"Well, I'm so glad you could make it! Nema, I've missed you. I wish you'd told me you were on your way, I would have tried to have some cakes out, put on some tea, but as you can see we're a little put out at the moment."

Nema glared at her fellow mage, but said nothing. Donal Amell continued to casually flip through an old tome while children huddled in a corner and wept.

"I thought you said that you didn't expect trouble here," Faeron muttered. Nema ignored him.

The Tower of Magi was in shambles. Walls crumbling, windows shattered, beams splintered, books strewn about and amidst it all, Donal Amell stood propped against a wall with his thin, crooked nose and skin that had never seen daylight, so perfectly at home with his contempt. He smoothed a shock of orange hair back away from his eyes, wet his pointer finger on his tongue and went back to his reading.

Nema could kill him.

When the doors to the Apprentice Quarters burst open, erupting in a swarm of apprentices surrounding Wynne, Nema really wished Donal had been serious about the tea. Powerful magic surged out of Wynne's very essence as she made quick work of the demon on her heels. The old mage quickly erected a barrier across the door and then, wiping sweat from her brow, took a moment to catch her breath.

"What was that?" Frannie asked.

"Rage demon," Donal said, without even looking up from his book. "Nasty, ornery fellows."

"Wynne." Nema walked over to the old woman, her chin raised.

"Grey Warden or no, I will strike you down where I stand," Wynne said, back hunched over, her knuckles turning white around her staff.

"I'm not here to fight." Nema raised an eyebrow. "It's good to see you alive and able. We were told to expect the worst, which is why I brought with me the best-suited companions I had." She extended a hand to the group directly behind her. Of everyone that had followed them to Lake Calenhad, Morrigan, Alistair, Frannie and Faeron had specific skills that would increase their survivability in a tower filled with mages gone awry. Frannie offered Wynne a smile; Alistair waved.

Wynne's grip loosened around her staff, but she didn't set it aside. "I will accept that, for now," she said. "But what are you doing here, then?"

Nema bore her irritation plainly on her face, but she kept her hands passively at her sides. "Don't worry, the Right of Annulment hasn't arrived yet."

Wynne let her staff drop. "They sent for it, then?"

Donal's book hit the floor with a thud. Nema nodded.

"They abandoned us to our fate," Wynne murmured. "If they invoke the Right, we will not be able to stand against them."

"I do not see why we help these fool mages," Morrigan announced to no one in particular. Her pale eyes scanned the small crowd of frightened children and anxious and exhausted mages. "I say leave them to this fate that they'd so readily accept."

Donal's lips thinned. "Right. I'll remember that the next time I see you neck-deep in a bad way. Best leave you to your fate."

"Best leave me be, period," Morrigan replied. "It would be insulting if I required the aid of a gelding."

Frannie stepped forward. "Sounds like we've got some abominations to kill."

As Wynne dispelled her barrier, Donal bent over and collected his book from the floor. He dusted it off and scowled at the blood stain on the front cover before he walked over to one of the children cowering by one of the surviving mages. He put a knuckle under the young girl's chin to lift her face up and spoke a few kind words quietly and with a smirk. The child nodded and Donal tucked the book under her arm, wiped some tears and snot from her face with the hem of his robe and followed after Nema.

"Alright," he said. "I'm coming.

Nema didn't even grant him a glance. "No."

"Alright, then, first thing I think we..." Donal blinked a few times as his mind caught up. "Horse shit! I'm not staying in the Apprentice Quarters; too many crying children."

"Donal, dear, I would appreciate your help," Wynne said as she placed a hand on his shoulder. "Particularly away from the young ones who might be influenced by some of the phrases you choose to use."

His ears flushed pink. "Uh, right. Thanks, Wynne."

The Tower of Magi could be a dangerous place in the best of circumstances. There had been times when nose-deep in a book, a young Donal had wandered into an apprentice training session and had looked up just in time to lose his eyebrows. Despite the lack of sportsmanship that his fellow mages displayed with seeing who could distract Donal enough so they could collect on the bet of whether he'd get scorched, frozen or electrocuted by a careless apprentice, it was usually Donal himself that got disciplined. It didn't matter that he had exit wounds on the soles of his feet where the electricity had grounded or that his hair defied gravity, it was more that he thought it acceptable to call a senior enchanter an, "insolent devourer of whores" in front of a class of twelve-year-olds before he passed out from his injuries.

Donal didn't mind the constant punishment. He was usually tasked with tending to the massive library. Categorizing and alphabetizing the tomes, discarding old volumes when newer ones arrived, repairing the ones that were too valuable to lose. Rumor had it the First Enchanter was amused by the frivolous, trivial knowledge that Donal kept pouring into his brain. He put aside the literature on Tower law as soon as he realized in was perfectly acceptable and allowable for him to take on a lover, should any willing partner ever appear, in favor of writings about failed spellcraft, such as trying to establish a psychic link with cattle or a grizzly bear or writings about why it's assumed that Tevinter's prefer the color purple to yellow.

Now, with cracked and oozing sacs of flesh clinging to the walls of the Tower, it was hard for him to not get disgusted. He wondered if anyone would be able to erase these images of their home bastardized from their minds long enough to sleep at night. He stumbled over a leg-- rather, half a leg, in the hallway and bumped into Alistair. It would be a damn shame if the library's copy of the Qun was lost. The religious text was downright hysterical if one replaced the names of all the qunari gods with the word, "breasts."

"We are not here to sight-see." Nema glared at him. "Stop craning your neck."

"I came because I wanted to help," Donal said.

Nema shook her head. "You came because you were curious about who that corpse on the ground was."

"I am not curious." Donal's nostrils flared and he turned his head away from the body. "I know that's Amelia. Because I, you know, talk to people on occasion as opposed to some other holier-than-thou sorts."

Frannie interrupted them. "Is that a..?"

"Demon?" Morrigan said. "Yes."

Morrigan and Frannie fell back with their ranged attacks while Faeron and Alistair charged at it head on. The creature looked to be a thing of molten lava and hatred, but their shields pushed it back and it bled like any other living being. It left a smear of grizzle and scorched paneling on the wall that the men pummeled it into. Ice left Nema's fingertips and the demon fell to a barrage of arrows, bone and shield and winter.

"Back away from it," Donal said. "Trust me."

Alistair pulled Faeron away just as the demon's remains incinerated in a fiery explosion.

Donal shook his head. "Happens every time. How expensive were those carpets, again?"

"Is anyone hurt?" Wynne asked.

One by one, they all shook their heads. Nema was already pushing forward.

"So." Alistair slowed his normal pace to fall into step with Donal. "If it's not inappropriate for me to ask, how did you know that the dead mage back there was your friend Amelia? She was face down."

"Yes," Donal replied. "But she was arse up, you see."

Alistair's eyes widened slightly. "Ahh."

"Anyway, don't feel bad," Donal continued. "It wasn't like she was a friend. More like something to be admired from afar. Mostly because she told me to stay that far away."

In retrospect, maybe Donal or one of the other mages experienced with Fade demons should have pointed out the dangers. Then again, if they had, everyone else may have simply sat back and waited for the Right of Annulment to arrive. So they continued to hack and slash their way through the Tower of Magi with preposterous side chitchat like, "My! I never expected abominations to be so easy to kill!" Donal kept an internal tally of all the intricate latticework that was smashed, tapestries that were ruined or merely compromised and furniture in need or repair or replacing as they traveled up the many floors of the Tower.

All the while, demons continued to attack. And when they thought they were free of demons, then came the blood mages. Alistair seemed deeply perturbed by the possessed Templars, but Faeron and Nema struck down all of their attackers without hesitation. With the will to tune out such rabid emotions as desire and rage, they left themselves vulnerable to Sloth. Sloth didn't spring from floor tiles to rip them asunder or promise them their most treasured wants. The demon faced them with such boredom and apathy that as they all fell into a life-threatening slumber, first Faeron and then Alistair, all Donal could do was utter the word, "Shit," as he realized briefly that he was the last one standing.

Donal did not stand for long. He fell headlong to join his friends on the ground. He was asleep even before his face landed on Frannie's breast.