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DRAGON AGE: THE CALLING 15 страница

Maric watched, but didn't see anything unusual about it. Just as he was about to ask, he suddenly noticed movement. The "stalagmite" unfolded, revealing a serpentine creature with a long and wormlike neck that ended in a maw full of sharp teeth. Its mottled skin was almost perfectly camouflaged to match the stone around it. It spun on them and hissed threateningly from afar, and then bounded off into the shadows with alarming speed.

Hafter growled again, eager to chase after the creature. The hunter restrained it with a small gesture. "The dwarves call them deep stalkers," he whispered."Were we fewer, or they more numerous, they would have already ambushed us." He pointed to several other stalagmites nearby, and now Maric began to see the subtle differences. He noticed where the creature's limbs folded up under its carapace, where it tucked its long neck under its body. Hidden in plain sight, the disguise was almost perfect. He could have reached out and poked them, they were so close.

"They're just going to let us pass?"

"They will follow, for a time, hoping for one of us to stray. The sound you hear is them communicating to each other, telling of intruders to their domain."

"We heard that back at the lake."

The hunter looked at him with amusement. "Then you're lucky you did not remain there longer. No doubt they were calling for more."

"Lucky," Maric repeated. Duncan had sat there by himself next to that lake, no doubt presenting an enviable target to these deep stalkers. He was the lucky one, probably.

They continued on in silence. A pall hung over the group now, and they all seemed eager to find their way back to the Deep Roads, if such a route existed. Utha stopped as soon as they left the cavern, kneeling and putting her hand to the ground. She had done this several times already, closing her eyes as if she could feel something within the stone that none of the others could. Dwarven stone-sense, Maric suspected, though he had never actually seen anyone use it before.

When she stood, she made a signal to Genevieve and led them down a new passage confidently. The Commander did not question her, and had said little of consequence since they'd left the lake. Nicolas, too, had been sullen and withdrawn, stumbling along without even a hint of preparedness should they need to fight.

Duncan kept far away from the man, remaining miserably to the rear of the party, which Maric figured was probably smart of him. He allowed himself to fall back to where the lad walked, and for a while they traveled together silently. Duncan refused to look at Maric, and though Fiona shot Maric a dangerous look of warning, he remained where he was.

"How are you feeling?" he finally asked.

Duncan seemed puzzled. "How should I be feeling?"

"I don't know. That was quite the impressive outburst back at the cavern."

"Yes, well." Duncan shrugged, obviously hoping that Maric would simply let the conversation drop.

"You remind me a little of myself, you know."

"Really? Maybe I should have myself fitted for a crown, then?"

Maric ignored the sharpness in his words."When I fought in the rebellion, I wasn't much older than you are now. I was never sure of myself, always questioning whether I was good enough or strong enough to be king. Every loss was agonizing because I was the one who caused it."

Duncan snorted. "Seems like you made out well enough."

"I know they call me Maric the Savior. I don't know who started that. Probably Rowan, come to think of it. She always encouraged the adoration of the people, because she believed it was important."

"I don't know who that is."

"My wife, the Queen." He tried to keep his voice flat. From Duncan's curious glance, he suspected he wasn't very successful. "She died. Three years ago, now."

"I'm sorry," Duncan said earnestly. "Did you love her?"

"I did. I do." Maric cleared his throat, studiously looking ahead. "There was another woman before her, however. An elven woman by the name of Katriel, the very one who led us to Ortan thaig when I was in the Deep Roads. She saved my life, but when I found out she was a spy and had cost us the battle at West Hill, I killed her. I ran her through."

Maric could feel the lad's speculative look, and was suddenly glad for the dim light as he was sure his color was rising. Why he was suddenly talking about this, he wasn't certain. He had never talked about it to anyone before, not since it had happened. Perhaps he was being foolish.

"I'd heard about that," Duncan said carefully. "Some of it, anyway."

"No doubt. Loghain made sure word got out, so everyone knew that justice had been done." He turned and looked at Duncan directly. "My point is that it wasn't justice. I was furious and felt betrayed. I felt responsible for all the people who had died because I was the one who trusted her. I couldn't forgive her. I murdered her, and I never regretted anything more in my life."

"Oh."

"We all make mistakes, Duncan. Some of them are going to cost others dearly. What's important is that your intentions were good, and that you learn from what you've done." He attempted a wan smile. "I wish I'd known that a long time ago."

They walked side by side for a time, both of them staring off into the shadows in awkward silence. Finally the lad looked at him, and for a moment Maric could have sworn the lad actually looked bashful. "Thank you," he said quietly.

Maric nodded and smiled. There was nothing more he could say.

"Hold!" Genevieve suddenly shouted from the front.

They all stopped, Kell drawing his bow and nocking an arrow almost instantly. Utha was ahead of them and gestured to the others to join her. They moved up, and as Fiona cautiously brightened the white glow from her staff, what the dwarf had found was revealed.

An entire section of the cave ahead of them had collapsed, and was almost impassable. What was far more important, however, was that past the hole in the cavern wall appeared to be a section of the Deep Roads. It would require them to climb up the rubble and squeeze through a fairly narrow aperture, but the signs of dwarven architecture beyond were unmistakable.

"It's a way back," Fiona breathed.

"I thought it seemed like we were headed up," Duncan said, and Utha nodded her head in agreement.

"Are there darkspawn up there?" Maric asked.

"No," Fiona offered, the faraway look in her eyes telling him that she was casting out her Grey Warden senses. "Not nearby, anyhow."

The elf tapped the onyx brooch attached to her chain shirt."It looks like the gifts from the Circle are proving their worth. We've lost them for the moment."

Genevieve seemed unconvinced."Perhaps," she frowned, "though it is odd. Normally they swarm like a horde of bees when disturbed."

She drew her greatsword, the blade flashing in the staff 's glare, and approached the rubble cautiously with it in hand. Waving for the others to follow her, she began her ascent. It was a slow process to get through the hole in the wall. In the end, they needed to clear some of the rocks at the top of the pile to make room for those with bulkier armor. Utha was the first through, and she gave the all clear from the other side.

It was good to be back in the dwarven passages, Maric thought. He noticed almost immediately, however, that the signs of darkspawn corruption had returned. There was an almost marked transition from the natural caves they had just left. Why was that? Was there something about the Deep Roads that made them more susceptible to this strange infestation? There he saw the familiar trails of black filth and the clusters of fleshy sacs lining the walls. The crumbling statues, too, looked much like every other part of the Deep Roads they had been to. They could be anywhere.

Genevieve looked about grimly. "Do you recognize anything?" she asked Maric.

He shook his head.

"Then we proceed."

They traveled for hours, Genevieve pushing them mercilessly, as if she expected an attack from the darkspawn at any moment. The other Wardens, however, seemed content that this was unlikely.They had slipped the noose, as it were, and if the darkspawn were searching for them anywhere it was back in the network of caverns they had just left. This appeared to bring no comfort to their commander, who became more tense the longer they traveled.

Twice they passed tunnels that branched off from the main route, the entrances marked with great stone archways. Utha signed that these were abandoned thaigs, though any indication of which ones they had been was now scoured away by time and the encroachment of darkspawn corruption. The dwarf stood at the entrances and stared sadly into the shadows beyond, clenching and unclenching her fists. Maric had to wonder what it must be like for her, to know your people once ruled a great empire that had been reduced to a shadow of its former self.

Much later they came upon a section of the Deep Roads that had mostly collapsed into the caverns below, leaving a gaping chasm filled with little more than cobwebs and darkness. The wall on one side remained intact, along with a narrow ledge at its foot just barely wide enough to walk along. They eyed it with suspicion, but Utha seemed convinced that it was well enough supported that they could cross it one at a time, if there was anywhere to reach. The light from Fiona's staff was not enough to extend all the way to the other side. They could only assume that there even was another side.

Genevieve went first, overriding objections by saying her armor was the heaviest present. If they couldn't get her across now, they wouldn't be able to do so later. Kell tied a length of rope around her, but Maric doubted the rope would even hold her properly if the stone on the path gave way. It offered little more than peace of mind.

Still, she went across without a moment's hesitation, flattening herself against the wall and sliding slowly along the ledge until she disappeared into the shadows. The rope represented their only indication that she had not fallen. Quiet minutes passed as they watched the rope carefully and Kell slowly let more and more of it out. Just when it looked like they were about to run out of rope, it jerked sharply. Twice. She was across.

Maric was one of the last to go, and it was an experience he was not likely to want ever to repeat. Slowly sliding along the narrow ledge, one barely got any indication that there was even a floor beneath. In that darkness it felt like he was suspended, and that he would pitch forward into the vast pit before him at any moment.

He couldn't see how deep it went, but he could feel it. He needed to stop once, pressing his head against the wall and closing his eyes to keep the world from spinning around him. Only the insistent tugging of the rope kept him moving, inching on toward the pinpoint of light on the other side.

When he finally stumbled off the ledge, he was sweating and trembling. Kell grabbed him and Fiona ran up. The warm glow of her staff was probably the most welcome sight he could possibly imagine.

"Are you all right?" she asked, concerned.

"I didn't fall in," he chuckled.

The elf frowned severely at him."Is that a yes?"

"Err... I suppose so, yes."

She snorted derisively and turned on her heel, walking away. Maric glanced askance at Kell and the hunter merely shrugged. He couldn't explain it, either.

They pressed on, entering a new portion of the Deep Roads with tunnels that looked higher than he remembered. They trudged through portions that were flooded with shallow, brackish water and others that were so thick with the corruption they needed to cut a path through the black film. Maric's sword was particularly suited for this, its runes glowing brightly as he forced the foulness to part before him. At one point they passed a hall lined with dwarven statues, most of them crumbled or covered in lichen and moss to the point of being unrecognizable.

Just when Maric felt like he was about to collapse from fatigue, he noticed a set of runes on one of the walls almost covered by dust and debris. "Wait!" he called out.

Genevieve ordered a halt and turned, concerned. He ran up to the wall, scraping it clear with his gauntlet, and smiled as he recognized a number of the markings. It had been years since he'd seen them, but he remembered them clearly. "I know these," he exclaimed. "We passed by these! I mean, I did, when I was here before... we came this way!"

"Are you sure?" Genevieve asked skeptically.

"They could just look similar," Duncan added.

Utha stepped forward and inspected the runes carefully. She made a series of motions at the others, and he didn't need a translation.

"It doesn't say anything about Ortan, right? It mentions another thaig?" At the dwarf 's cautious nod, he turned around and studied the tunnel carefully. There was more overgrowth and corruption here, but that had been the case ever since they'd entered the Deep Roads. The layout tweaked his memory, but he couldn't tell if that was because he actually remembered this place or because so many of the passages were similar to each other. "If I'm right, there should be a crossroads ahead, with even more runes on the walls."

The Grey Wardens blinked at each other, uncertain what to make of Maric's pronouncement. Without another word they turned and began marching ahead. Within minutes, they reached the crossroads he remembered. There were lava flows here, channels in the walls carved by the dwarves and at one time filled with glowing lava to provide light. The area was covered in random debris, much of the roof having collapsed, and, as he had predicted, more large runes were carved into the walls.

Maric smiled broadly. "See? Just like I said!"

The exhausted relief on the faces of the others was obvious. The idea that they might not have simply been wandering aimlessly all this time was a welcome one. Only Genevieve seemed more disturbed by their luck than reassured. She eyed the pillar suspiciously and regarded Maric with a raised brow. "Do you know the way to Ortan thaig from here?"

It took only a moment of thought. "That way." He pointed. "I remember we came the other way, and then Katriel... we saw those runes. That's how we knew where we were going."

She pondered carefully. "How long?" she finally asked.

"Less than a day."

With a curt nod, she unshouldered her pack, tossing it to the ground. "Then we rest here." When the others hesitated, staring at her in disbelief that she didn't intend to push on, she shrugged."For whatever reason, the darkspawn are not near. We must take advantage, while we can. Don't bother setting up tents. We won't remain long."

Considering he was ready to collapse, Maric didn't offer an argument.

The first of the Maker's children watched across the Veil

And grew jealous of the life they could not feel, could not touch.

In blackest envy were the demons born.

-Canticle of Erudition 2:1

Duncan felt like he was little more than a pile of bruises as he walked alongside the others. They'd had barely a handful of hours to rest, enough time to strip off some sweaty leathers that he felt like he'd been wearing for weeks and to rub magical ointment on his wounds. Fiona had passed it around, and they'd all taken a turn by the fire. It had been a litany of painful hisses, grunts, and relieved sighs.

His arm remained stiff and sore, but Kell had inspected it and declared that it was no longer broken. Fiona's spell had done the trick, and the ointment had managed to relieve much of the ache that had been plaguing him since the battle. He experimentally flexed and unflexed his hand, frowning at the fact that it seemed difficult to make a proper fist. But he could, and that was what mattered.

Hafter was the only one of them who'd slept well. Almost as soon as they'd set up the fire, the hound had curled up at his master's feet and was snoring within minutes. Duncan liked how the dog's feet twitched, and how he would occasionally huff like he was about to bark in his sleep. A dog's dreams were probably about running through sunny meadows and barking at squirrels, which was the sort of dream that Duncan wouldn't mind having himself.

Then he remembered that Hafter was tainted just the same as the rest of the Grey Wardens. Perhaps his dreams were just as dark, and when he ran, he ran away from the frightening shadows that always lurked at the edges of a Grey Warden's mind. He hoped he was wrong, for the dog's sake.

Genevieve led the way down the passage, tense and quiet. She was eager to get to Ortan thaig as quickly as possible now, and would brook no further delay. The others tried to keep up, but even so she pulled farther and farther ahead. They exchanged glances with each other, clearly wondering if she even cared that she was putting such distance between herself and the rest of her party.

Probably not, Duncan suspected.

He edged closer to Fiona and walked at her side for a time. The mage looked marginally less pale after some rest. Genevieve had strictly forbidden her to use any more magic to speed up the healing of the others, and though Fiona had complained, Duncan had to agree. All their major injuries had already been dealt with. She needed her strength, especially if Ortan thaig was as dangerous as Maric claimed.

He had told them all what had happened the last time he'd gone there eight years ago. Giant spiders, deformed by the taint, had swooped down upon them from a sea of spiderwebs that had obscured the upper reaches of the thaig. To defeat them, they'd burned the webs down. Duncan wondered if there would still be spiders there. He shuddered at the thought. He didn't like small ones, and the thought of meeting ones as big as he was, poison dripping from their mandibles, was downright revolting.

"I need to tell you something," he whispered to Fiona.

Nearby, Nicolas shot him an annoyed glare and sped up his pace to pull ahead. There was going to be no forgiveness there, Duncan saw. The warrior had been sullen and bristly by the campfire, barely attending to his own wounds and not even removing his soiled armor when he had the chance. He'd elected to take the first watch without question, stiffly walking off as the others looked after him in pity.

The elf was regarding him with interest. "What is it? Is it about Maric?"

"No!" he snorted. "What is it with you two?"

She sighed in exasperation. "Fine. What do you have to tell me?"

"It's about Genevieve." He glanced toward the Commander, and could barely see her off in the shadows ahead. It was as if the thaig were drawing her magnetically, and the closer they got to it the faster she was compelled to move. "She left the camp during the night. Not to go on watch, either. I mean she snuck off."

Fiona looked puzzled. "Snuck off? What for?"

"That's what I wondered. So I followed her."

"And she didn't see you?"

"I happened to be a very good thief in Val Royeaux before you lot came along, you know."

"Point made. What did you see?"

"She didn't actually go very far." He hesitated, suddenly not sure he should be relating the story, after all. Perhaps Genevieve would view it as an invasion of her privacy. He had been snooping on her, though at the time he told himself he was just making sure she'd be safe. But now that he'd brought it up with Fiona, there wasn't any point in stopping."She went just down a ways from the crossroads with a torch. Then she began taking off her armor."

"You watched her strip?"

"No! I mean... well, yes, but it wasn't like that. I thought that maybe she just wanted some privacy. I was going to turn around and let her be, and that's when I saw it."

"Saw what?"

"I thought it was a bruise." He remembered only too well the patch of discoloration that had extended all the way from the Commander's bare shoulder down the side of her ribs and almost to her thigh. He had been alarmed at first, especially at its intensity. Too dark to be a bruise, he'd wondered if maybe it had been a burn from the dragon's fiery breath. Had she been hiding her injury this entire time? Why would she? "It wasn't, though. I don't think Genevieve knew what it was, either. She held the torch close to take a good look in the light."

"And what did she see?"

"I thought... I thought it looked like darkspawn flesh."

Fiona stared ahead, pondering this information as they walked. For a moment, Duncan regretted telling her. He hadn't been sure what to think when he'd seen the "bruise." He'd been horrified, and from the look on Genevieve's face, she'd felt the same. He had the feeling, however, that it hadn't been the first time she'd seen it. She'd known it was there, and had hidden it from the rest of them.

"It could just be an injury," she offered. "An old injury."

"I don't think so."

"What else could it be?" She turned to look at him sharply. "Do you think she caught the plague? She's a Grey Warden, how can that be?"

He shrugged. "I don't know."

Maric walked up to them suddenly, effectively interrupting their conversation."What are you two whispering about so urgently?" he asked, trying to fight against a yawn and losing the battle.

"It's nothing," Fiona said too quickly.

"I was just telling her how tired I was," Duncan cut in."We didn't get much sleep before Genevieve was kicking us all up. I could have sworn I'd just shut my eyes."

Kell walked close, his bow unslung and at the ready. Hafter padded along amiably beside him. "I, for one, am glad we did not sleep more," the hunter muttered.

"Really?" Maric asked.

"The dreams were difficult to bear." Kell's eyes darkened and he looked away. Hafter glanced up at his master, whining quizzically.

Utha stepped toward them, making several agitated gestures with her hands. Fiona sighed and nodded her agreement. "I was the same. The dreams came as soon as I closed my eyes, like I was drowning in them." She closed her eyes and shuddered at the memory.

"Perhaps it is being within the Deep Roads?" Kell asked.

Maric shrugged. "I haven't had any dreams. Besides the usual, I mean."

"Grey Wardens always have dreams," Fiona explained."It comes with being part of the darkspawn consciousness. They've been getting worse since we entered the Deep Roads."

"Each night has been worse than the last," Kell added grimly.

"Not me." Duncan put up his hand. "I've been fine."

Fiona regarded him with a suspicious eye. "Are you sure? I thought for certain..."

"No. Just the normal sort of cheese dreams."

"Oh! I get those," Maric chuckled.

"Really? Fiona was using these spells to turn the darkspawn into giant pillars of stinky cheese, and I kept thinking, 'Why stinky cheese, of all things? I hate stinky cheese.' But she wouldn't use a different spell and got really angry at me."

"You mean like that?" He indicated the elf, who was indeed glaring at them with seething disapproval.

"You are both idiots," she grumbled, rolling her eyes.

"I think it was more that she just really liked stinky cheese," he told Maric. "She kept taking a big bite out of each pillar. All I could smell was feet."

"That's disgusting."

"That's what I said!"

Genevieve's appearance ahead of them cut off all conversation sharply, like a splash of cold water. They all stared as she stormed back toward them, her demeanor cold fury."Why have you slowed?" she demanded. "We are there." Without waiting for a response she turned back. They rushed to catch up, and quickly discovered that she was correct.

Fiona held up her staff and let the white light shine intensely into the cavern they entered, and that still didn't reveal it all. Duncan felt like they were disturbing a tomb, a great cavern full of the skeletons of ancient dwarven buildings long since settled to their quiet decay. He could see hints of crumbling walkways, great columns and statues fallen to the ground and shattered, gutted buildings, some of which climbed almost up to the vaulted ceiling high overhead.

Once this had been a bustling city, and now it seemed nothing more than silent and still. A thick black dust had settled over everything, and the upper reaches of the cavern were nothing more than a grey cloud full of strange clumps. If that was all a result of the webs being burned down so many years before, they hadn't been rebuilt. Perhaps the giant spiders had moved on? They could always hope.

"Ortan thaig," Maric breathed. Duncan noticed the distant, haunted look in his eyes. He got that way every time he thought of his last voyage in the Deep Roads. It made Duncan wonder why the man had agreed to come back here at all, despite the urgency of their mission.

Genevieve had her greatsword held out before her warily. All of them had their weapons in hand now, in fact, staring into the still shadows as if they expected a swarm of monsters to come rushing out at them. "Has anything changed?" she asked Maric.

"Fewer cobwebs."

The Commander gestured to Kell, who moved forward and knelt, studying the thick layers of dust and dirt that covered the stone. Hafter paced around him, snuffling at the ground with his nose and sneezing. "There has been much movement through this cavern. Most of it has been very recent, and darkspawn."

"And my brother?" she asked.

The question hung in the air, and Kell paused. He stared at the ground with his pale eyes, as if he could see patterns in the faint tracks that none of the rest of them could. Duncan suspected that was probably the case. The hunter had a sensitivity to the taint that went far beyond any tracking ability he might have learned during his time with the Ash Warriors. He was always the first to sense the approach of darkspawn, and he could discern between the various breeds by their scent alone. Some of the Grey Wardens even used to claim that Kell could do the same with them, sense who was who from afar just as if they were darkspawn. If so, the hunter never commented on it.

"Your brother has been through here," he finally agreed.

"Where?"

He arched his brow at her. "I am accustomed to his particular scent, Genevieve, but even I cannot track him through all the others. He has been here; that is all I know." He gestured at the ground, and even Duncan could see that the piles of black dust and dirt had been disturbed by many pairs of feet. Darkspawn feet, presumably, though apparently not all.

Genevieve frowned in frustration, and she searched the distant shadows of the thaig helplessly. Then her features hardened and she set her jaw, turning back to regard the others."Then we search every inch of this ruin until we find some trace of him."

"How do we know there even is a trace?" Maric asked. "He could have just passed through. He could have been chased through, for all we know."

"Then let us find out where he ran," she growled. Hefting the greatsword onto her shoulder, she turned and marched into the ruined streets of the thaig. The others followed without question.

For a time they moved carefully through the narrow passages between buildings. Some of the walls and walkways had collapsed, leaving large chunks of rubble strewn in their way, but much of it had not. It was a testament to the skills of the dwarves that many of these rune-covered arches and delicate statues were still standing.

The light from Fiona's staff bathed everything in a harsh glare, but left many shadows. Everywhere Duncan looked there was darkness just beyond the edge of the staff 's white glow, waiting behind statues and in doorways, obscuring the secrets this place kept. He imagined that Maric's spiders still hid in those depths, watching them progress with their many dark little eyes and waiting until they had proceeded too far in to retreat.

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