The illegal lyrium trade was familiar to Ten, many of her associates back in Denerim having been on the outskirts of the syndicate that ran it between an illegal mine outside Kal'Hirol in the environs of Amaranthine, and the templars who'd rob charity boxes and ecclesiastical dignitaries alike to keep themselves dosed up with it. She neither approved nor disapproved, for, really, it did not concern her. After all, elves did not serve in any capacity in the Chantry beyond sweeping up after the nuns, let alone being handed a sword and instructed on the finer points of anti-mage combat. It really only got to be a problem when a templar forswore his vows and left the Chantry - or was thrown out. When that happened… well, all the filth of the country rolled downhill to Denerim eventually, and all the filth of Denerim rolled down to the Alienage eventually. Before Ten had assumed control of the place, it had been for many people, both elf and human, the last stop before an ignominious death in the gutter. Ten, ever the pragmatist, had brokered a deal with the Captain, who ran a small, totally legitimate - yes, sir, on the up and up, nothing to see here - merchant fleet. A defrocked, strung-out, templar who passed out in the Alienage, more often than not, would find himself aboard one such vessel where he couldn't get his hands on the stuff even if he'd wanted to.
That said, the fact that it was such a lucrative trade meant Ten had never really seen too much of the stuff before her little jaunt to the Circle Tower. It really just looked like a pretty blue powder, iridescent in the sunlight, glowing slightly in the dark. She thought the amount she had gotten off the black marketeer in Dusttown, who'd instructed her that it could be detonated in liquid or semisolid form, but to be careful if you got it semi-solid as that meant that the concentrate was higher, was a lot. But then, Branka dragged a sack nearly as tall as she was out of a pile in the corner of a room, and then took a large scoop and dumped a pile of effluorescent blue onto a flat rock she expected Ten to use as a workbench. Ten could only think of how many crooks that quantity would have kept in business. Alistair refused to be in the same room while she was working during the day, no doubt only having seen the stuff in the context of what it had done to his former brethren, and made her wash her hands twice, while he watched, before he'd let her near him at night. Morrigan similarly avoided it, probably worried about accidentally getting flung right into the Fade if she got too much in her. And so Ten was left there, with a pile of very expensive dust and one of Oghren's spare jugs of whiskey, trying to get it into a form that would do what they needed it to do.
This also allowed her to watch Branka in action with a mix of awe and fear. The woman worked with a singular focus, her whole body moving in separate directions yet somehow in perfect sync. One foot pumped the bellows, heating crucibles of separate ores to the precise temperature she needed, one set of tongs moving them to various parts of the fire depending on that temperature, the other set in her other hands, combining them in the desired alloy. Ten had watched her uncle work his forge from when she'd been old enough that he didn't immediately chase her out, afraid she'd touch something hot. Nobody could accuse Cedrin of being an amateur. He knew what he was doing. He was a competent farrier and toolmaker. But watching Branka work, Ten understood why dwarven smiths were such a highly-regarded part of society.
On the third day, she got the proportions right, getting it to the consistency of clay. Branka had gone to take a nap in another cavern, so she figured it was as good a time as any to test it. She rolled some into a ball the size of a marble. She put it in the corner of the lab, walked to the other side, and threw a lit match at it.
The ensuing report summoned everyone else to the lab, where they found Ten, a little dazed, wrapping her head around what she'd just done.
"I think I've got it," she said. She shook her head, "Wait…"
"Do you? You're bleeding out your ears," Morrigan exclaimed.
"What?!"
"Your ears. You're bleeding."
"What?"
Morrigan motioned wildly to her own ears.
"What?" Ten said. She reached up, feeling the trickle, "Oh. Shit."
"You are wearing me out," Morrigan scolded, exaggerating her pronunciation so Ten could read her lips. She licked the tip of her finger, stuck it in the pile of lyrium dust Ten had been working with, and put it in her mouth. Then she put both hands over Ten's ears, and put the damage back together. Ten shook her head vigorously as her balance readjusted.
"Well, let's be sure to all be far away when we detonate the big one," Ten said.
"The big one? You busted your own eardrums over it, and that wasn't the big one?" Alistair exclaimed. Without giving Ten a chance to respond, he muttered something that started with 'you have got to be fucking kidding me' and stalked back out of the room before he could be mistaken for endorsing the insanity.
It took four more days for Ten and Branka to assemble what they were referring to, affectionately as Fat Nug. Ten managed to put together a sphere of the lyrium clay the size of a cantaloupe, and Branka studded it with sharp bits of shardsteel. Wearing chain gloves and a pair of earmuffs of her own design, the dwarf carried it into the main room, where the other three were playing cards, and held it high so everyone could admire the glistening surface.
"Well thank the Maker, this nonsense is close to ending," Alistair sighed.
"Until they find something else to work on," Oghren said resentfully.
"All right, kids, hang on to your holes!" Branka shouted, and disappeared back down the corridor towards the door she had dared not cross. Ten peeked out from the end of the hall, not wanting to get too close, and watched as Branka opened the door to the room with the golem sentries. Slowly, carefully, she rolled the sparkling sphere across the floor. It was apparently heavy enough to alert the golems. The four of them moved stiffly into the middle of the room as though they were all contemplating the strange object, though Ten did not see anything that resembled eyes on them. Morrigan, standing at the ready, shot a spout of flame into the room right as Branka slammed the door closed and jumped free of the threshold. Ten wasn't sure what Branka heard, but as she and Morrigan scurried back into the first cavern, there was not so much of a sound as there was a feeling, the cavern rumbling beneath and around them. Ten wrapped one arm against a stalagmite and used the other to reassure Pigeon, who was incredibly unamused with the entire thing.
"If we're about to be buried alive, it has been a privilege knowing you, gentlemen," Alistair said.
"Oghren what are you doing?" Ten asked. Oghren had braced his back against a boulder and had one in the air, but she could not see why through the violent shaking.
"When they find our corpses I want them to see that I died flipping you off," Oghren said.
After the loud part was over, the three women crowded in front of the door, peeking through. The whole place was black with dust, but when Branka stepped a toe over the threshold, nothing happened. There were no sounds of shifting stone, no ominous footsteps, nothing.
"Maker's breath, we did it!" Ten exclaimed, rather surprised.
"Finally!" Branka cried. She went and started rummaging through a sack.
"Wait for the dust to settle, will you?" Morrigan scolded, "Can't be good for the health, breathing it in."
"I've been waiting two sodding years!" Branka protested, but she rummaged in a sack, produced a broad scarf of dubious cleanliness and tied it over her mouth and nose before taking off. Ten and Morrigan looked at each other, and seemed to agree that this may be a bridge too far. They walked back to the rest of their companions, who had poured whiskey out into tin cups - including, to Ten's surprise - Sten, whose enormous hands were shaking as he took a sip.
"Sten, I didn't know you drank," Ten exclaimed.
"I do not care for the feeling of the earth shaking," Sten said, "I feel... untethered. This is grounding me."
"So, what do you think the odds are she actually lets us out?" Alistair asked.
"Doesn't matter. I found the release for the door," Ten said.
"What?!"
"I found the release for the door. She fell asleep under a table the other day while we were working and I snooped. It's at the back of her forge. Worst case scenario we sneak out while she's fucking around with the anvil, or whatever it is that's back there."
"Why didn't you say something earlier?!" Oghren demanded.
"I kind of want to see what the big fuss is about," Ten shrugged, "And did you really want to do another week of traps?"
"You think we can just, what, go around?" Alistair asked.
"Best case scenario. I mean it's entirely plausible we just start going up and we'll pop out of a cave somewhere in the Coastlands," Ten pointed out.
"So she's completely batshit crazy, right?" Morrigan said after looking behind her for several minutes, finally satisfied Branka was out of earshot, "We're all on the same page there?"
"Crazier than a shithouse rat. Keeping that level of intensity up for a week was fucking exhausting," Ten said, rubbing her scalp with both hands, "I think our only way of getting her back to Orzammar is bonking her on the head and carrying her. That only works if we find a non-trapped way out."
"Oh good, I was getting worried about you," Morrigan said, "Well, I'm sure I can restrain her, if I get the drop on her."
"And once she's still, I can keep her sedated. Sten, this will fall mostly to you. How do you feel about it?"
"I have carried stranger burdens."
"All right," Ten said, "Sounds like a plan."
"Wait, wait, wait," Oghren said, "We are not going to sedate my wife and carry her back by force."
"I hate to say it, mate, but they've got a point," Alistair said. He mostly looked relieved that Ten had not, in fact, fully signed on to Branka's insanity.
"What do you suggest then?" Ten asked, "She clearly can't be reasoned with."
"You spent fourteen hours a day in there with her, and you didn't try?" Oghren asked.
"Of course, I tried. The only thing she'll talk about is the anvil," Ten said.
"Well maybe if she sees it, she'll be so excited to share the good news she comes back voluntarily!" Oghren exclaimed.
"And when everyone finds out what she did to get there?" Morrigan asked, "I mean, I find it entirely understandable, but from my limited foray into the rules of civilization, sacrificing your own people to darkspawn seems to be frowned upon."
"It doesn't matter, she's a paragon. She can do no wrong in Orzammar's eyes," Oghren said furtively, "Don't you see? All she needs is to accomplish what she came here for, and she'll come back. That's always been what she needs."
"Oghren, I feel like you were singing a different tune not all that long ago," Ten said, "What'd you say? You might need to 'deal with' the woman she's become out of respect for the woman she was?"
"That's when I thought I was going to be greeted with a hammer to the head," Oghren said.
"I feel like that's not out of the question yet," Alistair observed.
"So… do we go after her or just hope she comes back?" Morrigan asked, "Looks like the dust's mostly settled."
"Well," Oghren said, "I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little curious about what's behind there."
"I didn't spend that long playing with explosives to not at least lay eyes on it," Ten said, "And I'm pretty sure the two of you have been so annoying for the last few days because you've been bored. Come on, there might be something to hit with a pointy stick back there."
Ten was a little skeptical that anything they were carrying would do much were there to be many more golems where the first four had come from, and so she had slipped a handful of pea-sized balls of the lyrium clay, carefully wrapped in wool cloth, into her pack. The first room was clear, then there was another series of narrow passageways. It took about half an hour for them to clear the last one, which opened onto another ledge in another enormous cavern. The crystals which lit this one felt colder, emitting light that was bluish rather than yellow. In that cold blue light, Ten beheld a sight somehow even more curious than what she had experienced over the past several days. Branka was sitting crosslegged on a ledge, appearing to be deep in conversation with another golem. At least that's what it appeared to be. Ten could not see that it had a mouth, or a face, or indeed anything that could produce speech.
"Ah! Here they are!" she exclaimed. She scurried over and beckoned them to follow. They did so, though the skepticism was plain as plain on each of their faces.
The golem turned the rock approximating its head towards them, and Ten heard a voice. It was not unlike when Morrigan 'spoke' to her even when it she possessed neither teeth nor lips. It echoed somewhere in her brain.
"Surfacers," the golem said, "You are a long way from home."
"A thing I'm reminded of more with every step," Alistair said.
"This is Caridin! Can you believe it?" Branka asked, her voice, which was low as women's voices went, almost a squeal.
"Is that supposed to mean something?" Ten asked lowly, looking at Oghren.
"Well… the one I can think of was a paragon," Oghren said, hesitantly, "He… ah… he designed Bownammar, where we camped those nights."
"You said Bownammar has stood for centuries," Sten said, crossing his arms.
"It has," Oghren said.
"Yes, yes, same one," Branka said impatiently, "They put him in a golem! He can't die! How incredible is that?"
"Well, I suppose that would depend on what Caridin thinks of it," Ten said. Legend had it her people had once possessed the secret of immortality, though the more she saw of the world the more she thought maybe records of it were nothing more than metaphor or perhaps a myth concocted by the Tevinters to justify several centuries of genocide. But, 'what would you do if you could live forever' was a popular topic of conversation among alienage youth. The consensus, as soon as they had reached the age of cynicism - fourteen or so was - 'go stark raving mad.'
A low, rueful chuckle echoed through Ten's mind.
"Who, exactly, put you in a golem?" Oghren asked. He was very clearly skeptical about the whole proposition.
"Why does it matter?!" Branka asked, "We know it can be done now!"
"You did not let me finish, little sister," Caridin rumbled.
"What more could there possibly be to it?"
"Golems require a sacrifice to power them," Caridin said.
"Wait, so those four we killed… they were people?" Ten asked.
"They were, at one point. A very long time ago."
"Shit," she sighed, feeling a little bit guilty, "So they could have been reasoned with… I didn't even realize they could talk."
"No, no," Branka said, "I told you about this already. You're supposed the be the smart one. They have control rods. The people just… power them. Give them the ability to move, speak. They can't really choose anything. The four in that room never slept because they were controlled by another golem!"
"But their minds are still in there? Intact? That's… terrifying," Ten said, "So, wait, Master Caridin, who holds your rod?" She paused, turned to Oghren, "If you make a dirty joke right now I will push you off the edge."
"Heh. I don't need to. I'm in your head now," Oghren said.
"Not all golems have rods," Caridin rumbled. Oghren stifled a laugh.
"But that's not the point!" Branka insisted, her voice high and strained, "The point is that's what the Anvil of the Void is for! That!"
Ten's eyes followed her pointing finger. The anvil itself didn't look all that different from any other anvil, except for the veins of lyrium shot through it. I suppose there's no way to sever a soul from a body and keep the soul without a little bit of magic. Though, this all makes me wonder what actually separates what the dwarves can do from what mages can do. Blood magic requires human sacrifice. Whatever this is requires dwarven sacrifice…
"This is supposed to be a cautionary tale," Caridin said. The stone approximating a head shook from side to side, "Do you think it was lost by accident?"
"Well no, of course not," Branka said, "You were just waiting for someone to be worthy! Right? And we've proven ourselves!"
"No, little sister," Caridin said, "It was supposed to be lost to the ages so that what was done to me cannot be done again."
"But… don't you know what we've lost?" Branka demanded, "There is nothing but darkspawn and spiders between Orzammar and Kal'Hirol. Ortan Thaig, Valdammar, all lost! Every thaig to the sea and a few under it, lost! More of us live up on the surface with them that stayed in our homeland!"
"Better to lose territory than our dignity," Caridin declared dismissively.
"What if… what if it was just volunteers," Branka said.
"We started out with just volunteers," Caridin said, "Be honest, do you think that's where it will end this time?"
Ten thought for a moment about what might happen if this strange hybrid of artifact and technology fell into the hands of either of the men currently vying for the throne. Bhelen had absolutely no scruples of any kind. And he would certainly start with the casteless. Harrowmont… no. Harrowmont was a man devoted to tradition, and if what this ghost of a paragon said was true, imprisoning minds in bodies of stone, slave to whomever held a rod was very much traditional. Neither of them can have it.
"Sacrifices are necessary," Branka insisted through gritted teeth, "It is the only way anything gets done. Do you know what I had to do to get here?"
Ten glanced at Oghren, who was looking at his wife with a resigned expression. He looked at Ten briefly and nodded very slightly.
"Branka!" Ten called, "Let this go. I watched you work. You're better than this. You could make something greater than this if you put your mind to it instead of trying to resurrect a corpser that should stay right where it is."
"I'm not interested in your moralizing," Branka snarled, turning on her, the pale eyes magnified by her spectacles burning with scorn, "You wouldn't understand. We lost everything. We built great empires and they were lost because of people like you, too squeamish to do what was necessary to keep them."
"I do understand!" Ten insisted, "I know exactly what it is to be the daughter of greater grandfathers! Do you know nothing of surface history?"
"Oh, I know full well what you elves let happen to you. I can read," Branka retorted, "You think the dwarves should bend over and take it because you've been too nugshit not to for generations! Especially you. The nerve on you, going to bed with your subjugator and daring to lecture me."
Morrigan, who was standing slightly in front of Ten and to the right, turned and looked at her curiously, "What's she talking about?"
"Mind your business," Ten said, not taking her eyes off Branka, who had turned from the golem and taken a few steps towards her.
"You," Branka declared, seeing that she had touched a nerve, "Are no better than a broodmother."
Ten felt like nothing more than the first time Alticia, her potions mistress, had slapped her across the face for the first time, more shocked than hurt, but still plenty hurt. Did I deserve that? I made the analogy, after all. But also… fuck that. She forced a steadiness into her voice, "Master Caridin, why didn't you just destroy it?"
"I cannot destroy what which made me," Caridin said.
"Could someone else?"
"Don't you dare," Branka growled.
"Bitch, if we were in Denerim I would have invited you to catch me outside long ago," said Ten. She had been making an effort to speak 'properly' her whole time underground, lest nobody understand her. But now, she let it all slip. She took a step towards the anvil. Branka got in front of her.
"Teneira," Branka said, trying another tack, "You're clearly a smart woman. This is technology we will never be able to recreate."
"Here's the thing," Ten said, "If I believed for a minute you'd be down here figuring out a way to animate stone without imprisoning people in said stone for eternity, I'd walk right out, let you do whatever you want. But I saw what you did to…" Laryn. "Hespith."
"Don't talk about Hespith," Branka said.
"You know she's dead, right?" Ten said, "I saw it happen. She walked right off a ledge in front of me." She reached up instinctively and remembered she had not worn earrings for ages. She she reached up, fingers sliding under her cap and into her hair.
"Don't you fucking talk about Hespith," Branka said, very quietly.
"She died regretting she ever met you," Ten said, "If you come at me right now, that''s your legacy. You can still turn this around."
"Or what?"
"Or you can let it the fuck go!"
"You know what I sacrificed for this."
Ten glanced around her, "Back up," she said to her companions. For once, nobody argued with her, but Morrigan did, momentarily, narrow her eyes as she obeyed.
"You couldn't even get here without me," Ten said, waiting, watching from the corner of her eye as they got back.
"Well, now I'm here," Branka said, grinning, "And what the fuck are you going to do about it?"
Ten's fingers found what they sought. She would never in her life fully master the fluidity with which Branka simultaneously performed two unrelated actions with two different parts of her body, but she came close at that moment, throwing the glass vial as hard as she could approximately five feet behind the crazed smith and simultaneously jumping clear of the blast that ensued. She landed awkwardly, her head cracking against a stray rock. She saw stars for a moment, and then let the darkness creeping around the edges of her vision win the day.