The night wrapped itself like a blanket over Clarissa, obscuring her entirely.
It had taken her two days to trek back across the Vimmark Mountains and into the borders of Wildervale. Fatigue weighed on her, slowing her breathing, sapping her strength. She had gone two days without sleep or pause.
And now, both a chill of fear and a shiver of excitement raced through her as she beheld the distant lights of a tall, wide structure, towering over the lake she was skirting along.
Falconsreach Hold.
From what she had gathered from the villagers living in the vicinity, the Grey Wardens' headquarters in the Free Marches was less than welcoming. The paths leading to the Hold were regularly patrolled by Wardens, and the more curious villagers were politely but sternly denied passage. From all accounts, the Hold was nigh on a complete mystery, and from that mystery spouted tales so varied and imaginative that Clarissa had the hardest time separating fact from fiction. But on many accounts, an unsettling phenomena keep surfacing, time and time again. She still remembered an instance of it vividly, told by a nervous, twitchy youth.
"My older cousin sneaked past the patrols last summer, saying he wanted to get a closer look at the Hold. He never came back."
And on the nights when the budding youth of Wildervale vanished near the fort, one thing was unanimous.
On those nights, the air seemed to thrum with debaucherous laughter.
But Clarissa wasn't about to let tall tales and myths stop her. She was in there. She could feel it. The connection between them was too powerful, wrought too deeply for her to ignore. She was there, within her reach.
Clarissa breathed in deeply and kept up her pace, the moonlight her only guide as she jogged along the lakeside path. She could not, and would not, stop. She had only to sneak in under the cover of darkness, and sneak back out with Bethany. The Wardens wouldn't even need to be alarmed if Clarissa could help it. The night air was crisp, the cloudless sky was showered with stars, and
"Halt!" A feminine voice, soft but daunting, declared. Clarissa whirled around, attempting to scan the ridge to her left
Damn it.
She drew her blade with a flourish, casting her eyes into the surrounding darkness. Stealth was no longer an option. She let magic flow into her sword, causing the edges of flared gold to gleam with pristine brilliance, a magical werelight that gave the encroaching darkness somewhat of a pause.
Faintly, she heard the tightening of a bowstring, high and to her left. She whirled round, sword up, ready to block the first of many arrows she had been sure was coming.
The moonlight hit her face just as she set eyes upon her assailant.
A tall figure, long and lean, wreathed in pale moonlight. Tapered fingers wrapped securely around a recurved bow of exotic make, drawing it taut with a languid grace that spoke of impeccable accuracy. Razor-sharp eyes running Clarissa through with sheer intensity alone, gleaming with a feral cunning that, in spite of Clarissa's indomitable determination, gave her pause.
And in that pause, Clarissa saw two things that made her falter even more.
As she assessed her opponent, who had the advantage of height and the element of surprise, she noticed the ink-black cloak wrapped around her, held in place with a knot around her neck. A similarly coloured hood obscured the area above her temples, leaving only her eyes, staring directly into the spot between Clarissa's eyes. Though she did not doubt the drive the archer possessed, there was something else in her eyes.
Then she saw it.
Blood-red eyes.
A Grey Warden with red eyes.
She saw similar revelations imposed upon the archer's frowning face.
"Hawke." The archer said simply, her tug on the bowstring as taut as ever. She didn't seem surprised that she was here.
"Katja?" Clarissa answered, not letting her guard down. Patrols were run in pairs, sometimes even groups. Wherever the hooded assassin had come from, there was bound to be at least one other Grey Warden.
Katja, for her part, merely eyed her down the length of the nocked arrow. "I was wondering when you'd arrive." She said. There was no contempt in her voice, not even a bit of anger. Clarissa found that puzzling.
"Then you know what I am here for."
"Yes," Katja's gaze wavered somewhat, flashing back towards the Hold in the distance. "your sister."
"Let me pass, then. I have no quarrel with the Grey Wardens. Let me take my sister back peacefully, and we can be spared bloodshed." Clarissa said.
"The Wardens will not take kindly to that, Hawke. You know that. The Joining is not a cure, but a commitment. Or so they say." Katja spoke softly, a tinge of pity colouring her words. Again, Clarissa was perplexed as to the compassion thinly veiled within her soft-spoken voice. If it was a ploy to get her to lower her guard, then it had worked.
"They do not need to know of what I intend to do, not if you hold your tongue and leave me be." She decided to press further. "Please, I just want my sister back."
"And how far would you be willing to go to get her back?" Katja asked, her eyes flickering ever so slightly when she saw the fire in Clarissa's eyes burn all the brighter.
"Anywhere. And I'll cut down whoever gets in my way." It was a thinly disguised threat, but Clarissa didn't care. She meant every word.
"I'm glad we're on the same page, then." Katja said.
No sooner did the last word leave her lips did the arrow, poised and quivering, flew forth.
A black streak, darker than the night enveloping it, left the trembling embrace of its bow and arced towards Clarissa, tugged ever so slightly downwards as it sliced the very air apart and moved with a wind of its own.
Clarissa, unprepared and confused, could only watch as the arrow became larger and larger, wider and wider as it closed the distance between them with a speed that was nigh on inhuman. Every joint in her bones locked; Every muscle in her body froze. It was so fast, or was it her that was too slow?
She squeezed her eyes shut when the arrow darted past her guard, evading her clumsy sword arm with ease.
Move! She screamed.
I can't! She screamed back.
She waited for it, for the moment the arrow would pierce her skin, dig into that spot she knew Katja had aimed for – right between the eyes. It was a clear shot, with no wind whatsoever. She couldn't have missed.
And yet, as the passage of time slowed to a trickle for her, she felt the telltale whisper of wind tickling her left ear, leaving behind a shallow whistle as something grazed her cheek with its wake.
Shortly after, she heard the dull thud of an arrow piercing flesh and embedding itself in bone. Curiously enough, she felt no pain. Had it been so quick that it outran her very senses?
Then she heard a faint hiss, a whimper of askance, sounding off behind her. The air behind her shifted slightly, as if something that had once occupied the space behind her had fallen to the ground, punctuating itself with the dull sound of leather impacting dirt.
Clarissa turned round slowly, tearing her gaze from the Warden perched high above the ridge with great difficulty. She thought she saw her smiling.
A man was behind her, wide eyes staring disbelievingly into the distance. He was on his knees, and small shudders racked his frame in short, unsteady intervals. As his slackening grip weakened further, a dagger fell from his right hand, perilously close to Clarissa. A particularly taxing heave tore from his chest, and intricate carvings etched onto the breast of his leather armor came into view, the half-buried shaft entirely out of place at the center of the elaborate symbol.
Twin griffons.
Clarissa's eyes furrowed. Why would Katja shoot one of her own? Had she, for some inexplicable reason, missed?
A second twang of the bowstring and the sudden appearance of another black shaft between the Warden's eyes told her otherwise. She watched, eerily transfixed as the Warden let his last breath escape, falling face forward onto the unseemly gravel.
A soft chuckle behind Clarissa jolted her with the force of an electric shock.
"That should complicate things." Katja remarked simply as Clarissa whirled round, backpedaling frantically and lifting her sword to eye level. She watched the dark-clad Grey Warden with unblinking eyes as Katja lifted her head from the tip of the sword on her throat, making no move but sigh with undisguised annoyance.
"He would've killed you, you know, had I not stopped him. I'd hoped it would count as a gesture of good faith on my part." Katja said, returning Clarissa's wary stare with equal parts of haughtiness and placidity. Where most women, or men for that matter, would at the least acknowledge the threat against their lives, Katja was unusually... resilient. Part of Clarissa admired her for it, but she pushed that part of her away as she assessed her unusual ally, if she could call a person with such fickle loyalty a friend.
"One gesture is not enough to explain your display of loyalty. Explain yourself, before I drive my blade through your neck." Clarissa snapped. She heard footsteps coming from where she had come.
Good. They're catching up.
"I never quite liked poor Valence. The fool liked to think he was the better shot."
"And you would take his life out of contest? To prove a point?"
"Not at all. You should've seen the way he looks at me. I don't like it when people look at me." Katja said, a hint of amusement in her voice. A small part of Clarissa looked the dark-skinned assassin over. With her lean figure, slanted, catlike face and intense blood-red eyes, Katja did warrant looking at.
"You would murder a fellow Grey Warden for that?"
"It was him or you. I chose you. Besides," Katja stole another glance at the fort, "while I share the Taint with these sorry excuses for Grey Wardens, it does not mean I approve of everything they say or do. The same blood may run in our veins, but my mind and my bow are my own, and them I shall give to who I see fit." Her tone was indignant, voice charged with a conviction that would've swayed any lesser person.
Clarissa paused at that, Katja's every word changing her perspective on her. The woman, without a doubt, was strong both physically and mentally. Her bravery had more than been exemplified at swordpoint, and Clarissa would hate to be at the receiving end of the woman's arrows, finding one instance to be quite enough. At the very least, they shared a common enemy, if her words were to be trusted.
You still need a way in.
What she had been thinking was betrayed by her appraising eyes, for Katja's lips lifted in a display of belated amusement.
"I see you've put two and two together and decided you still need that incognito passage into the Hold." She said, teasing and seemingly unaware of the tip still lingering inches away from her exposed throat.
That made Clarissa smile, despite herself. A split second later, she recomposed herself, but allowed her sword arm the relief of lowering itself.
"How do I know this is not some trap set by your Warden Commander to lure me in?" Clarissa asked, half-expecting her question to be contended with ease.
"You don't. But what you also do not know is that our dear Warden Commander cares little for traps and trickery. If he knew you were coming, he would have brought along his private army of obedient Wardens and waited for you at the mountain pass."
"And why does he not know of me?"
"Because I was the one responsible for reporting what had transpired in the Vimmarks and, seeing Aloysius's apparent interest in our 'guest', I kept it brief." Katja said.
Alarm surged through Clarissa once more at her mentioning.
"Where is she?" She asked.
"I do not know. I was assigned patrol duty for almost every day of the week. After we brought your sister into the fort, I left to join up with Valance here." She gestured at the limp body, staring for a moment at the corpse's head, propped slightly above ground by the arrow embedded securely in its center. "And he thought it was a Maker-given gift to run patrol duty with me."
She was caught off guard, then, when Clarissa drove her against the solid stone of the ridge, her steel bracer held against her neck with such force that it drove the air out of her lungs.
"You'll have to do better than that, Katja. I need a way in." Clarissa growled into the trapped archer's surprised features, eyes boring into her with equal parts of menace and desperation.
"Now."
"You could've just asked." Katja breathed, getting cut off once more as Clarissa pressed against her. Behind her, Clarissa heard a low, gruff voice loosing pant after pant and another voice, equally exhausted, shushing it.
"I'll tell you right now – There are no secret passages into Falconsreach Hold. No servants' entrance, no sewers, no nothing. The only way in is me." Katja regained her composure, glaring into Clarissa with barely-contained anger.
"And how do you propose you do that?" Clarissa asked. She was grasping at straws, but she had no choice. She was committed.
"It'll be easy." Katja half-mocked, half-assured her, "We go in the front door." Behind the simple sentence lay a challenge, and it was one Clarissa couldn't ignore.
Her right hand tightened round the hilt of her sword, and she released Katja from the ridge's crushing embrace. Despite herself, she felt a smile, born from bloodlust and fury, touch her lips.
Behind her, an out-of-breath voice chimed in.
"Uh, what did we miss?" Isabela asked, half-bent with with her hands on her knees. Varric, for his part, sagged against a conveniently-placed tree.
Striding over, Clarissa nudged Varric with her boot and helped Isabela up.
"It dawns in five candlemarks. Are you coming or not?" Katja stood a ways away from the party, starting ahead without a backward glance.
Hold on, Bethany. We're coming.
Isabela ended up carrying Varric with frequent curses and consistent muttering, but regardless, they had made good time.
Shrouded in darkness, yet alight with a determinate fire, Clarissa began her siege of Falconsreach Hold.
/Must... resist... urge... to start... Mass Effect 3 fanfic...
On a more serious note, Bioware has, in my opinion, outdone itself once again. Mass Effect 3 is arguably the best game I've ever played. And Traynor. 0.0
I'm sorry if this chapter is shorter than normal. But then again, there isn't exactly a norm for chapter length, now is there? I guess I'm home free then.
Spike: What does it look like now, hmm?
Night: I didn't want to keep you (guys) (and girls) waiting, so it's a bit short. But I liked it. Since when did I not like it... =P
Artman: And it shall be a fight well fought. That, I can guarantee.
And to all of you out there, wandering amongst the stars: Go Take Earth Back. It's worth every penny. (Bonus points for selfless advertisement?)/