Delilah's eyebrows shot up towards her hairline. "An…archdemon," she repeated slowly.
The Warden turned to her companions in exasperation. "Am I mumbling? Yes, an archdemon," she quipped. "We Wardens know that one of them is imprisoned in the area. We've been ordered here to kill it if we can, to prevent one of two possible more Blights."
"Haven't we already dealt with Wardens who wanted to storm the Deep Roads and kill the last archdemons by means of blood magic?" Dorian interjected. "We stormed Adamant Fortress and everything for it. Is it possible this is that same problem?"
"The nightmare demon is slain," Cassandra reminded him. "If these Wardens are here for the same purpose, it is of their own volition."
"Look, we heard about Adamant Fortress, so I understand your concerns," Castielle said brusquely. "But all three of us weren't even on the continent at the time, so it didn't affect us. I'm going to be frank with you: we're trying to find a cure for the Calling, and we're going to test it by getting close to a live archdemon. Regardless of if this cure works, we're going to attempt to slay the archdemon before it can rise and risk Thedas once more. But as I said, we're short on manpower. We can't do it alone."
"Cave-ins have killed most of our company," Finn added. "We brought fifteen Wardens down here, and it's just us three left."
"Come on, it'll be fun!" Sigrun finished.
Delilah crossed her arms, lost in thought. She turned to peer at her companions. Catching sight of her thoughtful expression, Varric sputtered indignantly.
"Don't tell me you're considering it!" he said vehemently.
"Varric-"
"They're going after a bloody archdemon that's still asleep and safely trapped miles underground! Andraste's tits, Sunny, that's the most foolhardy plan I've ever heard, and I was close friends with Hawke for nearly a decade!" he ranted, jabbing a finger to accentuate his point.
"It's not so ridiculous an idea," Delilah replied defensively. "Besides, at the moment, we don't have much choice but to agree to their terms and help them. The Wardens are the ones who know the Deep Roads the best. I'm sure they have a map to the exits, right?" The question was directed at Castielle, who raised a single perfect blonde eyebrow.
"Of course we have a map," she scoffed. She reached into her pack and pulled out a folded, dingy piece of paper. "We'd hardly be the most successful Wardens if we didn't."
"I still don't like it," Cassandra jumped in, "but as there is no apparent blood magic nor mind-controlling nightmare demons involved, and as there does not seem to be a better option, I believe we should agree to go with her."
"She's right," Dorian agreed. "Let's help her and get out of this horrid place once and for all."
"I still don't like it," Varric grumbled. "But…we don't have much of a choice."
"I'll follow you, Inquisitor, whatever you decide," scout Murray clarified.
Delilah nodded, mulling over it all for a moment. "Alright," she sighed at length. She turned back to face Castielle, who met her gaze steadily. "We'll do it. Where is this archdemon of yours, anyway?"
For the first time, the Warden commander allowed herself a small, smirking smile. "I'm glad you see reason," she said, holding her hand out. "You have my promise as Warden-commander that I will help you all to the surface as soon as our mission is completed."
Delilah clasped hands with her. The human and the elf held each other's gaze for a moment, Castielle's pewter gray eyes to Delilah's forest green, then released their hands. "I guess I'm stuck with you," Delilah half-joked. The Warden's mouth quirked a little.
"Only for a little while, at least," she replied. "Come on, we ought to get going. We only brought limited food supplies. But cave-ins killing most of my company had one good result – we were able to get at the packs of some of those who died, and salvage their supplies."
The group began heading down the road once more. Castielle led, as she had the map. Delilah caught up to the Warden, eyeing her warily. "I heard you saved the elven clan in the Brecilian forest," the elf probed.
"It's not like I didn't have any help," the rogue replied. "Alistair and Morrigan were with me, along with my mabari Kitty." Her voice softened at the mention of her warhound.
Behind them, Varric let out a short laugh. "Kitty? Seriously?"
Castielle pinned him with a stare. "Got a problem with my dog's name?"
He raised his hands in surrender. "Not at all! I'm just surprised. Hawke's mabari was named Kitty too, that's all."
"Hawke?"
"Champion of Kirkwall?" Castielle met the dwarf's explanation with a blank stare. "Friends with Anders, the mage who caused the chantry explosion and accelerated the mage-templar war?"
"Anders?" Sigrun piped up. "Our Anders?"
"You knew him?" Now Varric sounded surprised.
"Yeah, he was under my command at Amaranthine several years ago," Castielle explained. "You met him? And he was the one who blew up the chantry?"
"Oh yeah, it was…not pretty," Varric said. "That man has a lot of issues. I don't know where he is and I don't want to know, but I hope wherever he is, that he's getting help. Possession by a spirit aside, he's by-and-large a good man."
"Possession of a spirit?" Finn said incredulously. "He's an abomination?"
"Yeah, he let in a spirit of Justice and last I saw it was nearly destroying him," Varric explained heavily.
"Justice?" Now it was Sigrun's turn once more to be surprised. "Was this our Justice?"
"Your Justice?" Dorian laughed. "What, you were friends with a demon?"
Castielle and Sigrun shared a brief, uncomfortable glance. "Well…" the dwarf started.
"You were!?" Cassandra sputtered.
"To be fair, we've basically adopted Cole, a spirit of compassion, into our group," Delilah said mildly. Cassandra glared at her.
"Cole did not cause someone to put a bomb in a chantry and kill hundreds of people," the warrior said pointedly.
"Very true," Varric agreed somberly.
"Anyway, Anders is possessed?" Castielle prompted Varric. He nodded.
"Yes. I take it he and Justice met under your command?" he asked.
"Yes. I was wary of taking on a spirit into our company, especially considering we were really trying to recruit Wardens and you can't exactly make a spirit possessing a dead body into a Warden, but he was trapped outside of the Fade and seemed sincere in his desire to help," the Warden explained. "I find it hard to believe that Anders allowed Justice to possess him, or that Justice would even agree to such an arrangement. Both of them seemed much smarter than that to me."
"Desperation will do that to a person, I suppose," Varric sighed.
At the back of the group, scout Murray let out a low whistle. "You all sure do meet some interesting people in your travels."
Delilah chuckled tiredly. "You have no idea."
They continued down the stone road, and eventually, the conversation turned to Varric and Castielle comparing their crossbows.
"She's designed so you can cut reloading time in half, and it pulls the drawstring back automatically," Varric explained proudly. "Bianca here is a wonder of modern engineering."
Castielle jerked her thumb back at her own crossbow. "This one took down the archdemon Urthemiel in the Battle of Denerim."
The dwarf huffed, looking put out. "Well that's just cheating." The Warden commander chuckled.
"If it makes you feel better, it didn't give the killing blow," she explained. "My family sword did that one." She patted the hilt of the sword at her hip.
"That…actually does make me feel better," Varric admitted.
"The archdemon you took down, didn't you do it with the help of the Gray Warden Alistair? And Morrigan?" Delilah jumped in. "I met Morrigan at the Winter Palace."
"Yes," Castielle said thoughtfully. "And Zevran as well. I miss that elf. Tried to assassinate me once, and we were best friends ever since. You know, the last I'd heard from Alistair, my husband, he was going back to Ferelden to aid your Inquisition. He'd said he was going to storm Adamant Fortress with you all, and I haven't heard anything from since." The Warden stopped and pinned the elf with an icy stare. "Why is that, you think?"
Everyone's eyes seemed to be on Delilah. In that moment, she thanked every single Creator and anybody else listening that, when pressed with the decision of who should remain in the Fade to allow the others to escape, she had decided that Hawke would remain behind. She raised her hands in surrender. "The last I saw of him, he was perfectly fine! Tired and dirty, perhaps, but alive and well. He said he was heading to Weisshaupt to tell the other Wardens what had happened. I'm sure that as soon as you finish your mission here and go back, he'll be waiting for you." She smiled weakly.
Castielle considered her explanation for a long moment before nodding and seeming to accept it. "Very well," she said, turning and continuing walking. She pulled the map out once more and consulted it briefly. "We're getting close to a junction. Come on."
Behind her, Delilah pressed a hand briefly over her heart and sighed. Dorian's hand fell upon her shoulder, and she turned to see him giving her a smirk. "Well, it looks like you don't have to agonize anymore over whether you made the right decision or not," he chuckled.
"I could swear that I just saw my life flash before my eyes," Delilah muttered. His hand squeezed her shoulder reassuringly before he began following after everybody else. She straightened, and resumed walking too.
Besides that conversation, the most exciting thing that happened that day was turning left at a large junction between two of the roads. They all bedded down for the night along an unexceptionally ordinary stretch of the Deep Roads. Halfway through Delilah's watch shift, however, a sudden soft noise made her jump.
She turned to see that all three Gray Wardens had woken. Castielle stood, staring off in the distance.
"What is it?" Delilah asked in a hushed tone.
"Darkspawn," Finn answered. His already pale face had gone even paler under his freckles. Behind them, Cassandra and Dorian sat up, woken by the talking. "Not many, really, but even one is just plain too much to deal with, in my opinion."
"Why did you join the Gray Wardens, again?" Sigrun teased, already unsheathing her daggers. Cassandra woke Varric and Murray, who both stood and drew their weapons. From the darkness ahead came low shuffling noises, along with a single shivering screech which hung in the air like a foul odor.
"If you ever find out, let me know," Finn replied as the first darkspawn shuffled into the firelight. Behind it, about a dozen beady eyes reflected yellow back at them. Delilah had fought darkspawn before, certainly, but something about the abomination of a creature lurching at them from the depths of the earth, with rotted skin and jagged, razor sharp teeth, sent shivers of horror all across her body.
"Keep your mouth shut while you fight," Castielle warned hastily as she drew her sword. "Don't let them scratch you. If you get blood in your mouth, spit it out immediately."
The darkspawn gave a chilling scream and charged forward, its rusted sword raised high above its head. Castielle and Sigrun both leapt forward to cut it off.
Delilah and Dorian began firing off spells immediately. The bolts flew past the first darkspawn to land among the dozen or so behind it; fireballs bloomed forward and electricity arched between the rancid bodies, dropping them like flies. Finn joined them, casting barriers and healing any injuries he saw almost before they happened. Cassandra leapt into the fray, cutting down the beasts with her usual fury. Murray wasn't far behind, unsheathing a couple of daggers from his waist.
It didn't take more than a couple minutes, but soon every single darkspawn lay dead. Delilah rolled her left arm and winced; her shoulder still ached from being dislocated, and the sudden fight had aggravated it. Castielle came over, wiping black blood absentmindedly from the length of her blade.
"Is everyone alright?" she called.
"Everyone's alive and uninjured," Dorian replied.
"Good. Let's go ahead and get moving, then, since we're all wide awake now," Castielle sighed.
"Not many 'spawn out right now," Sigrun remarked. "You think this place would be crawling with them, what with that archdemon nearby."
"Maybe the rumblings are scaring them off," Finn suggested.
"Rumblings?" Dorian repeated skeptically.
"The archdemon's calling becomes physically audible when it's close enough," Sigrun explained. "Get something, anything loud enough, it'll vibrate the rock until it even shakes some loose. Hence, the cave-ins and our drastically reduced numbers."
As if to punctuate her point, a low rumbling echoed through the road. Dust drifted down from the ceiling, and a few tiny pebbles came loose.
"See what I mean?" Sigrun said cheerfully. "Cave-ins."
"We haven't had a strong one in a couple of days, though," Finn added. "Lucky us."
Varric groaned. "Kid, don't jinx us."
Finn bristled. "Kid? I'm twenty five-"
Another low rumble, louder than the last, interrupted them. Everyone's eyes jumped to the distance ceiling; more dust filtered down as the rumble slowly faded away. Several seconds of uneasy silence passed as everyone stared at the ceiling in anxious expectation. Then, right as everyone seemed to relax, a deep resounding crack echoed throughout the air. Above them, the ceiling fractured as enormous chunks of rock ripped free.
"RUN!" Castielle bellowed. Everyone jerked out of their horrified entrancement and bolted forward. The clamoring of stone hitting stone and breaking again and again was deafening, serving to egg them on faster as dust filled the air.
A rock bounced and struck Delilah on the back of the leg. She stumbled, suddenly terrified that she was about to be buried deep underground where she would never again be found. A hand grasped hers and yanked her forward out of reach of the cave-in as the rubble finally, mercifully became still.