Purpose
The Shepherd Girl
The bruised sky looked like the bottom of a cup of Rivaini tea, mottled with the memory of the storms that had raged all night and into the morning. The weak sun woke onto muddy fields, streaked with lush green and dirty brown. A shepherd girl, barefoot and with a gap-toothed smile sang to her sheep, still huddled nervously together. A song that belonged to fresh, wet mornings.
The girl stood atop her favourite watching rock, still slippery and cast her sharp eyes across the village in the valley below. Yarrow and his pa were already at work, repairing the thatch of their roof. Giselle clutched a bawling babe to her hip while she crossed the courtyard of her crookedly built inn to check the stables.
All the usual sort of morning work that happened in villages like Warden's Rest across the Free Marches.
Here was something new though. The girl ignored the busy bleating of her charges as they began to range across the hilltop.
A rider. And not just any rider. The girl hissed an excited breath. Norrie (for that was her name) slid down her rock and, scattering sheep sprinted down the slope, feet churning mud and flinging grass behind her.
The Innkeeper
Giselle ran her callused hand over Pontus' snout. Giselle was proud of her calluses, of her rough hands. They were not the soft hands she had used to play the lyre as a child. Her bronzed face, leathered by long days in her vegetable garden, was not the same as that which had delighted visitors to her father's estate in the Dales, soft featured and so delicate. That little girl had been another casualty of the Game but Giselle didn't regret her life in the Free Marches, though she wished her parents could have met their grandson.
The big dray horse tossed his head and Giselle shushed him in Orlesian. The storm might have been worse and could have been better. That described the storm and Giselle's life both. Little Etienne had quieted himself and clutched her dirty finger with both chubby hands, his eyes huge and curious, the tantrum forgotten. Giselle would bribe Callum with a flask of wine to help her with the repairs to the roof. The leaks weren't new but they were worse. Giselle moved Etienne from one hip to the other and returned to the yard, eager to be out of the stench of horse and manure. Botts slipped through the narrow door in the gate, thin hands cradling two loaves of bread, straight from the baker.
"There's a rider on the road, Mistress," Botts squeaked. "He's a big'un."
The elf deposited her change, a few coins into Giselle's hand and hurried off to the kitchen. That dwarf shouldn't be up before midday, the way she was carrying on last night (almost louder than the storm) but Giselle had learned never to let her guests' whims surprise her.
In fact, Giselle worked hard never to be surprised at all. That was the oath she had made to the Maker, as she had fled her ancestral home in the deep of night.
So she was not shocked at the heavy knock at the gate, thinking the rider Botts had seen had arrived. She unlatched the gate, it swung open easily and Giselle came face to chest with a huge horse. She stepped aside and shifted her gaze to the rider.
And she was, admittedly, surprised.
The blacksmith
"What is it then?" Callum asked between huffs. He glanced ruefully down at his expanding belly and resolved, again to listen to his dear Gwen about how many nights he spent drinking ale at Giselle's.
"Looks dwarf-built, I reckon," Jon called back. "The storm washed half the hill away and the mayor's boy saw a somethin' pokin' through this morning."
"What was Marcus doing up this way?" Callum managed, doubled over now as the track grew steeper.
"Patrollin' for qunari," Jon laughed. The younger man turned, hands on his hips and grinned a grin that took up most of his face. "Thinks the ox-men are lookin' to invade the Free Marches again, like they did with Kirkwall years ago."
"They got enough problems up north, from what I heard," Callum replied. He was thankful for the brief respite as he joined Jon, who was looking thoughtful. "Invasion's not going so well as they hoped, thank the Maker."
"We're almost there," Jon slapped his hand on Callum's broad back.
"So why did Marcus tell you about this dwarf-thing?" Callum asked Jon, lurching forward again.
"He wants me to dig it out and see what's what," Jon laughed. "His pa is in Starkhaven, paying respects to the Prince and he took Landry and Annabelle with him (the only two in the village who know the right end of a spear), so Marcus thinks that means he's in charge."
"And you're still going to do what he tells you?" Callum raised his thick brows.
Jon winked. "But we'll be keepin' whatever treasure the dwarves left. Me and you."
"So you're one of them Lords of Fortune now?" Callum snorted.
"Look at that," Jon grinned and Callum wiped the sweat from his brow and whistled himself.
"That's a wonder, alright," the blacksmith breathed.
Half the hill had indeed slid away, easy as cutting through one of those fancy Orlesian cakes Giselle would bake for Wintersend. And what was once beneath, hidden for an age was a stone pillar, tall as Starkhaven's great walls, black as midnight even with the sun's weak light falling on it.
"Is that a-"
"A statue!" Jon exclaimed. Half of a huge, bearded face, stone eyes glowering, like a giant breaking through the churned earth. Except it was bigger than that giant Callum had seen once, loping along the ridge line to the south. The statue was so large Callum could have stood on the bridge of its nose and not reached its heavy brow.
Jon clutched Callum's arm. "See that, between the statue and the pillar? That's a hole. Think what might be down there! Ancient dwarven armour, swords, gold and silver!"
"Or those blight monsters from the Chant," Callum murmured.
Jon groaned impatiently. "If them darkspawn were hiding in there, they'd have come out already. Look, there's not a sign of anything. Let's get down there, think how happy Gwen will be when you bring her home a diamond big as her head."
"Could use a diamond or two." Callum allowed himself a small smile. "You sure you haven't seen any darkspawn?"
"Not a hint of one. And Marcus didn't either. Let's get down there quick before that dwarf stayin' at Giselle's hear about it."
"Alright, quick and smart then." Callum took a recovering breath and followed Jon down the slope.
The Innkeeper
"'Big'un', you said, Botts," Giselle scolded. "You didn't say it was a bloody qunari!"
"He had a hood on!" Botts protested.
"It's eight feet tall," Giselle retorted. "It was either a qunari or an ogre."
They watched the huge oxman hunched over the table, tearing pieces off a loaf of bread. His face looked like someone had chiselled it from stone, hard angles. And those horns! Curved up and back from his head, chipped and marked with engravings in the qunari tongue. One pointed ear was notched and thick tattoos were traced across his swollen arms, competing for space with a jagged scar that snaked along his shoulder. He wore a sword that Giselle wouldn't have been able to lift on his belt.
"Fine time for the mayor to ride to Starkhaven," Giselle murmured.
"It's big as that old Warden statue in the square," Norrie whispered. The girl was eating one of Giselle's apples, manoeuvring around her two missing front teeth. The dwarf too was casting dubious glances through the smoky room, at the seemingly oblivious qunari.
"I'm gonna go and say hello," Norrie said, standing taller herself.
"Your mother would kill me if I let you get eaten by an oxman." Giselle pulled the girl back by the scruff of her tunic.
"He's not gonna eat me!" Norrie protested but the rest of her defence was lost as the door burst open and Callum stumbled through, with his apprentice Jon draped over him. Even by the dull light of the few lanterns (Giselle was notoriously stingy) the blood was bright and red and a lot over both of them.
"HELP!" Callum croaked.
"Andraste preserve us," Giselle whispered, hurrying forward as Etienne jerked awake in her arm and started shrieking.
"What happened?" Giselle demanded as Callum lowered Jon into a chair. The boy was ash-white, with a long, thick arrow shaft punching through his belly.
"Maker!" Botts clapped a hand to her mouth.
"Darkspawn got him!" Callum sank to the brushed dirt floor. "They're comin'."
Giselle handed Norrie her baby and the girl, well-used to her own sisters, shushed the screaming infant and moved away, her wide eyes staring at Jon's wound.
The dwarf had bustled over. She bore thick black lines across the bridge of her nose in a simple design. "What did he say about darkspawn?" She demanded, putting her mug down on the table and, perhaps not realising it, clutching the haft of the axe that was looped through her belt.
"Giselle, can you help him?" Callum pleaded, Jon's dried blood wiped across his face and neck. Giselle stared at the blacksmith helplessly. "I don't . . . I don't know anything about wounds. I'm sorry, Callum."
"He will need this," a deep voice said suddenly. The qunari tipped the dwarf's drink into Jon's mouth. The boy spluttered. "He will need more." The qunari lifted Jon up with one hand. The boy whimpered. "The arrow has pushed through." He lowered Jon back onto the chair. He looked at Giselle and there was not a flicker of emotion on that stone-carved face. "Can you sew?"
"Oui, yes, yes," Giselle stuttered.
"You will need to stitch the wound closed once the arrow is out."
"Don't let it touch me," Jon tried to push himself off the chair but cried out and fell back.
The qunari ignored his words, grabbed the arrow shaft and snapped the black wood easily between his thumb and forefinger. Jon screamed and Callum leaped forward and grasped the boy's hand in his own.
"Now, I must pull the arrow through," the qunari said. "It will be very painful."
Giselle poured a cup of wine and passed it over to Callum with shaking hands. He forced it down Jon's throat, and the wine mingled with the blood as more red splashed down his neck and chest.
Giselle looked away as Jon screamed again. Botts had her eyes squeezed shut.
"It is done." The qunari tossed the arrow onto the floor. Giselle hadn't realised but Jon had fainted. His head lolled on his shoulders.
"You must close the wounds," the qunari said. Giselle stumbled to her feet and hurried upstairs.
The Carta smuggler
"Alright, fine, he'll live," Kalli said impatiently. "Thank your Maker and all that. Now where did you see darkspawn?"
"A piece of the old mountain on the road to Starkhaven fell away in the storm. There were dwarven ruins and a tunnel. We thought we could-"
"Loot the memories of my people," Kalli growled, hand still resting on the haft of her axe.
Callum looked away. "There were darkspawn inside, hiding. So many. The noises . . ." He shuddered.
Kalli flicked scattered a few coins across the table. "Thanks for your hospitality, I'll be on my way." She charged up the stairs to her simple room and pulled her coat on. She retrieved her bag, hidden behind the small bed and carefully slipped her strong arms through the straps.
"That is gaatlock," a familiar voice said from the door. Kalli cursed silently and turned around, conjuring a perplexed look.
"What are you talking about, qunari?"
"I am not qunari." The ox man stepped into the room, lowering his head and coming through sideways to fit. "I am tal-vashoth. I have abandoned the Qun, like so many."
"Whatever you are, get out of my way," Kalli said and unslung her axe from her belt. She had a dagger in her other hand quick as a flash.
"You have gaatlock in your bag. I can smell the powder on you," the qunari- the tal-vashoth said. "We must collapse the entrance to the tunnel. Gaatlock will serve."
"Whatever is in this bag, is mine," Kalli hissed. "And worth a lot of coin. Coin I need."
"Your selfishness is a response to your circumstances. I understand this." The tal-vashoth stood with his arms behind his back but Kalli had spent a lifetime around those who knew violence and this one could have killed her already. She noticed too the huge sword, tall as Kalli herself sheathed at his belt.
"The dwarf waiting for me won't accept a tale of heroics as recompense for missing coin," Kalli said, desperate now.
"You are bound to your trade," the oxman said. "I understand that too. Know this, you cannot outrun the darkspawn. They will already be marching on this village. You must go through me to escape and, even should you win, most unlikely, you will be too injured to flee before these creatures arrive. Your only choice is to give the gaatlock to me. Now."
"Why do you care whether these humans live or die?" Kalli snarled. "They hate you."
"Perhaps," the tal-vashoth said without emotion. "But if I return their hate with hate, then I am but a mirror. And I would be more than that."
Kalli slid her pack off. "Take it then. And when you die, I will take it back."
"Acceptable," the tal-vashoth said.
The Blacksmith
Callum clutched his hammer in his hand and struggled to match the qunari's huge strides.
"I'm . . . uh Callum," he huffed. The qunari turned his horned head.
"I no longer have a name," he said in his deep voice.
"Oh, I'm sorry," Callum said, rather lamely. "Thanks for helping us," he added. The qunari did not reply. He had the sack slung over his shoulder.
The qunari had announced he would use . . . something, Callum didn't understand the word, to collapse the tunnel entrance. Sounded a lot like magic, though apparently the qunari didn't go in for mages.
Callum had stupidly volunteered to go with the oxman, feeling useless with Giselle patching Jon up and the dwarf already on her way out. The qunari had, rather unkindly welcomed Callum's help and he had grabbed the only thing he had any skill with; his hammer.
Giselle had tasked Botts with sharing the news with the villagers and Norrie out to the farms to round everyone else up. They would fortify the inn and send a rider to Starkhaven. If the qunari and Callum didn't manage to collapse the tunnel, if the darkspawn were already spreading over the hills like a plague, then hopefully Warden's Rest could hold out in the inn until the Prince sent aid.
That was a fool's hope, though Callum wouldn't have said it, and nobody else seemed keen too either. They had all pretended it was a fine plan.
"Uh, why are you helping us?" Callum asked. "Not that I'm not thankful! Maker Himself must have sent you but . . . why?"
The qunari was silent as they continued on, so the only sound were Callum's gasping breaths and the dull knocks of the qunari's armour.
"You are a blacksmith," the qunari said finally. "That is your purpose. I was Karasten. That was my purpose. But the Aantam betrayed the Qun. So I betrayed the Aantam. Now, I have no purpose."
"What's a karasten?" Callum asked.
"You would say a leader of soldiers."
"Well, you're leading me, so you're still a leader but I'm no soldier," Callum chuckled.
The qunari looked at him with those deep-set, black eyes until Callum looked away.
"A soldier fights for those who cannot. You are a soldier."
Callum hefted his hammer with a sheepish grin. "It's not far now."
The qunari grasped Callum by his shoulder and pulled him down as an arrow sliced through the air above his head.
Callum saw them. Loping across the hill, cackling and snarling wordlessly. Dozens of them. Grey skin oozing with bloody sores and cuts, lips drawn back from snarling, mismatched teeth, eyes wide with a mad rage.
His heart felt like it would break his chest. Think of your family, man. Courage for them, by the Maker. Courage.
"Andraste save us," Callum whispered. The qunari shrugged the bag off and pressed it into Callum's lap.
"Do you have flint?"
"Yes, yes, I do," Callum stammered. "They're getting close." Another arrow fell short and the stunted darkspawn shrieked, in frustration perhaps.
"I will draw them away," the qunari said, calm as though he were planning a shortcut through Fatty Lefson's field. "You must collapse the entrance. That is a scouting party. There will be more soon."
"How do I-"
"Light the bag here, at the cord. It will only be a moment before the fire reaches the powder. You must be away before it does. At the entrance. Under the column you spoke of."
The qunari rose and drew his great sword. He dodged another arrow and it sank into the ground behind him.
"Go now."
Callum ran.
Karasten
He gripped his sword with both hands, relishing the weight of it. The darkspawn were the seed of true chaos, so the Arashok had always said. There was no strategy to their attack. No intelligence. No order. Their entire being was suffering. And Karasten would end it.
He stepped under the first wild swing and cut through the darkspawn who had delivered it. Sure-footed, Karasten parried the next blow, grasped the creature by its throat and crushed, bones breaking under his hand. A darkspawn arm splintered under the pommel of his blade, its companion was run through as Karasten stepped around its spear. Blood sprayed the wet grass in a storm.
Karasten felt a blade notch against his armour. He struck out with his fist and the darkspawn fell. He crushed its head under his boot as his blood trickled down his leg.
Karasten felt the anger pulsing under his skin. He forced calm. Cut through a darkspawn, from shoulder to belly and the twitching creature died. They fled from him now. Afraid. Loping back towards their tunnels, where they felt safe in the darkness.
No. Karasten rolled along the wet ground as a torrent of blistering magic burned through the air above. He readied his sword.
An emissary. He remembered the Arishok's words. He had fought such creatures in the far south, in a land of dogs and witches. The creature stood taller than its fellows. Clawed hands crafting obscene magic.
Karasten stood. He gripped his sword. The darkspawn grinned through blood-stained teeth.
The Blacksmith
Callum had run until he thought he might die, as the darkspawn shrieked the last of their rage against the qunari. He scrambled once more up the slope, digging into the wet soil with his hands, pulling himself up, grunting and gasping desperate prayers to Andraste, to the Maker, to Shartan, to Andraste's loyal dog, whoever might help.
Callum grasped at the deep engravings on a cracked tablet and hoisted himself up beside it. Clutching a jagged stitch in his side, Callum found his feet. The entrance to the cave lay just beyond, in the shadow of the pillar. Seeming darker now, deeper. The huge statue of the dwarf glared impotently from its mountain prison.
Callum stumbled forward, shrugging the pack from his shoulder. He fell to his knees at the base of the pillar, ruffling in his coin pouch for the flint. Staring into the shadows, he fumbled for the flint with sightless fingers.
A faint screech echoed from within the tunnel.
"Maker's mercy," Callum whispered. He dropped the flint and whimpered. He could hear scuffling now against stone. Clawed feet slapping against wet rock.
"No, no, no." Callum snatched the flint up and struck it at the base of the pillar.
A wet roar. Closer. On him.
Callum grabbed for his hammer.
"Light it." The qunari stood over him. Caked in blood and gore. "Do not wait." The qunari's glare was so intense that Callum almost recoiled. "Do. Not. Wait." A darkspawn leapt from the darkness with a crazed snarl and the qunari cut through it with one stroke.
The qunari raised his sword. "ANAAN ESAAM QUN!" He roared and plunged into the darkness.
Callum struck the light, the flame curled around the string, caught and held. Callum spared a last glance for the qunari, lost to the shadows and ran.
The Innkeeper
"C'est magnifique, Callum," Giselle said and grasped the blacksmith's arm.
They stood in the square with the rest of the village. Gathered around the bronze statue.
Callum smiled thoughtfully. "I don't think I have captured his eyes. They were harder. Stronger."
"It's finer than the statues outside the temple in Starkhaven," Jon said, leaning on Callum's wife, Gwyn.
Norrie led the village children through the crowd, each carrying a candle. They gathered at the base of the statue. The bronze Karasten stood, tall as he had in life, sword raised, face set, as the children placed their candles around his boots. He was bathed suddenly in a soft glow. The villagers, gathered around stared up at the qunari most had never met, had never seen, even as they owed him their lives. Callum accepted the whispered appreciations graciously, and the apologies from Landry and Anabelle, who still blamed themselves that they were not there to defend the village.
"A worthy tribute," Gwyn said to her husband, smiling.
"I didn't know you could work bronze like this," Jon said, one hand cradling the bandages wrapped around his belly.
"I didn't either," Callum admitted. "But if anyone was going to do something for him, I wanted it to be me." He smiled at them. "I'm a blacksmith, it's my purpose."