Under the relentless assail of dust motes and cloudless sky⊠the desert seemed to unravel. Its high dunes surrounding Adamant Fortress swept across them, wind-swept and merciless, heedless of the Inquisitionâs efforts to slog through the sand in order to avoid being pinned by errant arrows whistling past their heads. The fortress itself was full of echoesâbattle cries, shrieks and explosive blasts as fireballs crashed into the pillars and sent shards of rock raining down across their heads. Steel arrowheads and stomping footsteps accompanied the frequent whine of magic heard above the ramparts, as well as at their sides.
A lumbering contraption of metal bindings and thick wood was being laboriously shoved along the beginning of stonework leading up to the fortressâ reinforced gates. Several soldiers lied grunting and groaning as the wheels clattered and spun across chunks of stone, sweaty faces peeking out from beneath helms. The sand certainly hadnât done the battering ram any favors. Its decreased mobility wasnât aiding those whoâd been tasked to push the damned thing either. Where arrows found their marks, injured men and women were pulled away behind the general safety of crooked, fallen pillars to be tended to. Others had stationed themselves at their sides, arrows notched and loosed at the ramparts, so that they could counter the arrows and shards of ice being hailed down.
The stone warren ahead of them tasted stale. Heavy with the grit of sand and the sear of flames licking at their sides; behind them and overhead. Everything so impossibly dry. Long hours had taken them towards the main gates, a slow and arduous trek. Even so, it felt as if everything was rushing quickly. Far too quick. Somewhere overhead, something thumped heavily against the walls and the ground beneath their feet trembled. All they needed to do was breach the walls. All they needed to do. Easier said than done when hell was raining down on them. Approaching a hornetâs nest with ladders, and a slow moving ram, was laughable. At least, Zahra thought so. Sheâd never been involved in such an assault before. Never had to fight alongside so many people before, either. So many faces. There were those sheâd come to know personally⊠and others whoâd joined them along the way.
There was a cry heard above the din. Hit. Or fire. Zahra couldnât tell. A large boulder sailed overhead and crashed into the side of the walls. Sending a line of armored men pinwheeling through the air. Stonework crumbled into shards of brick and trickled down the sides of the walls. Not quite enough to allow entrance, but definitely enough to crush those whoâd been unfortunate to stand there. Another volley fired shy of its mark and crashed somewhere within the gates while the ladders approached the base of the walls. Archers continued covering them from the ground, firing up with bare arrows, and some doused in flames.
Battle raged around her. Less hectic than Haven, to be sure. Zahra had the good sense to ignore the pang in her heart, even if she knew this could have much of the same result. Her friends, companions. They were not invulnerable, and neither was she. However, theyâd come out of hairier circumstances, and she had no doubts theyâd fight tooth and nail to accomplish what they needed to. She notched an arrow and loosed it from behind the advancing battering ram. Glimpsed the arrow striking into the slip between a Wardenâs helm, toppling forward off the walls. Only long enough to loose another.
Many of the Wardens on the walls had made note of the battering ram's ponderous approach, and turned their aim upon it. Flashes of fire lit up the darkening sky as spheres of orange flame careened down from the walls, aimed for the ram and the soldiers carrying it. Most of them crashed into barriers with heavy sounds, guttering out before reaching the soldiers and vital parts of the machinery itself. Both were protected by Asala and even Cyrus, who reinforced her work with some of his own, a slight variation in the shade of blue the only way to tell them apart. Each time a barrier shattered under the force of a blow, another bloomed over the empty space to replace it.
With his free arm, Cyrus hurled bolts of lightning, each precise enough to catch a figure on the walls above, and placed so as to ricochet between several more, breaking up the volleys and easing their slogging passage just a little. The Warden Nostariel's arrows were just as goodâunlike Zahra's, they tended to explode on impact, which made up for the fact that she didn't aim quite as accurately. The next to fly in blew off a heavy chunk of the crenelations on the wall, cracking the stone and sending a massive chunk of it over the side, the man who'd been standing on it following it down screaming.
The fighters who specialized in closer quarters were harder-pressed to help much at this stage. Those with shields were generally at the front, round and kite-shaped metal faces turned up to protect vulnerable heads and necks from the bite of arrowheads and icicles. Others carried ladders to try and mount the walls themselves, but keeping them in place long enough to use was proving difficult. The Wardens clearly knew how to hold a fortress; the rate at which Inquisition soldiers were falling to their arrows and magic was far too quick to sustain much longer. They had to make it the rest of the way to the door. Only then would Zahra and her companions be able to push inside and make an effort at breaking the siege.
The ram wasn't more than ten feet from the gate when a lucky volley struck two of the soldiers pushing it on the left, slipping in during the small gap between one barrier's fall and the next materializing. The men collapsed to the sand, the ram itself teetering dangerously to the side as the others pushing it tried to compensate for the sudden loss and prevent it from becoming hopelessly mired in sand.
Leon ducked in, catching one of the vacant handles in his grip. It was hard to tell given his helmet, but the heavy scrape of his gauntlets on the wood suggested that even he struggled to keep it from rolling back down the incline, at least for the few seconds it took for the other men to get their feet back underneath them. His boots sank heavily into the sand as he pushed for traction, taking a hard step forward to plant his treads on stone instead.
More arrows and magic flew in overhead in those precious seconds; one of the trebuchets went up in flames, scattering its crew. The Wardens were making use of Tevinter fire on the battlements as well, heaving a cauldron of it over onto one of the ladders that had managed to stake out a position on the wall. The screams as it splashed over the arms and chests of the Inquisition soldiers holding it in place at the bottom were unholy things, harsh even over the rest of the noise.
âForward!" The Commander rolled his shoulders back, adjusting to the weight of two-thirds of the ram's left side. At the command, it moved forward again, alighting on sand-covered stone. That proved to be the hardest part, and it rolled forward smoothly after that. Gesturing for another two soldiers to man the actual ram portion of the contraption, Leon stepped back and shook out his hands, flexing his fingers open and closed several times.
âDraw back." The soldiers shuffled to rock the ram back into the rearward position. As soon as they were steady, the Commander's voice boomed out again. âHeave!"
The sound of the hit echoed like thunder, reverberating through the banded wood of the gate. It held steady, though, and so the soldiers drew it back again. The second time, a harsher crack followed as part of the door splintered, and Leon gestured the advance team to cluster just behind and to the side of the siege weapon. There was no telling what the Wardens were assembling in there to meet them.
The third hit broke through a chunk of the wood, but it took several more before the opening was large enough for them to use. On the eighth, the right half of the door broke on its hinges and swung inwards, finally allowing them through.
"On me!" The elven knight among them was at the forefront of the attack, face hidden behind the mask of his helm, his spear lowered and shield ready to receive the first enemy. Vesryn charged forward, through the cloud of dust that had billowed up in the wreckage of the gate, temporarily disappearing from sight. The others followed close behind him, Inquisition soldiers at their backs supporting them. For the first few moments the going was slow as those in the front undoubtedly met a thick resistance, and Zahra wasn't able to see any of what was occurring inside. She could only hear the screams of the desperate and the dying, the roars of the attackers, and the wails of demons among their enemies.
But they pushed forward, heedless of any losses, and soon Zahra was able to make out the carnage inside the gate. The Wardens had mounted a fierce resistance, but they'd been cut down by the brutal attack of the Inquisition's assault party. The fallen bodies made the footing treacherous to those not paying attention. Dozens of arrows littered the ground where they'd harmlessly fallen after clattering off one of the barriers protecting the attackers from above. Still, some had made it through, and no few men and women of the Inquisition were on the ground and bleeding, or crawling for aid. Their attempts to secure the walls were going poorly.
Ahead, the bulk of the Warden warriors had been broken and driven back, and in their place the mages were commanding demons into the fray. Vesryn intercepted the first of the shades with his shield, bashing it quickly and leaving it on the ground so he could keep his shield facing forward and advance. Romulus swiftly took care of the fallen creature, his eyes slightly glazed from the effects of his tonics.
"Keep pushing forward!" Vesryn shouted, burying his spear in a Warden mage and toppling her as he redirected her stream of fire away with his shield.
Approximating hope from such carnage had never been Zahraâs style. As soon as the gates buckled and splintered inwards, sheâd vaulted onto the now unoccupied barricade ram. She notched and loosed her arrows into the swelling forefront of Wardenâs gawking overhead. Shouting commands, pointing fingers and firing arrows with less precision than they had been when their fortress had been shuttered close. Now that the Inquisition could spill into Adamantâs walls, utter chaos ensued. With the last of her arrows spent, she slung the bow around her shoulder and hopped down behind Vesryn and the others, pulling her rapier free from its scabbard.
Sheâd never be as good or quick as Marceline was, nor as graceful, if she was being honest⊠but using her bow in close-quarters, elbows nearly touching with companions and enemies alike wasnât efficient. Sheâd learned that long ago. Zahra breathed in, steadying herself as the dust settled around them. Silhouettes crashed together. The sound of metal scrapping against metal added to the crackle of thrown lightning bolts to their sides. There were still streaks of molten fire, casting light across their faces, before slamming into bodies. The smell⊠was almost unbearable. Burnt flesh. Coppery blood. Sand grit in their teeth. She was already having trouble dancing between scorched corpses. Though she spotted one of her own well enough. An arrow jutted from one of his shoulders. She swept down and slipped a hand under his armpit, dragging him back to his feet. Wordless, breathless.
Through skeins of smoke, a shade burst out and raked its claws down towards Zahraâs face. She only barely had enough time to throw them both to the ground. Her head cracked against the stone, hard enough to blow stars in her vision. Fortunately, not hard enough to render her unconscious. The world spun beneath her as she pushed herself to her feet and tried to regain her balance. A warm wetness wept from her hairline. She didnât need to touch it to know that it was hers. She smeared the blood away from her left eye in time to see the shade rear back towards her. This time, whether it was dumb luck or a bloom of anger swelling in her belly, Zahra hewed it with her blade and pushed past it. Further into the fortress.
They were more or less navigating through the fortress blind; what information the scouts had been able give them dealt with the fortifications rather than details of the layout, since those things would only be visible from the inside. Leon, up front near Vesryn, seemed to be choosing their course, though it was hard to know how he was doing it. Estella fell in next to Zahra, expression showing a flicker of concern before it smoothed out. Perhaps her tumble had been witnessed. âIâm alright,â Zahra offered with a toothy grin. She didnât know the extent of the damage, but that was always best handled afterwards.
The resistance seemed to thin for a while. The group's pace accelerated until they were all clipping along at a smooth jog, but Leon pulled them up before they rounded the next blind corner, ducking around it for a moment and then reappearing to gesture them all forward.
It seemed the battle here was already taking place, and the Wardens were manning both sides themselves. This knot looked to be mages and demons versus everyone else, if the armor styles were anything to go by. In truth there wasn't much left to do by the time they arrived, aside from blocking a flanking maneuver by several rage demons, something the fighters at the front took care of in short order.
The stillness after, when the Inquisition faced down the winning half, was tense. Estella's voice cut through it first.
âWhy were you fighting them?" Her tone was neutral, careful, modulated. Her face gave nothing away, yet, and the tension didn't quite abate.
Even so, one of the Wardens answered. His winged helmet seemed to be a mark of some rank distinction or another; the rest of them arrayed around him in a way that suggested he was the leader. "Because this is insanity, and they are no longer the people they once were." In contrast to Estella, he sounded haggard, tired, even through the metal of his helm.
âThen fight with us." Nostariel and Stroud moved into his line if sight. While the elf's expression was mild, her partner still wore a hard, disapproving scowl. At a look from her, though, it eased slightly.
"You could have realized this sooner, but it is good that you have now, at least." A few of those present, without helmets obscuring their faces, had the grace to look ashamed or at least properly chastened. Stroud glanced at Romulus and Estella. "Perhaps we should send them back, to help your army breach the wall. They would not be noticed as hostile until they attacked, I should think."
The man with the helm inclined his head. "We would be willing to do this... but you should be careful ahead. I know not what Clarel and that man are preparing for you, but they retreated to do it as soon as you were spotted."
"Then we should keep moving," Vesryn said, lifting his shield from where it had rested with its bottom rim against the ground. "Go on then, beat some sense into your brethren, and we'll put a stop to this insanity."
The Wardens went on their way, as did the assault party. The fortress proved difficult to navigate, not only due to their unfamiliarity. An unfortunate side effect of the siege engines was that several large stones had collapsed the quickest pathways, eventually forcing them up onto the battlements to seek an alternative route. It seemed that Inquisition forces had finally gotten something of a foothold, as they encountered small numbers of their own troops, battling for control of the high ground. They assisted where they could, but could not linger for long if they wanted to stop Clarel and Pike.
Up ahead they came upon a lookout point of sorts, a wider section of wall that overlooked a significant portion of the fortress. There they found a number of their troops engaged with a vicious contingent of demons. Upon closer inspection, they proved to be some of their scouts, with Lia at the helm of them. She dueled with a floating despair demon, the creature nimbly twirling away from one of her arrows and flinging itself through the air, launching an icy spike as it went. The projectile tore through the leather on Lia's left arm, leaving a bloody wound in its wake, and a lucky shade immediately tackled her from behind. The pair went down together, but Lia soon drove a knife into its head, rolling out from under its writhing mass as nimbly as she was able to.
Many of the others had gone in for close quarters, as well. Signy covered Rhys's back, driving one of her two hatchets into the single eye of another shade. Blood spattered liberally over her face and leather armor, but it went as unheeded in her case as in the rest. Rhys took a step away from her for a moment, swinging one of his sabers from below and slashing another shade up its body before coming across with the other. It hissed weakly as it bled out, and he returned back to Signy, slinging the lingering blood off of the edges of his blades.
The despair demon bore down on Lia, threatening to continue flinging ice spears at her until an arrow struck it in the side. From among their own group, Ashton broke off and fired another arrow at the demon, striking it once more before he became its new focus. Unlike Zahra, he had stuck with his bow even in close combat, pilfering ammunition from fallen Wardens on the wall. As he nocked the next arrow, the demon feinted again, attempting to bait Ashton's arrow, but he must have seen it coming because the next arrow struck true as well, felling the demon out of the air and dispersing when it struck the ground.
"Now's not the time to be laying around," Ashton said holding out a hand for Lia to take, his tone far more grim than his words.
"Thanks," Lia said, taking his hand and getting back to her feet. "And thank the gods you're all okay. Took us longer than we would've liked to get through on the walls, and I thought we'd fallen behind. Didn't expect we were actually ahead of you."
"We encountered a few complications of our own," Vesryn said, ensuring that the immediate area was clear of demons. "Any idea how far we've yet to go to reach Pike?"
"Not far, I don't think. Keep going that way," she pointed towards the center of the fortress. "You should hurry, we heard some strange noises before we were set upon. We'll cover your backs."
Zahra joined Vesryn at his side. Better off next to someone with a shield to batter a path open. Sheâd been dancing between shades, much more nimble now that she wasnât being used as a crutch. Though she had stumbled a few times, shaking the drumming pangs from her head. Damned rumble. It was a poor excuse. One that might earn her another stripe, or a claw through the gut, if she wasnât being careful.
âLetâs press on then,â her eyes followed Liaâs finger and nodded her head, signaling that Vesryn should take the lead. An ungraceful shadow, but one who could stab with the pointy end just as well.
A lumbering contraption of metal bindings and thick wood was being laboriously shoved along the beginning of stonework leading up to the fortressâ reinforced gates. Several soldiers lied grunting and groaning as the wheels clattered and spun across chunks of stone, sweaty faces peeking out from beneath helms. The sand certainly hadnât done the battering ram any favors. Its decreased mobility wasnât aiding those whoâd been tasked to push the damned thing either. Where arrows found their marks, injured men and women were pulled away behind the general safety of crooked, fallen pillars to be tended to. Others had stationed themselves at their sides, arrows notched and loosed at the ramparts, so that they could counter the arrows and shards of ice being hailed down.
The stone warren ahead of them tasted stale. Heavy with the grit of sand and the sear of flames licking at their sides; behind them and overhead. Everything so impossibly dry. Long hours had taken them towards the main gates, a slow and arduous trek. Even so, it felt as if everything was rushing quickly. Far too quick. Somewhere overhead, something thumped heavily against the walls and the ground beneath their feet trembled. All they needed to do was breach the walls. All they needed to do. Easier said than done when hell was raining down on them. Approaching a hornetâs nest with ladders, and a slow moving ram, was laughable. At least, Zahra thought so. Sheâd never been involved in such an assault before. Never had to fight alongside so many people before, either. So many faces. There were those sheâd come to know personally⊠and others whoâd joined them along the way.
There was a cry heard above the din. Hit. Or fire. Zahra couldnât tell. A large boulder sailed overhead and crashed into the side of the walls. Sending a line of armored men pinwheeling through the air. Stonework crumbled into shards of brick and trickled down the sides of the walls. Not quite enough to allow entrance, but definitely enough to crush those whoâd been unfortunate to stand there. Another volley fired shy of its mark and crashed somewhere within the gates while the ladders approached the base of the walls. Archers continued covering them from the ground, firing up with bare arrows, and some doused in flames.
Battle raged around her. Less hectic than Haven, to be sure. Zahra had the good sense to ignore the pang in her heart, even if she knew this could have much of the same result. Her friends, companions. They were not invulnerable, and neither was she. However, theyâd come out of hairier circumstances, and she had no doubts theyâd fight tooth and nail to accomplish what they needed to. She notched an arrow and loosed it from behind the advancing battering ram. Glimpsed the arrow striking into the slip between a Wardenâs helm, toppling forward off the walls. Only long enough to loose another.
Many of the Wardens on the walls had made note of the battering ram's ponderous approach, and turned their aim upon it. Flashes of fire lit up the darkening sky as spheres of orange flame careened down from the walls, aimed for the ram and the soldiers carrying it. Most of them crashed into barriers with heavy sounds, guttering out before reaching the soldiers and vital parts of the machinery itself. Both were protected by Asala and even Cyrus, who reinforced her work with some of his own, a slight variation in the shade of blue the only way to tell them apart. Each time a barrier shattered under the force of a blow, another bloomed over the empty space to replace it.
With his free arm, Cyrus hurled bolts of lightning, each precise enough to catch a figure on the walls above, and placed so as to ricochet between several more, breaking up the volleys and easing their slogging passage just a little. The Warden Nostariel's arrows were just as goodâunlike Zahra's, they tended to explode on impact, which made up for the fact that she didn't aim quite as accurately. The next to fly in blew off a heavy chunk of the crenelations on the wall, cracking the stone and sending a massive chunk of it over the side, the man who'd been standing on it following it down screaming.
The fighters who specialized in closer quarters were harder-pressed to help much at this stage. Those with shields were generally at the front, round and kite-shaped metal faces turned up to protect vulnerable heads and necks from the bite of arrowheads and icicles. Others carried ladders to try and mount the walls themselves, but keeping them in place long enough to use was proving difficult. The Wardens clearly knew how to hold a fortress; the rate at which Inquisition soldiers were falling to their arrows and magic was far too quick to sustain much longer. They had to make it the rest of the way to the door. Only then would Zahra and her companions be able to push inside and make an effort at breaking the siege.
The ram wasn't more than ten feet from the gate when a lucky volley struck two of the soldiers pushing it on the left, slipping in during the small gap between one barrier's fall and the next materializing. The men collapsed to the sand, the ram itself teetering dangerously to the side as the others pushing it tried to compensate for the sudden loss and prevent it from becoming hopelessly mired in sand.
Leon ducked in, catching one of the vacant handles in his grip. It was hard to tell given his helmet, but the heavy scrape of his gauntlets on the wood suggested that even he struggled to keep it from rolling back down the incline, at least for the few seconds it took for the other men to get their feet back underneath them. His boots sank heavily into the sand as he pushed for traction, taking a hard step forward to plant his treads on stone instead.
More arrows and magic flew in overhead in those precious seconds; one of the trebuchets went up in flames, scattering its crew. The Wardens were making use of Tevinter fire on the battlements as well, heaving a cauldron of it over onto one of the ladders that had managed to stake out a position on the wall. The screams as it splashed over the arms and chests of the Inquisition soldiers holding it in place at the bottom were unholy things, harsh even over the rest of the noise.
âForward!" The Commander rolled his shoulders back, adjusting to the weight of two-thirds of the ram's left side. At the command, it moved forward again, alighting on sand-covered stone. That proved to be the hardest part, and it rolled forward smoothly after that. Gesturing for another two soldiers to man the actual ram portion of the contraption, Leon stepped back and shook out his hands, flexing his fingers open and closed several times.
âDraw back." The soldiers shuffled to rock the ram back into the rearward position. As soon as they were steady, the Commander's voice boomed out again. âHeave!"
The sound of the hit echoed like thunder, reverberating through the banded wood of the gate. It held steady, though, and so the soldiers drew it back again. The second time, a harsher crack followed as part of the door splintered, and Leon gestured the advance team to cluster just behind and to the side of the siege weapon. There was no telling what the Wardens were assembling in there to meet them.
The third hit broke through a chunk of the wood, but it took several more before the opening was large enough for them to use. On the eighth, the right half of the door broke on its hinges and swung inwards, finally allowing them through.
"On me!" The elven knight among them was at the forefront of the attack, face hidden behind the mask of his helm, his spear lowered and shield ready to receive the first enemy. Vesryn charged forward, through the cloud of dust that had billowed up in the wreckage of the gate, temporarily disappearing from sight. The others followed close behind him, Inquisition soldiers at their backs supporting them. For the first few moments the going was slow as those in the front undoubtedly met a thick resistance, and Zahra wasn't able to see any of what was occurring inside. She could only hear the screams of the desperate and the dying, the roars of the attackers, and the wails of demons among their enemies.
But they pushed forward, heedless of any losses, and soon Zahra was able to make out the carnage inside the gate. The Wardens had mounted a fierce resistance, but they'd been cut down by the brutal attack of the Inquisition's assault party. The fallen bodies made the footing treacherous to those not paying attention. Dozens of arrows littered the ground where they'd harmlessly fallen after clattering off one of the barriers protecting the attackers from above. Still, some had made it through, and no few men and women of the Inquisition were on the ground and bleeding, or crawling for aid. Their attempts to secure the walls were going poorly.
Ahead, the bulk of the Warden warriors had been broken and driven back, and in their place the mages were commanding demons into the fray. Vesryn intercepted the first of the shades with his shield, bashing it quickly and leaving it on the ground so he could keep his shield facing forward and advance. Romulus swiftly took care of the fallen creature, his eyes slightly glazed from the effects of his tonics.
"Keep pushing forward!" Vesryn shouted, burying his spear in a Warden mage and toppling her as he redirected her stream of fire away with his shield.
Approximating hope from such carnage had never been Zahraâs style. As soon as the gates buckled and splintered inwards, sheâd vaulted onto the now unoccupied barricade ram. She notched and loosed her arrows into the swelling forefront of Wardenâs gawking overhead. Shouting commands, pointing fingers and firing arrows with less precision than they had been when their fortress had been shuttered close. Now that the Inquisition could spill into Adamantâs walls, utter chaos ensued. With the last of her arrows spent, she slung the bow around her shoulder and hopped down behind Vesryn and the others, pulling her rapier free from its scabbard.
Sheâd never be as good or quick as Marceline was, nor as graceful, if she was being honest⊠but using her bow in close-quarters, elbows nearly touching with companions and enemies alike wasnât efficient. Sheâd learned that long ago. Zahra breathed in, steadying herself as the dust settled around them. Silhouettes crashed together. The sound of metal scrapping against metal added to the crackle of thrown lightning bolts to their sides. There were still streaks of molten fire, casting light across their faces, before slamming into bodies. The smell⊠was almost unbearable. Burnt flesh. Coppery blood. Sand grit in their teeth. She was already having trouble dancing between scorched corpses. Though she spotted one of her own well enough. An arrow jutted from one of his shoulders. She swept down and slipped a hand under his armpit, dragging him back to his feet. Wordless, breathless.
Through skeins of smoke, a shade burst out and raked its claws down towards Zahraâs face. She only barely had enough time to throw them both to the ground. Her head cracked against the stone, hard enough to blow stars in her vision. Fortunately, not hard enough to render her unconscious. The world spun beneath her as she pushed herself to her feet and tried to regain her balance. A warm wetness wept from her hairline. She didnât need to touch it to know that it was hers. She smeared the blood away from her left eye in time to see the shade rear back towards her. This time, whether it was dumb luck or a bloom of anger swelling in her belly, Zahra hewed it with her blade and pushed past it. Further into the fortress.
They were more or less navigating through the fortress blind; what information the scouts had been able give them dealt with the fortifications rather than details of the layout, since those things would only be visible from the inside. Leon, up front near Vesryn, seemed to be choosing their course, though it was hard to know how he was doing it. Estella fell in next to Zahra, expression showing a flicker of concern before it smoothed out. Perhaps her tumble had been witnessed. âIâm alright,â Zahra offered with a toothy grin. She didnât know the extent of the damage, but that was always best handled afterwards.
The resistance seemed to thin for a while. The group's pace accelerated until they were all clipping along at a smooth jog, but Leon pulled them up before they rounded the next blind corner, ducking around it for a moment and then reappearing to gesture them all forward.
It seemed the battle here was already taking place, and the Wardens were manning both sides themselves. This knot looked to be mages and demons versus everyone else, if the armor styles were anything to go by. In truth there wasn't much left to do by the time they arrived, aside from blocking a flanking maneuver by several rage demons, something the fighters at the front took care of in short order.
The stillness after, when the Inquisition faced down the winning half, was tense. Estella's voice cut through it first.
âWhy were you fighting them?" Her tone was neutral, careful, modulated. Her face gave nothing away, yet, and the tension didn't quite abate.
Even so, one of the Wardens answered. His winged helmet seemed to be a mark of some rank distinction or another; the rest of them arrayed around him in a way that suggested he was the leader. "Because this is insanity, and they are no longer the people they once were." In contrast to Estella, he sounded haggard, tired, even through the metal of his helm.
âThen fight with us." Nostariel and Stroud moved into his line if sight. While the elf's expression was mild, her partner still wore a hard, disapproving scowl. At a look from her, though, it eased slightly.
"You could have realized this sooner, but it is good that you have now, at least." A few of those present, without helmets obscuring their faces, had the grace to look ashamed or at least properly chastened. Stroud glanced at Romulus and Estella. "Perhaps we should send them back, to help your army breach the wall. They would not be noticed as hostile until they attacked, I should think."
The man with the helm inclined his head. "We would be willing to do this... but you should be careful ahead. I know not what Clarel and that man are preparing for you, but they retreated to do it as soon as you were spotted."
"Then we should keep moving," Vesryn said, lifting his shield from where it had rested with its bottom rim against the ground. "Go on then, beat some sense into your brethren, and we'll put a stop to this insanity."
The Wardens went on their way, as did the assault party. The fortress proved difficult to navigate, not only due to their unfamiliarity. An unfortunate side effect of the siege engines was that several large stones had collapsed the quickest pathways, eventually forcing them up onto the battlements to seek an alternative route. It seemed that Inquisition forces had finally gotten something of a foothold, as they encountered small numbers of their own troops, battling for control of the high ground. They assisted where they could, but could not linger for long if they wanted to stop Clarel and Pike.
Up ahead they came upon a lookout point of sorts, a wider section of wall that overlooked a significant portion of the fortress. There they found a number of their troops engaged with a vicious contingent of demons. Upon closer inspection, they proved to be some of their scouts, with Lia at the helm of them. She dueled with a floating despair demon, the creature nimbly twirling away from one of her arrows and flinging itself through the air, launching an icy spike as it went. The projectile tore through the leather on Lia's left arm, leaving a bloody wound in its wake, and a lucky shade immediately tackled her from behind. The pair went down together, but Lia soon drove a knife into its head, rolling out from under its writhing mass as nimbly as she was able to.
Many of the others had gone in for close quarters, as well. Signy covered Rhys's back, driving one of her two hatchets into the single eye of another shade. Blood spattered liberally over her face and leather armor, but it went as unheeded in her case as in the rest. Rhys took a step away from her for a moment, swinging one of his sabers from below and slashing another shade up its body before coming across with the other. It hissed weakly as it bled out, and he returned back to Signy, slinging the lingering blood off of the edges of his blades.
The despair demon bore down on Lia, threatening to continue flinging ice spears at her until an arrow struck it in the side. From among their own group, Ashton broke off and fired another arrow at the demon, striking it once more before he became its new focus. Unlike Zahra, he had stuck with his bow even in close combat, pilfering ammunition from fallen Wardens on the wall. As he nocked the next arrow, the demon feinted again, attempting to bait Ashton's arrow, but he must have seen it coming because the next arrow struck true as well, felling the demon out of the air and dispersing when it struck the ground.
"Now's not the time to be laying around," Ashton said holding out a hand for Lia to take, his tone far more grim than his words.
"Thanks," Lia said, taking his hand and getting back to her feet. "And thank the gods you're all okay. Took us longer than we would've liked to get through on the walls, and I thought we'd fallen behind. Didn't expect we were actually ahead of you."
"We encountered a few complications of our own," Vesryn said, ensuring that the immediate area was clear of demons. "Any idea how far we've yet to go to reach Pike?"
"Not far, I don't think. Keep going that way," she pointed towards the center of the fortress. "You should hurry, we heard some strange noises before we were set upon. We'll cover your backs."
Zahra joined Vesryn at his side. Better off next to someone with a shield to batter a path open. Sheâd been dancing between shades, much more nimble now that she wasnât being used as a crutch. Though she had stumbled a few times, shaking the drumming pangs from her head. Damned rumble. It was a poor excuse. One that might earn her another stripe, or a claw through the gut, if she wasnât being careful.
âLetâs press on then,â her eyes followed Liaâs finger and nodded her head, signaling that Vesryn should take the lead. An ungraceful shadow, but one who could stab with the pointy end just as well.