Liane Merciel - Dragon Age: Last Flight

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For Peter, as ever.

And for the dogs, who taught me what a working partnership could be.

CONTENTS

9:41 D RAGON

Weisshaupt.

Backed by the great ivory butte of Broken Tooth, the faraway fortress rose before Valyas awed eyes. Silver-fringed banners flapped from its towers, their emblems indistinct at this distance, but Valya knew that they showed a steely gray griffon upon a field of blue. Beneath them stood a single gate of thick wood and steel. Brother Genitivi had written in his histories that it was wide enough for three horses to pass abreast, but from where Valya stood, it was so dwarfed by Weisshaupts stony bulk that it seemed tiny as her thumbnail.

For weeks shed dreamed of this place. Ancient stronghold of the Grey Wardens, final resting place for the heroes of ages, first and last bulwark against the horrors of the Blights and now her home, too. The thought made her shiver with fearful delight.

None of that excitement was reflected on her companions faces. The fear was there, though, despite their best efforts to mask it.

There were four of them besides Valyaan extraordinary number of recruits to be taken at once, shed been told. They ranged in age from sixteen to nineteen, except for Senior Enchanter Eilfas, whose scraggly beard was more white than brown. All of them were mages, which was another extraordinary thing. By tradition, the Wardens took only one recruit from each Circle of Magi in Thedas.

But that tradition had been broken. Violently.

Beginning in Kirkwall and spreading swiftly through Orlais, the mages of Thedas had found themselves hunted and hounded on all sides. The Templar Order, supposedly their protector and defender, had turned against them. How and why it had happened, Valya wasnt sure; shed been only an apprentice until a few weeks ago, so no one had told her much of anything, and the rumors were impossibly confusing.

What she did know was that Weisshaupt, and the Grey Wardens, represented sanctuary.

Elsewhere in Thedas, the world might have gone mad. Elsewhere, shed heard, entire Circles of Magi had been destroyed. Their towers had been pulled to the ground, and every mage and apprentice inside had been slaughteredeven the little childrenfor no crime beyond being born with the gift of magic. Other Circles were said to have risen up in rebellion and joined an army of mages massing somewhere around Andorals Reach.

But that was elsewhere. Not here. Here in the Anderfels, men and women remembered the true dangers of the world, and they did not waste precious lives fighting one another. When the first rumors reached their Circle, the Senior Enchanter had sent a swift message to Weisshaupt, and within days the Wardens reply had come back. Any mage who wished to join the Grey Wardens was welcome. No such mage was to be troubled by the templars. The Wardens Right of Conscription was inviolateand that meant its promise of sanctuary was too.

Even so, few had chosen to accept the Wardens invitation. Becoming a Grey Warden meant a hard life and a sure death, one way or another. It was a noble and ancient order, its tales sung by bards across Thedas and no one, absolutely no one , save the truly heroic or the truly desperate, wanted to become a member.

Valya wasnt sure which she was. But she knew she didnt want to die fighting templars, and she knew the Grey Wardens, even more than the Circle of Magi, offered a place where an elf could stand equal to any human. Nowhere else in Thedas could give her that.

So she had packed her few belongings and announced that she would accompany Senior Enchanter Eilfas and a handful of other junior mages to Weisshaupt. To become a Grey Warden, or die trying.

Now, under Broken Tooths shadow, she could see the others regretting their decisions. It was as plain as the fear they tried so hard to hide. Templars were fanatics, but they were still men. They could be reasoned with, cajoled, bullied, bribed. There would be none of that with darkspawn. Only a hard life, and a sure death.

Valya stepped forward, starting on the steep long road to Weisshaupts gates.

* * *

It was late afternoon when they turned onto the path to Weisshaupt, but it was fully dark by the time they reached its gates. Twice Eilfas had called a halt for water and rest. Life in the Circles tower, with all those endless spiraling stairs, had kept the Senior Enchanter reasonably fit for his age, but there was nothing in any Circle of Magi that approximated the road up Broken Tooth.

A thousand feet of vertical distance separated Weisshaupts gate from the dusty earth. The path that climbed up all that stone was at least three miles of hard switchbacks punctuated by ancient carved steps where the slope was too steep to run smooth. Each step had been worn down by the boots of countless Grey Wardens through the centuries, leaving shallow bowls that sent up little puffs of bone-colored dust as the mages robes whisked across them.

Narrow benches were carved into the stone at two wider points along the path, offering a spartan respite, but otherwise there was no comfort to be had on the journey up. Nor was there meant to be. The thin black slits of archers windows stared down at them, pointedly foreboding, but they hardly needed to be there. Anyone who tried walking up the path under the suns full glare would have been defeated by heat and wind long before coming into bowshot. Even in the coolness of twilight, the walk was punishing.

At last, just when Valya thought her legs were about to give out and send her plummeting mercifully down the mountainside, they reached the final stretch of stairs. Above them, the moon shone white in a cloudless sky; below, the blasted land of the Anderfels stretched endlessly on in shades of gray and red. A smaller door, barely visible as a shadowed indentation in the massive wall, faced them. The Senior Enchanter rapped against it with the end of his staff, and after a moment it swung inward.

A bluff-faced woman in a gray tunic and trousers stood inside. The sleeves of the tunic had been torn off, showing arms as muscular as a blacksmiths. An old injury had split her lip; it had healed with a flat white mark over her front teeth, and the teeth themselves were made of silver that glinted in the starlight. A spiked war hammer hung from a well-worn loop on her belt.

Youll be the Hossberg mages? she said. Valya couldnt place her accent. Fereldan, maybe. She hadnt met many Fereldans.

Senior Enchanter Eilfas bowed his head graciously, despite his weariness. We are.

Come in. Ill show you to your rooms. Therell be wash water if you want it, and food. Rest for tonight. In the morning we can talk over what youll be doing.

Of course, the Senior Enchanter said. May I ask your name? I am Senior Enchanter Eilfas of the Hossberg Circle or I was . I suppose I dont know if I still am. My companions are Valya, Berrith, Padin, and Sekah. They are young, but all very good. We have come to offer our skills to your cause.