When Fate Summons (a Dragon Age fanfiction)

Fear

Despite her exhaustion, Thora slept fitfully. She'd grown accustomed to Alistair's presence all over her skin like a warm blanket. Without it, she felt cold and bereft, and cursed herself for a fool to have let her guard down and have to go through the pain of parting with him all over again.

After she'd rolled over in the blankets for the fourteenth time, she sat up, deciding that more sleep was out of the question. She got out of the bedroll, pacing nervously, wondering what was so unsettling. Then, when both Anders and Sigrun sat up as well, she knew, her skin prickling. The Legionnaires around her were stirring, too. In the dimness, she could make out maybe three of them, none of them the bald dwarf she'd met when they arrived at the camp.

Then, from out of the blackness of the Roads, a hissing voice. "Commander. We have come for you."

"What do you wa—" Sigrun began, but Thora's hand clamped down on her arm.

"I have nothing to say to any darkspawn. Come closer and you can speak to my blade. That's all you'll get from me."

There was a sibilant chuckle. "And your daughter? What will we get from her?"

Panic flooded Thora, followed by rage, red and pulsing. She shrieked, a bloodcurdling scream worthy of Oghren, and drew her blades as she ran forward toward the voice, only to feel the sudden and unpleasant constriction of ice surrounding her. Damn that Anders! What was he thinking, holding her here? Encased in the ice, she heard nothing, and saw little, only wavery lines, but she cooled down, both literally and figuratively. However the darkspawn knew about her daughter, rushing headlong into the darkness and Maker-knew-how-many of them wasn't the way to handle the situation. She fidgeted within the melting ice.

The ice broke apart suddenly, Jens pulling her out of the cracked pieces, and she heard sounds again, crisp in her ears. Looking around, she saw Anders in his accustomed place near the back where he could keep an eye on the battle, Jens with his giant blade at the ready, a couple of the Legionnaires ranged near him, swords out. She shot a glance at Anders, and he looked pointedly toward the dark corridor. Thora strained to see where Sigrun was, following his gaze, but the little dwarf had sunk into the shadows as she moved forward, probably with the other Legionnaire rogues.

"Commander," came the hissing voice again, "you are wasting time. Our people are well ahead, attacking the party you seek. The old woman we will eat, taking her magic into us ... but the little girls ..." He gave that harsh, echoing darkspawn laugh that she hated. "Will your girl spew forth hurlocks or genlocks? Or something entirely different?"

Jens glanced anxiously at her, but she shook her head sharply. She would not be enticed, although her mind's eye presented her with the vivid and unpleasant picture of Anawyn at their mercy, Anawyn being forced to eat their noxious bodies, Anawyn as a broodmother. Turning her head, Thora vomited onto the stone floor, unable to remove that hideous picture.

The laugh came again. "Disturbing, the thought. We will be the stronger for her blood ... your blood ..." The voice trailed off then. "Do not think your rogue is advancing secretly, Commander. We can sense her—"

"Sense this!" It was Sigrun's voice. A green cloud of acid billowed from the darkness, Sigrun sprinting away from it. Behind the cloud came the screams of darkspawn and the death gurgles of a body stabbed in the back. The other rogues were doing their work well, apparently.

Sigrun returned to Thora's side. "I made a good decoy, don't you think, Commander? The Legionnaire rogues are back there with gas masks. Clever!"

"Indeed." Thora looked to the Legionnaire warriors, one of whom raised a great hammer.

"Get the blighters!" he screamed, and he rushed forward.

Thora nodded to her people to follow him, hoping devoutly that she would finally get her hands on that damned red-shirted darkspawn. It had to be the same one who'd been following them. Third time's a charm, she thought.

A light appeared in the corridor, illuminating the battle, and Thora cast a grateful glance toward Anders. She spied the red shirt at the back of the crowd, slashing her way through the other darkspawn to go after the thing.

It turned as if to run, and she whipped the bow she carried from her back, nocking an arrow. She wasn't up to rogue standards with the weapon, but she trained hard with it for just such occasions. The arrow whistled over the heads of the melee, and in a swift arc embedded itself in the back of the red shirt. She'd been aiming for the back of his leg, but as the arrow severed the spinal cord, she thought for once she didn't mind her aim being a bit off. Thora pushed her way through the crowd to where the red-shirted darkspawn had fallen, and shoved him over with one booted foot.

He glared up at her. "You're too late," he whispered, black blood frothing at his mouth. "We've already got her. She's our mother now." He laughed again, and then coughed.

Thora bent, her eyes holding his. "What do you want with me? Why are you here?"

"You think ... we don't know ... you?" The light was fading from his eyes. "Killer ... killed all ... hope ... kill ... your hope ..." And he was dead, his tainted blood seeping out from under him.

She supposed that was true. She had ended their Blight, killed their Archdemon, killed both the Architect and the Mother, which had ended any plans those entities may have had to evolve and enlighten the darkspawn. Perhaps the creatures did hold a particular grudge against her. Her heart in her throat, she thought of her daughter in their vengeful hands and the image of Anawyn as broodmother floated before her again. With a great choking cry, she stabbed down into the darkspawn's lifeless body, over and over again until it was nothing but pulp. Only then did she look around her and see that the rest of the darkspawn had been defeated.

Sigrun decapitated the last genlock with a sweep of her twin blades and whirled, one of them at the ready, on a shadow behind her. She held her weapon when she saw the bald dwarf they'd met earlier. He grinned at her, pushing past her to Thora.

"Quite a scrap," he said. "But nothin' to what went on up ahead."

"Anawyn?" She clutched at his arm. "What happened?"

He grinned again. "The old lady, she froze 'em. The black-haired little girl turned into a spider and melted 'em with her spit. The red-head burnt 'em to a crisp. Nice little dustup."

"Fire mage, huh?" Anders said. He tugged at one of Thora's short red locks. "That fits."

"How did you get back here so quickly?" Sigrun asked. "The darkspawn leader seemed to think they were attacking Anawyn right now."

The bald dwarf chuckled. "Darkspawn can't tell time," he said. "The little girls held off that other party a little bit ago. They're gone now."

"Who's gone? The darkspawn?"

"The darkspawn're dead. The old woman and the little girls, they left."

"Left?" Sigrun stared at him. "How can that be?"

"The old lady burst the doors open. This big wind came whistling through, and boom! All three of 'em climbed right over, headed out onto the mountain."

Relief had just started to spread through Thora, but now panic took over again. With a sickening sense of 'too late' in the pit of her stomach, she said, "They've reached Haven."