taking their turn to eat and rest. Delilah, Cassandra, Dorian, and Varric all collapsed gratefully onto the bedrolls already laid out for them under the shade cast by a tarp. Delilah pulled off her boots and wiggled her toes, sighing happily.
"If I never have to ride another horse ever again, it'll be too soon," Varric grumbled from her left. On her other side, Cassandra snorted.
"Is it uncomfortable being so high up off the ground?" she taunted.
"Hey, you're already tall, you're used to it. It's a whole other story for me," the dwarf shot back.
"I, for one, am on Varric's side on this," Dorian interjected. He stretched out on his bedroll and sighed. "That saddle is far less comfortable than I'm used to."
"You have horses in Tevinter?" Delilah asked, curious. The other mage snorted.
"Hardly," he replied, with a note of haughtiness.
"Oh, do your slaves pull carriages by hand, then?" The elf couldn't quite keep the bite out of her voice. She loved Dorian dearly, but his blasé attitude towards his country's reliance upon slave labor still made her skin crawl.
Dorian let out a sigh, not rising to her bait. "No. We do have horses, but we don't prize them the way Fereldans do, for example. We don't breed them for specific purposes; if it can walk and pull a cart or a carriage, then that is sufficient."
She hummed thoughtfully. "I see," she said at last. "That sounds reasonable." She grimaced, hoping that her silent apology was apparent in her expression. The Tevinter seemed to understand her unspoken apology, because he nodded and smiled a little.
"We like to think it's reasonable, at least," Dorian replied. "I know it doesn't have the significance that the Dalish associate with your halla and landships-"
"Aravels," Delilah corrected automatically.
"- aravels," the Tevinter continued, "but it works."
The sound of approaching feet interrupted them, and they looked up to find scout O'Riley had come back. She pulled back her hood to reveal amber skin and tightly curled black hair pulled away from her face. "Enjoying your rest?" she asked.
"Much," Delilah said with a smile. "We figure we'd rest for a couple hours and then attack the Red Templar camp at twilight, when they'd likely be relaxed. But if you have any information or suggestions, we'd be glad to hear them."
O'Riley sat on an empty bedroll across the fire pit from Delilah, and rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "Well, best we can figure is that there's about a dozen of them spread throughout their camp," she explained. "They do have a guard rotation going on, and they'll be doing a shift change around dinnertime, when the sun gets low. Like you said, that'd be a good time for an attack. If you can get the drop on the two that guard the camp entrance, you should be able to sweep through with little fuss."
"That sounds too easy," Cassandra interrupted. "If it's as simple as you make it sound, why were you scouts unable to take care of them on your own? Why was it required that we personally come wipe them out?"
"Well, I was getting to that," O'Riley pointed out. "These red templars have been behaving erratically. More so than your average red templar, mind you. We cannae tell why or what it may be, but something has these buggers very agitated."
"And that interferes with an attack?" Dorian asked.
"Precisely. Just as we think we have their patterns figured out and feel safe to jump in, something tweaks their noses and they get all a-jitter. They're almost more paranoid than we can be," the scout admitted. "I figured that Sister Nightingale would order us to jump in anyway, but we offer a strategic observation and reporting point here which I think she doesn't want to lose. We're the ones who send the reports from Griffon Wing Keep as well as Adamant Fortress."
"I understand." Delilah stood and stretched, groaning as her sore muscles protested the movement. "Would it be alright if at least a couple scouts accompanied us later? I'd feel much more confident about this if we had some backup, in case things get ugly."
"Of course, Inquisitor. We'll be there. Just say the word when you're ready, and we'll head out together." O'Riley reached out her hand, and Delilah grasped it gratefully.
"I don't know about you, but I plan on grabbing a nap," Varric announced loudly.
"If you snore again as loudly as you did last night, I will magically fuse your mouth shut," Dorian muttered, only half seriously.
"What was that, Sparkler?"
"Nothing, oh Master Tethras," the mage said innocently. The dwarf harrumphed, but didn't press the issue.
Delilah settled back on the bedroll and pulled out a snack ration from her pack. She leaned back, munching, and stared up at the azure sky. Soft, painting-perfect clouds drifted lazily by, and her companions' chatter slowly lulled her into a doze.
Almost no time later, a hand fell on her shoulder, jerking her awake. Above her hovered Cassandra, her outline haloed by the setting sun. The sky had turned to varying shades of purple and orange with the sunset.
"It's time," the warrior said, before offering a hand to help Delilah to her feet. The elf shouldered her heavy staff and adjusted her coat as scout O'Riley approached.
"Are you ready, Your Worship?" the woman asked. Delilah grimaced.
"Please, you don't have to call me that," she sighed. "Just Delilah or Inquisitor will do."
"Yes, Inquisitor. My apologies," O'Riley apologized. "I've got one other agent here who is good to help. The six of us should be more than enough to handle a dozen templars, don't you think?"
"I mean, we've taken on a half-dozen high dragons with just the four of us and survived, so I'd rather hope so," Delilah said mildly. Behind her, Varric and Dorian snickered.
"Scout Murray, at your pleasure." The man held out his hand, and Delilah shook it. His voice was soft, and he had a very young-looking face, but the steely glint in his eye seemed to say he had more experience and fire in him than his boyish features would suggest.
"Lead the way to the Templar camp," Cassandra instructed.
"Aye, my lady."
The walk to the Red Templar encampment was brief and quiet. Scout O'Riley waved them over to a rock shelf that would shield them from view; below, they could see the entire camp laid out. Two red templars stood guard at the camp entrance. Behind them, a handful of tents scattered around a small campfire and cooking pot. A couple red templars milled about, but most of them appeared to be in the tents. One of them, a giant of a man who appeared to be the one in charge, went around, issuing orders here and there. Even at fifty paces, the sheer amount of tainted lyrium flowing in their blood made Delilah's skin prickle.
Her eyes skimmed the camp, noting the locations of each red templar. Two at the gate, four sitting and eating, the commander pacing around, two siting and writing… at least three had to be in the tents, then.
Delilah turned to her companions. "Varric, you take out the sentries," she said in a hushed tone. "That'll let us get in somewhat undetected. Dorian and I will do some long-ranged attacks to stun and disable. Cassandra, while they're reeling, I want you to charge in and take out as many of them as you can while Dorian and Varric cover your back. I'll come in and join you. Scouts O'Riley and Murray will keep an eye on the perimeter to stop any nasty surprises, as well as provide backup in case it's too much for us to handle. Sound good?"
"Not that I'm trying to tell you how to fight your battles, my lady," Murray interjected hesitantly, "but is it wise to have you in the center of the fight? I understand that you're a skilled mage but…you're a mage. Not really built for close combat, from what I understand."
Delilah gave a short laugh, and Varric and Cassandra shared a chuckle. "Just…trust me," she half-laughed. Murray's brow creased, but he dropped the subject. Delilah gestured towards the sentries. "Alright, Varric, at your leisure."
"It would be my absolute pleasure," the dwarf replied. He shouldered his admittedly impressive crossbow, Bianca. He peered down the sights for a heartbeat, then squeezed the trigger.
One of the sentries clutched at his chest where Delilah could faintly see the red feather-fletched end of the bolt sticking out. The other sentry had just turned to see what the commotion was when the second bolt struck him in the neck. Two muted thuds later, the entrance was clear.
They approached quickly and silently, Cassandra at the front. They stepped over the dead red templar sentries and crept between the tents. Delilah, Dorian, and Varric hung back, and the two mages held their staves at the ready. At Delilah's nod, she and Dorian attacked.
Deafening, crackling lightning arched through the center of the camp, striking every red templar in the area. They barely had time to stiffen and cry out before billowing, white-hot flames erupted forth. "Go!" Delilah shouted. Cassandra charged; the flames parted to allow her past, and two of the red templars fell at her feet without even lifting their swords. Crossbow bolts whizzed past, peppering the remaining red templars.
Two of them flanked Delilah. Their eyes looked hollowed out, their minds and bodies consumed by the corrupted red lyrium they had either been tricked or tempted into taking. With their swords raised menacingly, they backed her up against a tent. Her mind raced for a solution. She glanced again at the tent to her back, and something in her mind clicked.
"Hey!" she taunted, shouting above the din. "Corypheus sucks nug dick!"
Without waiting for a reply, she dove inside the tent. Behind her, the red templars bellowed in fury and followed. With a quick prayer to the Creators that this would work, she cast a shield around herself. At the same time she sent out a shockwave of heat and energy. Everything within a three meter range burst into flame; the two red templars included. They fell, screaming, as their now cherry-red armor sizzled against their skin.
Delilah stood, panting, as her barrier faded away. Cassandra finished off the last templar as she watched.
"Is that all of them?" Varric asked.
"I believe so," Cassandra panted. She wiped the blood from her sword on one of the dead red templar's skirt, then sheathed it. "That wasn't terribly difficult."
"Might make for a less than gripping report to Sister Nightingale," scout Murray remarked as he and O'Riley reappeared, "but a red templar killed simply is just as good in my books as a red templar killed extravagantly."
"True," scout O'Riley agreed. She approached a table that the red templars had set up, and began rifling through the papers that covered the surface. "Though that explosion that you pulled off, Inquisitor, was quite impressive, if I might say."
Delilah peered over the woman's shoulder to see what was going on. "What's it all say?"
O'Riley hummed thoughtfully. "Looks like they were investigating and trying to mine in the area under orders from Samson," she replied. "But apparently they didn't find anything in particular, but there's something about red templars ending up acting erratically in the area. That matches our reports. This one is an order to call off the mining, and return to the main force." She straightened. "They hadn't found anything conclusive, from the looks of these reports, but this one here mentions a mine in the area where the effect seemed strongest."
"Something to investigate?" Dorian piped up.
"Possibly. Our only mission was to eradicate this templar encampment, and we have," Delilah sighed tiredly. She raised her eyes to the rapidly darkening sky; the sun was fully below the horizon, and the vibrant oranges and pinks were beginning to fade. "We can stop by in the morning before we leave for Skyhold."
At that moment, the earth trembled beneath their feet. A deep rumbling filled the air, and Delilah and Cassandra's eyes met in surprise; and then it was gone.
"What the bloody hell was that?" Varric demanded.
"Felt like an earthquake," Murray supplied. "Not real common, but they happen sometimes. Nothing to be afraid of."
"They're almost unheard of this far south, though," Delilah replied. "Red templars investigating and mining some random area of a desert wasteland, and then suddenly an earthquake happens here? I'm not one to believe in coincidences."
"I suppose we need to investigate that abandoned mineshaft after all," O'Riley suggested.
"I think you're right," Delilah agreed.
The mine was only a short walk away, surrounded by old mining equipment. While the rest of the group fanned out, Delilah leaned over the edge of the rail to peer down into the mineshaft. The bottom of the hole was swallowed in darkness.
"What kind of excavation could the red templars have been doing here?" Dorian wondered. He knelt and picked up a discarded scrap of armor, likely from a shoulder plate. "Whatever they were doing, they must have left in quite a hurry."
"They could have left whenever Corypheus called them to attack Haven," Cassandra suggested.
"It's certainly possible, but it's been a year since the attack," Delilah pointed out. "Those footprints make it look like they were here recently, though. I'm not seeing any clues as to what they were digging for, however. Not even the usual cart of raw red lyrium we normally find at these camps."
Scout O'Riley kicked open a chest and rifled through it. "Aha! A log book. Let's see what our tainted-lyrium addled fools were out here doing."
She stepped back and idly wandered over to the wooden walkway that extended all the way across the top of the mineshaft. A moment later, O'Riley called out.
"Found a note that wasn't part of the original log book. Looks a lot older, if you ask me. 'So close. We nearly reached him. Made it down to what looked like a dwarven thaig where the song was actually audible, real and thrumming through the air, not just in our heads'," the scout read aloud. "'It rattled through the lyrium pillars and shook the earth beneath our feet to its dreadful tempo. We lost thirty men in the last cave-in, and the Warden-Commander is abandoning the mission. I tried to argue for one last push, but the rock is too unstable down there. We'll have to find another Archdemon somewhere more solid.'"
"Archdemon?" scout Murray repeated. "You don't mean an archdemon archdemon, do you?"
"As opposed to a chantry sister archdemon?" Varric suggested.
The scout waved a hand dismissively. "You know what I meant! If there's an archdemon down in that hole, that explains what Gray Wardens were doing here so long ago, but how does that relate to the red templars?"
"Corypheus did ensnare the Wardens in his plot, if you'll remember," Dorian reminded them. "But I feel the same, I fail to see any connection besides that. This note looks far too old to be related to our current predicament."
Delilah looked over the edge of the walkway, into the dark depths of the mine. Could there actually be an archdemon down there? Her clan had been very far north during the Blight a decade ago, but the idea of a winged monstrosity bursting forth with a horde of darkspawn at its heel was enough to make her skin prickle.
"Maybe it doesn't matter how it's related," O'Riley piped up. "The red templar camp is cleared out, mission accomplished."
"You could be right," Delilah sighed. "Still, it would've been nice to know so I could properly fill out a report. Be sure to pack the logbook and the note, we might still get some information out of-"
"Inquisitor look out!"
She turned to see Cassandra, fifteen paces away with a desperate look on her face. At the end of the ramp, sword in hand and a malicious look in his reddened eyes, was none other than the red templar commander that they'd seen in the templars' camp earlier. Without thinking, Delilah hefted her staff from her back and held it in front of her, crouching defensively.
"I thought you were dead!" she exclaimed.
"Not yet," the templar replied with a hollow chuckle, "but soon we both will be." He raised his sword and charged with a snarl. Delilah blocked the blow with the center of her staff, but staggered; the blow felt at least five times heavier than anybody she'd fought yet.
Behind the templar, everybody rushed forward to help. They'd barely stepped onto the walkway, however, when the red templar pulled back from his attack and bashed his sword at the wooden planks beneath their feet. His extraordinary strength shattered the beams, and the walkway shuddered at the blow.
Realization struck Delilah like lightning. "Run!" she cried. "It's going to-"
A resounding CRACK echoed off the rocks as the ramp's supporting beams snapped and pulled away from the mineshaft walls. The ramp swayed, then folded in upon itself. Everything almost seemed in slow motion; the crazed templar in front of her, his watery eyes wide not with fear but satisfaction; the walkway falling away from under her feet; all of her companions falling too, their faces filling with shock and fear as they realized their peril. The walls of the mineshaft rose until the sky felt far away indeed. Delilah, the templar, Cassandra, Dorian, Varric, and Scout Murray; one and all were swallowed up in the darkness.