Before Vesryn could properly comprehend what had happened to him, the darkness of the Deep Roads chasm was replaced by a green-tinted mountainous landscape, as though he'd simply hit the ground and fallen out of the sky again. But the air felt instantly different, immediately wrong to him. Not that it was any concern of his until his descent slowed just before he expected to slam into the ground and die. He was pulled to a gentle stop, and then roughly deposited in a shallow pool of... something. Water, perhaps? It didn't taste like it, nor did it look like it.
He flailed about like an idiot for a moment, his body still refusing to believe that he was somehow still alive. Saraya was bewildered and perplexed and alarmed about as much as he was, but where her instincts sought their surroundings, Vesryn sought his spear. His weapon had fallen a few feet from him, and he pushed himself out of the foul pool, picking it up again alongside his shield. The ground felt wet beneath his boots, unstable and shifting. Like he was in the midst of an earthquake without all of the shaking, just... shifting.
"Estella?" he called. Had he seen her do something while they fell? It was hard to say, he'd been spinning and only briefly catching glimpses of the others around him. "Cyrus? Romulus? Anyone?" His voice echoed around him, off the walls and the indistinct shapes in the distance. The sky was... green, swirling, unnatural. Saraya immediately protested his calling. She knew where they were, and she knew to be on guard. Vesryn could agree with that, but he needed to find the others. Anyone else. The silence in that moment was unbearable.
He had landed in somewhat of a dead end, but there was a rough path leading forward, and so he took it, putting one foot in front of the other, stepping around more pools, and eventually encountering a lone wraith. A pitiful, lonely demon, it wailed at the sight of him and hurled magic. The attack bounced off his shield, and Vesryn closed the gap and speared the creature, watching it fizzle and fade in front of him. More demons...
"Estella!" He saw her sprawled face-down atop a pile of rubble, pieces of what might have been the bridge they had stood upon before Pike obliterated it. Carefully, he took her by the shoulders and rolled her over onto her back, setting her down on the softer ground and checking her for injuries. He pulled off his tall helm and set it aside, touching a gloved hand to her face. "Estella, wake up. Come on, wake up." He couldn't find anything in the way of serious injuries, but it didn't stop him from worrying...
She seemed to wake abruptly, pulling in a rasping hiss by way of breath before it turned into a weak cough. A shudder wracked her, but she steadied after a moment, cracking her eyes open and blinking unfocused eyes several times. Clarity slowly returned to them, at least the clarity required to recognize him. Her brow furrowed; she got her hands underneath her and managed to push herself into a sitting position. “Vesryn?"
Her eyes flickered to their surroundings, comprehension or something close enough to it dawning over her features. Her lips parted, but it took several more seconds before she could speak. “We're... what have I done?" Her breath still rattled; he could hear that much in the oppressive quiet. “Where are the others?"
"I don't know," he admitted. "I fell or... was dropped here, alone. You're the first person I've found. Discounting a lone demon. What did you do? We were falling, I thought I saw you do something with your mark." He kept one hand firmly upon her shoulder; she didn't look very steady yet to him. "Estella, where are we?"
She pursed her lips, but not fast enough to hide the small tremble in them. Swallowing thickly, she shook her head. “I—I don't know what happened. The mark did something and—this is the Fade. We're in the Fade, and we're not dead." Her eyes were wide, too round; it seemed that she was on the verge of panic. “The last time this happened, it created the Darkspawn, and I've..." Her eyes glimmered, the rims reddening. “All I wanted to do was help, and I..."
The Fade... that was, to put it lightly, quite extraordinary, and made a great deal of sense now that she said it. Saraya was able to confirm her words quickly enough, and Vesryn was more than willing to trust them both. It looked a great deal less friendly than his dreams, even the ones he wasn't too fond of. Perhaps that had something to do with standing in it physically.
But he was forgetting himself, and he squeezed Estella's shoulder. "Nonsense. You're alive, I'm alive, there's no reason to think the others aren't alive somewhere in here as well. If you brought us in here, you must be able to take us out again. I know you can." He stood from his crouch, offering his hand down to her. "Come on. Cyrus can help us make sense of this. We'll come up with something."
Estella shook her head again, almost violently. “I can't. I can't replicate an accident. We're going to be stuck in here, and that's if we don't—if we don't end up as Darkspawn ourselves. What good is being alive if we're trapped in the Fade until some demon gets the better of us, or worse?" Drawing her knees up to her chest, she hugged them close to herself, leaving his hand untaken.
“Go if you want. I don't have any right to stop you. You and Saraya have a better chance of working this out than I do, anyway, especially if you can find Cyrus."
Vesryn's mouth hung open rather dumbly for a moment, before he shut it in a frown. He had thought that would work. It was terrifying for her, undoubtedly, to have done something so unheard of, thought impossible even, but she had to know she was the center of this. She had brought them here. Maybe Romulus could take them out again if they could find him, if he still lived, but Romulus had never done anything like this even on accident, at least as far as they knew. Saraya was confused, too, still wary of everything around them.
"Estella... we need you. You've already done the impossible, you can do it again. You can still help us. If not for yourself, then for us." It hurt to look at, the way she was sitting there. Nothing stopping her from rising but herself. She wasn't wounded, she wasn't ensnared by anything other than her own mind. How did he not see this coming? As far as he could tell, she hadn't been in any danger of breaking like this. Was he so blind?
"I'm not leaving you here, Estella."
“You should." She tilted her head up to meet his eyes with a guileless expression. “You're kind, Vesryn, but you don't know the first thing about me. Please stop trying to help. You can't." Her throat worked as she swallowed something back. “I'm sorry, but you can't."
He felt a pang in his chest upon hearing that, but it was almost entirely drowned out by Saraya's warnings, which he was more than willing to heed. It was a preferable alternative to this being the state of things, the state she'd been reduced to. His look of concern melted away into a rather blank stare. "Respectfully, I'd like to disagree." He took one step to the side, slowly scooping up his shield and wiping a bit of muck from the face of it. That done, his slipped his hand around the shaft of his spear, but rather than turn to leave, he took a single step back, and lowered the spear at Estella. Not poised to strike, but obviously on guard.
"You and I have been through a great deal already. You have doubted yourself, despaired even, but I have witnessed you take on odds bordering on the reckless without hesitation when your friends needed you. You have never wavered in that, and I don't think you would now." He curled his lip, allowing himself to feel a little contempt despite how wrong his instincts told him it was. "Whatever magic has ensnared you, you need to fight it. Or if you're some demon here simply to toy with me, assume your true form and face me, so that I can end this and move on."
If it was a demon of some kind, it was doing a very impressive job mimicking Estella's facial expressions—or at least what they would probably look like if she ever made her feelings apparent. “I'm not under any spell," she said with a sigh. “And I'm not going to fight you. You can kill me if you really think I'm some demon. It won't change anything anyway." She regarded the point of his spear steadily, as though she really didn't much mind either way.
“I envy you, if you can't even imagine being crushed enough times to finally give up. If you can't believe that I've hit that limit. That's a nice thing to think about me." She smiled wryly. “Perhaps I'm grateful."
His spear arm jerked forward, the spear tip moving a few inches towards Estella before Vesryn wrenched it back. A look of surprise passed over his face before he washed it away. Instinct alone had told him to strike her, but it was entirely Saraya's and not his. Her urge was strong, powerful, trying to outdo Vesryn's hesitation. She wanted to kill her, her every emotion demanding Vesryn do so. Naturally Vesryn felt he couldn't do it, and he could almost hear Saraya chiding him for it. His brow twisted in pain, as though looking at an oncoming charge of darkspawn about to overwhelm him. He only trusted one person more than Estella, and that was the one that had been guiding him for nearly half of his life.
"Please... forgive me if I am wrong. If Saraya is wrong." He knew she would, too. Swiftly and surely, he let Saraya's steadiness and precision drive the spear tip forward, with the speed and strength needed to pierce through Estella's leathers... and her heart.
She pulled in a sharp breath before going slack. There was no attempt there to put up a fight, not even when it became clear what he intended to do.
“Vesryn?" His name was slow, slightly drawn-out, as though the speaker were uncertain it was the right one to apply. It too appeared to belong to Estella. This one was a bit more scuffed; there was a cut on her cheek that had given her a broad smear of blood from the side of her nose to her jaw, like she'd wiped at it. She was climbing over whatever version of the debris from their fall had been retained or created in the Fade; just after she spoke, she landed on ground level.
Her eyes moved from him, and his bloody spear, to the entity he'd just killed. One that looked very much like her. Her motion stilled; very carefully, she laid her hand on the hilt of her sword, brows furrowing, but she did not draw.
Vesryn swiftly turned and put his shield in front of him, wrenching the spear free and letting the form of Estella fall to the ground. The end of his weapon dripped blood in front of him, and emotionally he found himself less than stable. He was starting to feel anger in equal parts to grief. Some justification at least that another image of Estella would appear, somewhat convincing him he hadn't just murdered her, but also anger, that the Fade might be throwing more tricks at him.
"Don't come any closer. Please." His tone practically begged her to stay still. "If you're another specter of the Fade or some poor imitation of Estella, just stop. Don't make me do this again." Saraya, at least, was not immediately demanding he attack, for which he was immensely thankful.
Immediately, she raised both hands to the level of her shoulders a bit in front of her, perhaps thrown by his demeanor. A step backwards put her heels right at the edge of a fallen chunk of bridge; she shuffled with some apparent discomfort, but did not attempt to approach. “It's all right," she said, tone measured and even. “I can't... I don't think I can prove to you that I'm me, I'm afraid. The demon here probably knows everything you'd expect me to say or do, and everything you wouldn't, so..."
She shrugged a little. “Just, um... I'll stay here, and if you can think of anything that would prove what needs proving... let me know, okay?" Her eyes turned briefly down what looked like the path forward, and then to the obvious corpse, but she didn't let them linger for more than a moment before returning them to him.
Vesryn's spear wavered for a moment, and then fell. He planted the butt of it in the marshy ground and sank into a crouch, exhaling heavily, his breath shaky. He took several more before he trusted himself enough to speak. "It probably doesn't matter. If you're a demon, I couldn't do it again anyway." That was a lie, and he knew it. It wasn't entirely, though; he couldn't do it once. Saraya could do it as many times as she was required, but still... the very motion would haunt him.
"Just..." he hesitated. "What do you think we should do? I'm lost here. Even with a mage in my head."
Estella let her hands fall. It seemed that she was still hesitant to approach him, though she also appeared to want to, at least if the small half-step she took before standing still again was any indication. “I... well, yes. It's not... I'm not really sure how to fix this, but if anyone will have a good idea of what it would take, it's Cyrus. We should make sure to find everyone, and then try and... undo whatever it is I did." She frowned down at the mark on her hand for a second, shaking her head once and closing her fingers over it.
“I hope... I really hope they're alive. For what it's worth, I'm glad to know you are. I suspect we have that in common." She made a clear attempt at a smile that got at least halfway there.
He had to believe that it was her. It felt like her. Determined to find Cyrus and the rest, and figure out a way to escape, and yet still concerned that all of this was somehow her fault. It was her doing, certainly, but Vesryn could find no fault in it. "The only reason any of us still have a chance at surviving this is because of you, Estella. And if anything ill should come of this... being in the Fade, we'll deal with it together."
He pushed himself up, collecting his helmet and using his spear as a sort of walking stick while he closed the distance between them. He pulled to a stop before her. "I'm glad you're alright, too. I—" He half glanced back at where the fallen and false Estella lay, then down at the blood still upon his weapon. "I'm just glad you're okay."
The terrain remained mountainous for them, steep and rocky walls surrounding them on either side and offering them only one path forward, which Vesryn led the way down. Still the footing remained soft and wet, uncomfortably similar to that blasted marsh in which he'd first met Estella. He wasn't fond of it, nor of the way it shifted and moved as though it were alive. Or watching them.
"Visitors... welcome. You have pleased me thus far, do not stop now."
Vesryn immediately halted and raised his shield, trying to locate the source of the voice, but it was annoyingly omnipresent, and even Saraya let off a pang of discomfort at the tone of it. Vesryn checked briefly to ensure that Estella had heard it as well.
"And what an exquisite pair you are. Or... a trio. Very unique. First we have the would-be elven knight, a fraud in ancient armor, made a puppet by an unknown soul that you allowed to slither through your mind and body."
"If you have a tongue, demon, I'd advise you to hold it." Vesryn practically spat the words, sliding his tallhelm down into place over his features.
Estella had no such easy way to conceal her face, and it was to her the voice next directed its attention.
"Well, well, well. Lady Inquisitor Estella Avenarius. Herald of Andraste. Argent Lions Lieutenant. Friend to princes and Viscountesses and Grey Wardens and even the Black Divine himself. Beloved of the heartless, dearest to the selfish. How very... significant, you are. In more ways than you could possibly understand."
She visibly braced herself, drawing in a breath and keeping her eyes fixed straight ahead on the path before them.
"And not one bit of it deserved. Not one bit of it earned. A pretender, a fake, an imposter."
The demon laughed, a low sound unable to escape its own menace.
"So. Much. Fear. The contents of your mind would feed every creature here for decades. Have you room for anything else?"
She did not answer, expression unmoving as stone.
"And as much as you have... my, it pales in comparison to the third. How many lifetimes do you have to draw upon?" The demon seemed to draw in a sudden breath. "Why, you even fear that I should speak your name. For you have not heard it for generations beyond counting, and what a terrible crime it would be for me to be the first."
Vesryn could feel it. Her fear. The demon was tugging at it, drawing it out, and it was truly powerful, enough that his stomach began to coil uncomfortably, his knees began to feel weak, and his breath came sharp and rapidly. It was all he could do to keep moving forward. There was no way to fight this thing, and thus they simply had to endure it, and keep pushing on.
"Allow me to gorge on your fear. You will make me strong indeed... look upon the field and remember, wisp of a woman."
The path then bent to their left, around a corner, and before them was an open, marshy field. Upon it were bodies, hundreds of them, mangled and broken, the aftermath of a battle in which only one side had been dealt death and defeat. Their armor, where it was not blasted and bloody, was ornate and remarkable in the way Vesryn's was. The corpses were that of elves, their faces fair and hauntingly beautiful, left pristine and untouched despite the wounds covering their bodies. Their eyes were open, staring lifelessly towards Vesryn and Estella.
"I know you remember. No passage of time could ever make you forget. And what you fear are the very words I could spill next. The way I could utterly destroy the faith of the warrior that carries you, your one remaining connection to life, your one hope of... achieving your goals."
Looking upon the faces, Vesryn felt a veritable storm of emotions welling within him. An impossible rage, at the demon, but more than that... a terrible, terrible guilt. Sorrow beyond comprehension. Tears sprang to his eyes entirely unbidden, and Vesryn choked on his next breath, unable to keep his feet. He sank heavily forward to his knees, ripping off his helmet again and gasping for air.
Estella crouched beside him, pulling his hair back out of his way with careful hands and placing her unmarked palm at his shoulder-blades. Even through the armor, it was perceptible, solidly present but not heavy. “Breathe slowly," she urged gently. “In through your nose and out through your mouth." She seemed to be following her own advice, though whether that was intended to help him or because she simply needed to wasn't exactly clear.
He tried this several times, and found it to be of middling effectiveness. "She knows... their faces," he managed. "Every one." They were faces she had not seen for years innumerable, and now only in this hellish landscape were they reunited.
"Cross the field, and let them give her the welcome she deserves... or go back, and wither away alone. The choice is yours."
Slowly, steadily Vesryn began to regain control of himself, and shakily got back to his feet. The helmet would remain off, hooked to the back of his belt. He needed all the breath he could get. Testing his grip on his spear, he first looked at the distance they would need to cross, and then at Estella. "We need to get through this. We can't go back."
She nodded once, clearly ready to move when he was.
He nodded back, and led the way out into the field of bodies. The eyes... they followed them where they went, though the bodies remained entirely still. Unblinking they stared, boring into Vesryn's mind and unnerving him more with each step. Their footing was uncertain. They had to step over bodies in many places, or sink into nearly knee deep muck and soil, tinted crimson with still leaking blood, as though the battle had occurred mere minutes earlier.
"You should be thankful for your lack of sleep. For I know what nightmare would have plagued you otherwise. Live it now, if you can."
A creaking of bone, armor, and flesh alerted Vesryn to one of the corpses rising on his right. The body of the elven warrior was in shambles, a hole punched straight through his midsection by some powerful magic perhaps. He shambled forward, blade in hand, moving swifter than Vesryn expected. He caught the first blow on his shield, kicked the undead body back into the muck, and plunged his spear down into the softened face of the warrior. Though it ended the threat, the body still continued to writhe disgustingly on the ground long after the spear had been removed.
Behind them, another was rising with a pair of short swords and heading straight for Estella. A third began to move right at her feet, and reached up to ensnare one of her legs.
She pulled the leg in question away, stepping back and pointing at the corpse with the first two fingers of her left hand. She grimaced, but red-gold fire bloomed to life at her fingertips, surging into the corpse still on the ground. The blast was enough to still it, save the occasional twitch in one of its extremities. Her right hand drew the knife at her back in just enough time to block the incoming swing from the next. She was forced several steps back in the muck, but that gave her enough time and space to draw her saber, the enchantment glimmering brightly against the rather dull-colored surroundings.
“Hang on, hang on, I can..." She seemed to be talking more to herself than anything, but the words did have some relevance; in the next moment, bright flames bloomed at the point of Vesryn's spear. Fire was generally effective where the undead were concerned—it wasn't a bad idea.
She shifted; from the sounds of it, she was moving into place behind him. “There are another half-dozen getting up back here. Just, uh, so you know."
"Keep moving!" Vesryn urged, plunging the now-flaming spear through one of the elves and bringing it back down into the marsh. "Watch your step." The ones at their feet were easily the most dangerous, armed and likely to move at any moment. And they couldn't really just torch the ground where they were about to step.
"Even in your mind, she is still restrained, Vesryn. Still bound by ancient magic that even her escape into your body could not undo. Shall I weaken the bonds for you? Shall we see what changes it unlocks?"
The demon did something, then. Vesryn couldn't begin to comprehend what, but it felt as though his very mind was beginning to unravel. Just as he discarded another of Saraya's resurrected memories he screamed out in pain, collapsing in a heap on his side next to one of the bodies. Without thinking he dropped his spear, his hand clutching at his head. The pain worsened and worsened, amplified by Saraya's grief, her guilt, the terror...
And then she screamed.
He heard her voice in his mind, crying wordlessly in agony, and then the moans formed into words, ancient elven that he did not understand, but every babbling word of it felt like it was splitting his skull open. The demon's voice boomed above Saraya's.
"Will it destroy you, Vesryn? Will it obliterate your mind, kill her in the process? Shall I take the next step for you?"
"Please, Saraya," Vesryn whispered, even though it was more than it would take for her to hear him. "Withdraw. Be silent... please." He never imagined it would happen like this, if it happened at all. He never imagined the first sound of hers he would hear would be screaming agony. He never imagined he would want it to stop. But he did, for he knew it would kill him if she continued.
And she withdrew, leaving Vesryn to his own mind as much as she was capable of. He groaned in pain, his hand finding his spear again, and he struggled to rise.
A corpse fell next to him, still smoking. Estella braced her foot on its shoulder and used the pin to wrench her saber free of its belly. Her face and front were spattered—it was probably better not to know exactly how much of it was mud and how much was corpse bile. From the number of bodies with fresh burns or slashes, she'd been moving quickly while he was down; there was a notable radius of several feet in every direction that was conspicuously free of the dead.
She looked like she wanted to say something when he rose, eyes a bit too bright to be wholly dry, but whatever it was, she must have decided it could wait. “It's not much farther," she said steadily, pointing with her sword. The field did indeed seem to end some fifty yards away or so. “Are you okay to get there?"
Vesryn nodded, unable to manage any more words. He felt unstable, off-balance, struck with fatigue. It was always a shock to be without Saraya's guidance, but she could offer none for him now, not physically nor mentally. He would have to manage on his own.
They charged for the end, at one point Vesryn bowling headlong into a corpse with his shield, smashing it underneath him, and he clumsily got back to his feet, tripping more than once where the footing was too treacherous. He'd sustained a few slash wounds by the time they reached the end of the bodies, and he hadn't even had time to see if Estella was wounded as well. But they were free of the marsh, on slightly more solid ground again, and as they put more distance between them and it, the bodies behind them fell once more to their rest, and silence reigned.
"This is not a fear you can run from, I'm afraid. Whether it takes a day or ten thousand years, it will catch up with you. But go, continue your flight as long as you are able, and I will feast on your fears all the while."
Only when they had put the marsh out of sight, and the path began to lead down and into fog did Vesryn stop, breathing heavily. He sank against the rock behind him, weariness permeating from his every action.
"I heard her voice, Estella," he said, gasping in air. "I heard Saraya in my head."
She blinked at the declaration, standing awkwardly for a moment before she took a somewhat more cautious kneeling position next to him. Her breath was heavy, but even, and she didn't look to be particularly injured anywhere. Just dirty and sweaty. “What... what was all that?" she asked, leaning forward a bit to inspect a cut on his arm. “I mean, I heard what the demon said, but to me the rest of it was just... you in a lot of pain." Her eyes met his for a moment, but then she glanced back down, a soft purplish light forming at her hands.
“Sorry—I'm not going to be able to do what Asala does, even here." The bleeding did stop, though, and then the light shifted to something more greenish and the wound closed over. It was definitely still tender, though—it might tear open again if he pulled at it too hard.
"I can feel what Saraya feels," he explained. "It was like... like when we were first joined, when I first found her. Overwhelming emotion that almost cripples me. Then it was a wish for death, despair at finally being released only to find herself in a new cage. Now... it was grief, and guilt, and sorrow. As though she failed them all somehow, maybe. It's hard to say." And he couldn't, not while Saraya was withdrawn as she was. Nor did he expect she wished to linger on the subjects. The fact that she remained in her state of silence implied to Vesryn that it still wasn't safe.
"The demon... was able to do something, I don't know what. Manipulate some restraints still upon her, perhaps. It felt like... like my mind was being torn to pieces from the inside. Whatever pain I felt, Saraya felt as well, and then... I heard her scream. Incomprehensible words and screams. That was all." If it was permanent, whatever the demon had done, he couldn't bear to think about leaving it that way. With those awful screams being the only memory he could have of Saraya's voice.
"She's withdrawn now, deep in my mind. It's as close as we can get to being alone from each other, but she's still there. It was the only way I could think to make the pain stop. For our purposes, it's... just me now." And already he felt wholly inadequate without her. He'd barely survived the escape, against foes that were more frightening than actually dangerous. All those years working alongside Saraya and he still could hardly hold his own.
"Thank you. I very much doubt I'd have gotten through that alone." If he had actually gotten through. That remained to be seen, and the uncomfortable headache he still had was not the best of signs.
In the time he'd spoken, Estella had patched the wound in his side similarly to the one on his arm, but she looked to be nearing the limit of her magic, for the moment. She shook her head. “The fight? That's just what friends do." She dredged up a wry smile from somewhere, though it quickly became a pensive frown, drawn brow to match.
“I don't think there's anything we can do about the rest, for now. It sounds like you're both still... intact, at least. Maybe if we defeat the demon, things will go back to normal. If they don't, we can cross that bridge when we come to it." A brief flicker of guilt moved over her face, but she quashed it quickly. “Do you think you can stand? We can rest a while longer if you need." She pushed to her feet and offered an arm down.
"No, we should keep moving." He took hold of the offered arm and got back to his feet, surveying the path ahead. "Hopefully that was the worst of the demon's surprises."
“I'd say it must have been, but I'd really rather not know, in all honesty." Releasing his arm, Estella stepped away and glanced down the path in front of them. It was blanketed in a thick fog; the ground was more solid under their feet than before, but not by a great deal. Her lips thinned, but she stepped forward anyway, leading the way in.
The fog had a similar green-grey color to the sky, and as they walked, the path seemed to grade down, immersing them in ever-increasing thick clouds of the stuff. It wasn't more than a few minutes before Vesryn could barely see Estella in front of him, and that was more because she'd lit a small mage-light over an open palm than anything.
It was chilly, enough that his breath clouded in front of him and it seemed almost that some frost glittered in the swirling clouds, along with tiny fragments of light, jumping randomly around like crackles of electricity.
That was all silent, though—in fact, everything was silent, at least until the whispers started up. Not so unlike the Envy demon's, actually, from Therinfal. But these were in many voices rather than one, and Estella seemed to be the focus of their attention. The fog itself shaped around her, forming briefly into shapes like hands to brush at the nape of her neck or the sides of her face; they seemed equally content with anywhere bare skin was exposed. At first, the whispers themselves were hard for him to make out, but they increased in volume enough for him to hear in time.
"Lieutenant, huh? Yeah... I like that. I'll be in your squad, Stel. You can count on me."
"We need to come up with something cool to call ourselves. Because we're the best squad, obviously."
"We're not calling ourselves the Star Knights. See? Even the Lieutenant thinks that's a stupid name, she's laughing at you!"
"We decided on a name, Lieutenant. We're just going to be Stel's Team. It's the only thing everyone could agree on, so... we hope you don't mind."
Estella's pace faltered for just a moment; she sucked in a shaky breath, clearly tilting her head up for the space of a few seconds before resuming her forward progress. As they walked, the fog started to form almost into distinct shapes, most of them falling apart as soon as Vesryn's or Estella's passage disturbed the air. Some of them looked familiar, almost, but they didn't hold their shape long enough to be sure.
"Genny, is that you?"
That voice was the clearest yet—it stopped Estella cold. From the fog emerged the shape of an elderly man. He was clearly composed of it as well, but held together with much more sharpness and clarity. The surface of the apparition seemed to cover a layer of light, like there was a wisp inside the cloud or something similar. He moved forward, not stopping until he was within a couple feet of Estella, squinting in a slightly-exaggerated fashion before smiling with relief.
"Oh, it is. You'll not believe the dream I just had, Genny. Such a strange one—you were dead and then there was..." He trailed off, reaching forward as if to lay a hand on the side of Estella's face.
She flinched almost violently, taking a hard step back and nearly hitting Vesryn. “Leave me alone," she rasped, stirring the fog violently with her hands.
The figure disappeared for a moment, but reformed again a second later as though nothing had changed. “Genny? Your hair is... it's the wrong color. What have you—you're not Genny!" His face contorted; the apparition's mouth opened and let out a bellow, a sound of pure betrayal and rage. It flew at them both, passing harmlessly over them with a gust of frigid air. The drops of fog that had condensed on Vesryn's armor froze in place.
He'd almost had his spear down in time to do something useful if the apparition were indeed a threat to them, but it turned out not to matter, and Vesryn quickly assumed a more neutral stance. Though the figure was gone, the fog hadn't lifted, even if it seemed to no longer be toying with Estella. There wasn't much he could do about any of it, a fact that didn't sit right with him. At least Saraya's demons could be beaten and burned at for a time. As for Estella's... he understood the first part easily enough, the squad she'd lost when she somehow survived the explosion that created the Breach. But the second part he was entirely unsure of. It seemed to bother her a great deal more effectively. He wanted to help, but these sorts of things were often private, and unlike the demon, Vesryn had no wish to intrude on that if he wasn't wanted.
"Are you alright?" he asked, settling for that. It felt inadequate, as likely none of them were alright after this, but it was all he could think to say.
She glanced back at the question. Frost streaked down through the dirt on her face, but she smiled briefly. Unconvincingly. “I will be, when we get out of here. Better not to stop, I think." Returning her attention forward, she started walking again, the little light in her hand still valiantly fighting through the fog.
"Truer words were never spoken," Vesryn said to himself, continuing forward behind her before the fog could remove her from his sight.
He flailed about like an idiot for a moment, his body still refusing to believe that he was somehow still alive. Saraya was bewildered and perplexed and alarmed about as much as he was, but where her instincts sought their surroundings, Vesryn sought his spear. His weapon had fallen a few feet from him, and he pushed himself out of the foul pool, picking it up again alongside his shield. The ground felt wet beneath his boots, unstable and shifting. Like he was in the midst of an earthquake without all of the shaking, just... shifting.
"Estella?" he called. Had he seen her do something while they fell? It was hard to say, he'd been spinning and only briefly catching glimpses of the others around him. "Cyrus? Romulus? Anyone?" His voice echoed around him, off the walls and the indistinct shapes in the distance. The sky was... green, swirling, unnatural. Saraya immediately protested his calling. She knew where they were, and she knew to be on guard. Vesryn could agree with that, but he needed to find the others. Anyone else. The silence in that moment was unbearable.
He had landed in somewhat of a dead end, but there was a rough path leading forward, and so he took it, putting one foot in front of the other, stepping around more pools, and eventually encountering a lone wraith. A pitiful, lonely demon, it wailed at the sight of him and hurled magic. The attack bounced off his shield, and Vesryn closed the gap and speared the creature, watching it fizzle and fade in front of him. More demons...
"Estella!" He saw her sprawled face-down atop a pile of rubble, pieces of what might have been the bridge they had stood upon before Pike obliterated it. Carefully, he took her by the shoulders and rolled her over onto her back, setting her down on the softer ground and checking her for injuries. He pulled off his tall helm and set it aside, touching a gloved hand to her face. "Estella, wake up. Come on, wake up." He couldn't find anything in the way of serious injuries, but it didn't stop him from worrying...
She seemed to wake abruptly, pulling in a rasping hiss by way of breath before it turned into a weak cough. A shudder wracked her, but she steadied after a moment, cracking her eyes open and blinking unfocused eyes several times. Clarity slowly returned to them, at least the clarity required to recognize him. Her brow furrowed; she got her hands underneath her and managed to push herself into a sitting position. “Vesryn?"
Her eyes flickered to their surroundings, comprehension or something close enough to it dawning over her features. Her lips parted, but it took several more seconds before she could speak. “We're... what have I done?" Her breath still rattled; he could hear that much in the oppressive quiet. “Where are the others?"
"I don't know," he admitted. "I fell or... was dropped here, alone. You're the first person I've found. Discounting a lone demon. What did you do? We were falling, I thought I saw you do something with your mark." He kept one hand firmly upon her shoulder; she didn't look very steady yet to him. "Estella, where are we?"
She pursed her lips, but not fast enough to hide the small tremble in them. Swallowing thickly, she shook her head. “I—I don't know what happened. The mark did something and—this is the Fade. We're in the Fade, and we're not dead." Her eyes were wide, too round; it seemed that she was on the verge of panic. “The last time this happened, it created the Darkspawn, and I've..." Her eyes glimmered, the rims reddening. “All I wanted to do was help, and I..."
The Fade... that was, to put it lightly, quite extraordinary, and made a great deal of sense now that she said it. Saraya was able to confirm her words quickly enough, and Vesryn was more than willing to trust them both. It looked a great deal less friendly than his dreams, even the ones he wasn't too fond of. Perhaps that had something to do with standing in it physically.
But he was forgetting himself, and he squeezed Estella's shoulder. "Nonsense. You're alive, I'm alive, there's no reason to think the others aren't alive somewhere in here as well. If you brought us in here, you must be able to take us out again. I know you can." He stood from his crouch, offering his hand down to her. "Come on. Cyrus can help us make sense of this. We'll come up with something."
Estella shook her head again, almost violently. “I can't. I can't replicate an accident. We're going to be stuck in here, and that's if we don't—if we don't end up as Darkspawn ourselves. What good is being alive if we're trapped in the Fade until some demon gets the better of us, or worse?" Drawing her knees up to her chest, she hugged them close to herself, leaving his hand untaken.
“Go if you want. I don't have any right to stop you. You and Saraya have a better chance of working this out than I do, anyway, especially if you can find Cyrus."
Vesryn's mouth hung open rather dumbly for a moment, before he shut it in a frown. He had thought that would work. It was terrifying for her, undoubtedly, to have done something so unheard of, thought impossible even, but she had to know she was the center of this. She had brought them here. Maybe Romulus could take them out again if they could find him, if he still lived, but Romulus had never done anything like this even on accident, at least as far as they knew. Saraya was confused, too, still wary of everything around them.
"Estella... we need you. You've already done the impossible, you can do it again. You can still help us. If not for yourself, then for us." It hurt to look at, the way she was sitting there. Nothing stopping her from rising but herself. She wasn't wounded, she wasn't ensnared by anything other than her own mind. How did he not see this coming? As far as he could tell, she hadn't been in any danger of breaking like this. Was he so blind?
"I'm not leaving you here, Estella."
“You should." She tilted her head up to meet his eyes with a guileless expression. “You're kind, Vesryn, but you don't know the first thing about me. Please stop trying to help. You can't." Her throat worked as she swallowed something back. “I'm sorry, but you can't."
He felt a pang in his chest upon hearing that, but it was almost entirely drowned out by Saraya's warnings, which he was more than willing to heed. It was a preferable alternative to this being the state of things, the state she'd been reduced to. His look of concern melted away into a rather blank stare. "Respectfully, I'd like to disagree." He took one step to the side, slowly scooping up his shield and wiping a bit of muck from the face of it. That done, his slipped his hand around the shaft of his spear, but rather than turn to leave, he took a single step back, and lowered the spear at Estella. Not poised to strike, but obviously on guard.
"You and I have been through a great deal already. You have doubted yourself, despaired even, but I have witnessed you take on odds bordering on the reckless without hesitation when your friends needed you. You have never wavered in that, and I don't think you would now." He curled his lip, allowing himself to feel a little contempt despite how wrong his instincts told him it was. "Whatever magic has ensnared you, you need to fight it. Or if you're some demon here simply to toy with me, assume your true form and face me, so that I can end this and move on."
If it was a demon of some kind, it was doing a very impressive job mimicking Estella's facial expressions—or at least what they would probably look like if she ever made her feelings apparent. “I'm not under any spell," she said with a sigh. “And I'm not going to fight you. You can kill me if you really think I'm some demon. It won't change anything anyway." She regarded the point of his spear steadily, as though she really didn't much mind either way.
“I envy you, if you can't even imagine being crushed enough times to finally give up. If you can't believe that I've hit that limit. That's a nice thing to think about me." She smiled wryly. “Perhaps I'm grateful."
His spear arm jerked forward, the spear tip moving a few inches towards Estella before Vesryn wrenched it back. A look of surprise passed over his face before he washed it away. Instinct alone had told him to strike her, but it was entirely Saraya's and not his. Her urge was strong, powerful, trying to outdo Vesryn's hesitation. She wanted to kill her, her every emotion demanding Vesryn do so. Naturally Vesryn felt he couldn't do it, and he could almost hear Saraya chiding him for it. His brow twisted in pain, as though looking at an oncoming charge of darkspawn about to overwhelm him. He only trusted one person more than Estella, and that was the one that had been guiding him for nearly half of his life.
"Please... forgive me if I am wrong. If Saraya is wrong." He knew she would, too. Swiftly and surely, he let Saraya's steadiness and precision drive the spear tip forward, with the speed and strength needed to pierce through Estella's leathers... and her heart.
She pulled in a sharp breath before going slack. There was no attempt there to put up a fight, not even when it became clear what he intended to do.
“Vesryn?" His name was slow, slightly drawn-out, as though the speaker were uncertain it was the right one to apply. It too appeared to belong to Estella. This one was a bit more scuffed; there was a cut on her cheek that had given her a broad smear of blood from the side of her nose to her jaw, like she'd wiped at it. She was climbing over whatever version of the debris from their fall had been retained or created in the Fade; just after she spoke, she landed on ground level.
Her eyes moved from him, and his bloody spear, to the entity he'd just killed. One that looked very much like her. Her motion stilled; very carefully, she laid her hand on the hilt of her sword, brows furrowing, but she did not draw.
Vesryn swiftly turned and put his shield in front of him, wrenching the spear free and letting the form of Estella fall to the ground. The end of his weapon dripped blood in front of him, and emotionally he found himself less than stable. He was starting to feel anger in equal parts to grief. Some justification at least that another image of Estella would appear, somewhat convincing him he hadn't just murdered her, but also anger, that the Fade might be throwing more tricks at him.
"Don't come any closer. Please." His tone practically begged her to stay still. "If you're another specter of the Fade or some poor imitation of Estella, just stop. Don't make me do this again." Saraya, at least, was not immediately demanding he attack, for which he was immensely thankful.
Immediately, she raised both hands to the level of her shoulders a bit in front of her, perhaps thrown by his demeanor. A step backwards put her heels right at the edge of a fallen chunk of bridge; she shuffled with some apparent discomfort, but did not attempt to approach. “It's all right," she said, tone measured and even. “I can't... I don't think I can prove to you that I'm me, I'm afraid. The demon here probably knows everything you'd expect me to say or do, and everything you wouldn't, so..."
She shrugged a little. “Just, um... I'll stay here, and if you can think of anything that would prove what needs proving... let me know, okay?" Her eyes turned briefly down what looked like the path forward, and then to the obvious corpse, but she didn't let them linger for more than a moment before returning them to him.
Vesryn's spear wavered for a moment, and then fell. He planted the butt of it in the marshy ground and sank into a crouch, exhaling heavily, his breath shaky. He took several more before he trusted himself enough to speak. "It probably doesn't matter. If you're a demon, I couldn't do it again anyway." That was a lie, and he knew it. It wasn't entirely, though; he couldn't do it once. Saraya could do it as many times as she was required, but still... the very motion would haunt him.
"Just..." he hesitated. "What do you think we should do? I'm lost here. Even with a mage in my head."
Estella let her hands fall. It seemed that she was still hesitant to approach him, though she also appeared to want to, at least if the small half-step she took before standing still again was any indication. “I... well, yes. It's not... I'm not really sure how to fix this, but if anyone will have a good idea of what it would take, it's Cyrus. We should make sure to find everyone, and then try and... undo whatever it is I did." She frowned down at the mark on her hand for a second, shaking her head once and closing her fingers over it.
“I hope... I really hope they're alive. For what it's worth, I'm glad to know you are. I suspect we have that in common." She made a clear attempt at a smile that got at least halfway there.
He had to believe that it was her. It felt like her. Determined to find Cyrus and the rest, and figure out a way to escape, and yet still concerned that all of this was somehow her fault. It was her doing, certainly, but Vesryn could find no fault in it. "The only reason any of us still have a chance at surviving this is because of you, Estella. And if anything ill should come of this... being in the Fade, we'll deal with it together."
He pushed himself up, collecting his helmet and using his spear as a sort of walking stick while he closed the distance between them. He pulled to a stop before her. "I'm glad you're alright, too. I—" He half glanced back at where the fallen and false Estella lay, then down at the blood still upon his weapon. "I'm just glad you're okay."
The terrain remained mountainous for them, steep and rocky walls surrounding them on either side and offering them only one path forward, which Vesryn led the way down. Still the footing remained soft and wet, uncomfortably similar to that blasted marsh in which he'd first met Estella. He wasn't fond of it, nor of the way it shifted and moved as though it were alive. Or watching them.
"Visitors... welcome. You have pleased me thus far, do not stop now."
Vesryn immediately halted and raised his shield, trying to locate the source of the voice, but it was annoyingly omnipresent, and even Saraya let off a pang of discomfort at the tone of it. Vesryn checked briefly to ensure that Estella had heard it as well.
"And what an exquisite pair you are. Or... a trio. Very unique. First we have the would-be elven knight, a fraud in ancient armor, made a puppet by an unknown soul that you allowed to slither through your mind and body."
"If you have a tongue, demon, I'd advise you to hold it." Vesryn practically spat the words, sliding his tallhelm down into place over his features.
Estella had no such easy way to conceal her face, and it was to her the voice next directed its attention.
"Well, well, well. Lady Inquisitor Estella Avenarius. Herald of Andraste. Argent Lions Lieutenant. Friend to princes and Viscountesses and Grey Wardens and even the Black Divine himself. Beloved of the heartless, dearest to the selfish. How very... significant, you are. In more ways than you could possibly understand."
She visibly braced herself, drawing in a breath and keeping her eyes fixed straight ahead on the path before them.
"And not one bit of it deserved. Not one bit of it earned. A pretender, a fake, an imposter."
The demon laughed, a low sound unable to escape its own menace.
"So. Much. Fear. The contents of your mind would feed every creature here for decades. Have you room for anything else?"
She did not answer, expression unmoving as stone.
"And as much as you have... my, it pales in comparison to the third. How many lifetimes do you have to draw upon?" The demon seemed to draw in a sudden breath. "Why, you even fear that I should speak your name. For you have not heard it for generations beyond counting, and what a terrible crime it would be for me to be the first."
Vesryn could feel it. Her fear. The demon was tugging at it, drawing it out, and it was truly powerful, enough that his stomach began to coil uncomfortably, his knees began to feel weak, and his breath came sharp and rapidly. It was all he could do to keep moving forward. There was no way to fight this thing, and thus they simply had to endure it, and keep pushing on.
"Allow me to gorge on your fear. You will make me strong indeed... look upon the field and remember, wisp of a woman."
The path then bent to their left, around a corner, and before them was an open, marshy field. Upon it were bodies, hundreds of them, mangled and broken, the aftermath of a battle in which only one side had been dealt death and defeat. Their armor, where it was not blasted and bloody, was ornate and remarkable in the way Vesryn's was. The corpses were that of elves, their faces fair and hauntingly beautiful, left pristine and untouched despite the wounds covering their bodies. Their eyes were open, staring lifelessly towards Vesryn and Estella.
"I know you remember. No passage of time could ever make you forget. And what you fear are the very words I could spill next. The way I could utterly destroy the faith of the warrior that carries you, your one remaining connection to life, your one hope of... achieving your goals."
Looking upon the faces, Vesryn felt a veritable storm of emotions welling within him. An impossible rage, at the demon, but more than that... a terrible, terrible guilt. Sorrow beyond comprehension. Tears sprang to his eyes entirely unbidden, and Vesryn choked on his next breath, unable to keep his feet. He sank heavily forward to his knees, ripping off his helmet again and gasping for air.
Estella crouched beside him, pulling his hair back out of his way with careful hands and placing her unmarked palm at his shoulder-blades. Even through the armor, it was perceptible, solidly present but not heavy. “Breathe slowly," she urged gently. “In through your nose and out through your mouth." She seemed to be following her own advice, though whether that was intended to help him or because she simply needed to wasn't exactly clear.
He tried this several times, and found it to be of middling effectiveness. "She knows... their faces," he managed. "Every one." They were faces she had not seen for years innumerable, and now only in this hellish landscape were they reunited.
"Cross the field, and let them give her the welcome she deserves... or go back, and wither away alone. The choice is yours."
Slowly, steadily Vesryn began to regain control of himself, and shakily got back to his feet. The helmet would remain off, hooked to the back of his belt. He needed all the breath he could get. Testing his grip on his spear, he first looked at the distance they would need to cross, and then at Estella. "We need to get through this. We can't go back."
She nodded once, clearly ready to move when he was.
He nodded back, and led the way out into the field of bodies. The eyes... they followed them where they went, though the bodies remained entirely still. Unblinking they stared, boring into Vesryn's mind and unnerving him more with each step. Their footing was uncertain. They had to step over bodies in many places, or sink into nearly knee deep muck and soil, tinted crimson with still leaking blood, as though the battle had occurred mere minutes earlier.
"You should be thankful for your lack of sleep. For I know what nightmare would have plagued you otherwise. Live it now, if you can."
A creaking of bone, armor, and flesh alerted Vesryn to one of the corpses rising on his right. The body of the elven warrior was in shambles, a hole punched straight through his midsection by some powerful magic perhaps. He shambled forward, blade in hand, moving swifter than Vesryn expected. He caught the first blow on his shield, kicked the undead body back into the muck, and plunged his spear down into the softened face of the warrior. Though it ended the threat, the body still continued to writhe disgustingly on the ground long after the spear had been removed.
Behind them, another was rising with a pair of short swords and heading straight for Estella. A third began to move right at her feet, and reached up to ensnare one of her legs.
She pulled the leg in question away, stepping back and pointing at the corpse with the first two fingers of her left hand. She grimaced, but red-gold fire bloomed to life at her fingertips, surging into the corpse still on the ground. The blast was enough to still it, save the occasional twitch in one of its extremities. Her right hand drew the knife at her back in just enough time to block the incoming swing from the next. She was forced several steps back in the muck, but that gave her enough time and space to draw her saber, the enchantment glimmering brightly against the rather dull-colored surroundings.
“Hang on, hang on, I can..." She seemed to be talking more to herself than anything, but the words did have some relevance; in the next moment, bright flames bloomed at the point of Vesryn's spear. Fire was generally effective where the undead were concerned—it wasn't a bad idea.
She shifted; from the sounds of it, she was moving into place behind him. “There are another half-dozen getting up back here. Just, uh, so you know."
"Keep moving!" Vesryn urged, plunging the now-flaming spear through one of the elves and bringing it back down into the marsh. "Watch your step." The ones at their feet were easily the most dangerous, armed and likely to move at any moment. And they couldn't really just torch the ground where they were about to step.
"Even in your mind, she is still restrained, Vesryn. Still bound by ancient magic that even her escape into your body could not undo. Shall I weaken the bonds for you? Shall we see what changes it unlocks?"
The demon did something, then. Vesryn couldn't begin to comprehend what, but it felt as though his very mind was beginning to unravel. Just as he discarded another of Saraya's resurrected memories he screamed out in pain, collapsing in a heap on his side next to one of the bodies. Without thinking he dropped his spear, his hand clutching at his head. The pain worsened and worsened, amplified by Saraya's grief, her guilt, the terror...
And then she screamed.
He heard her voice in his mind, crying wordlessly in agony, and then the moans formed into words, ancient elven that he did not understand, but every babbling word of it felt like it was splitting his skull open. The demon's voice boomed above Saraya's.
"Will it destroy you, Vesryn? Will it obliterate your mind, kill her in the process? Shall I take the next step for you?"
"Please, Saraya," Vesryn whispered, even though it was more than it would take for her to hear him. "Withdraw. Be silent... please." He never imagined it would happen like this, if it happened at all. He never imagined the first sound of hers he would hear would be screaming agony. He never imagined he would want it to stop. But he did, for he knew it would kill him if she continued.
And she withdrew, leaving Vesryn to his own mind as much as she was capable of. He groaned in pain, his hand finding his spear again, and he struggled to rise.
A corpse fell next to him, still smoking. Estella braced her foot on its shoulder and used the pin to wrench her saber free of its belly. Her face and front were spattered—it was probably better not to know exactly how much of it was mud and how much was corpse bile. From the number of bodies with fresh burns or slashes, she'd been moving quickly while he was down; there was a notable radius of several feet in every direction that was conspicuously free of the dead.
She looked like she wanted to say something when he rose, eyes a bit too bright to be wholly dry, but whatever it was, she must have decided it could wait. “It's not much farther," she said steadily, pointing with her sword. The field did indeed seem to end some fifty yards away or so. “Are you okay to get there?"
Vesryn nodded, unable to manage any more words. He felt unstable, off-balance, struck with fatigue. It was always a shock to be without Saraya's guidance, but she could offer none for him now, not physically nor mentally. He would have to manage on his own.
They charged for the end, at one point Vesryn bowling headlong into a corpse with his shield, smashing it underneath him, and he clumsily got back to his feet, tripping more than once where the footing was too treacherous. He'd sustained a few slash wounds by the time they reached the end of the bodies, and he hadn't even had time to see if Estella was wounded as well. But they were free of the marsh, on slightly more solid ground again, and as they put more distance between them and it, the bodies behind them fell once more to their rest, and silence reigned.
"This is not a fear you can run from, I'm afraid. Whether it takes a day or ten thousand years, it will catch up with you. But go, continue your flight as long as you are able, and I will feast on your fears all the while."
Only when they had put the marsh out of sight, and the path began to lead down and into fog did Vesryn stop, breathing heavily. He sank against the rock behind him, weariness permeating from his every action.
"I heard her voice, Estella," he said, gasping in air. "I heard Saraya in my head."
She blinked at the declaration, standing awkwardly for a moment before she took a somewhat more cautious kneeling position next to him. Her breath was heavy, but even, and she didn't look to be particularly injured anywhere. Just dirty and sweaty. “What... what was all that?" she asked, leaning forward a bit to inspect a cut on his arm. “I mean, I heard what the demon said, but to me the rest of it was just... you in a lot of pain." Her eyes met his for a moment, but then she glanced back down, a soft purplish light forming at her hands.
“Sorry—I'm not going to be able to do what Asala does, even here." The bleeding did stop, though, and then the light shifted to something more greenish and the wound closed over. It was definitely still tender, though—it might tear open again if he pulled at it too hard.
"I can feel what Saraya feels," he explained. "It was like... like when we were first joined, when I first found her. Overwhelming emotion that almost cripples me. Then it was a wish for death, despair at finally being released only to find herself in a new cage. Now... it was grief, and guilt, and sorrow. As though she failed them all somehow, maybe. It's hard to say." And he couldn't, not while Saraya was withdrawn as she was. Nor did he expect she wished to linger on the subjects. The fact that she remained in her state of silence implied to Vesryn that it still wasn't safe.
"The demon... was able to do something, I don't know what. Manipulate some restraints still upon her, perhaps. It felt like... like my mind was being torn to pieces from the inside. Whatever pain I felt, Saraya felt as well, and then... I heard her scream. Incomprehensible words and screams. That was all." If it was permanent, whatever the demon had done, he couldn't bear to think about leaving it that way. With those awful screams being the only memory he could have of Saraya's voice.
"She's withdrawn now, deep in my mind. It's as close as we can get to being alone from each other, but she's still there. It was the only way I could think to make the pain stop. For our purposes, it's... just me now." And already he felt wholly inadequate without her. He'd barely survived the escape, against foes that were more frightening than actually dangerous. All those years working alongside Saraya and he still could hardly hold his own.
"Thank you. I very much doubt I'd have gotten through that alone." If he had actually gotten through. That remained to be seen, and the uncomfortable headache he still had was not the best of signs.
In the time he'd spoken, Estella had patched the wound in his side similarly to the one on his arm, but she looked to be nearing the limit of her magic, for the moment. She shook her head. “The fight? That's just what friends do." She dredged up a wry smile from somewhere, though it quickly became a pensive frown, drawn brow to match.
“I don't think there's anything we can do about the rest, for now. It sounds like you're both still... intact, at least. Maybe if we defeat the demon, things will go back to normal. If they don't, we can cross that bridge when we come to it." A brief flicker of guilt moved over her face, but she quashed it quickly. “Do you think you can stand? We can rest a while longer if you need." She pushed to her feet and offered an arm down.
"No, we should keep moving." He took hold of the offered arm and got back to his feet, surveying the path ahead. "Hopefully that was the worst of the demon's surprises."
“I'd say it must have been, but I'd really rather not know, in all honesty." Releasing his arm, Estella stepped away and glanced down the path in front of them. It was blanketed in a thick fog; the ground was more solid under their feet than before, but not by a great deal. Her lips thinned, but she stepped forward anyway, leading the way in.
The fog had a similar green-grey color to the sky, and as they walked, the path seemed to grade down, immersing them in ever-increasing thick clouds of the stuff. It wasn't more than a few minutes before Vesryn could barely see Estella in front of him, and that was more because she'd lit a small mage-light over an open palm than anything.
It was chilly, enough that his breath clouded in front of him and it seemed almost that some frost glittered in the swirling clouds, along with tiny fragments of light, jumping randomly around like crackles of electricity.
That was all silent, though—in fact, everything was silent, at least until the whispers started up. Not so unlike the Envy demon's, actually, from Therinfal. But these were in many voices rather than one, and Estella seemed to be the focus of their attention. The fog itself shaped around her, forming briefly into shapes like hands to brush at the nape of her neck or the sides of her face; they seemed equally content with anywhere bare skin was exposed. At first, the whispers themselves were hard for him to make out, but they increased in volume enough for him to hear in time.
"Lieutenant, huh? Yeah... I like that. I'll be in your squad, Stel. You can count on me."
"We need to come up with something cool to call ourselves. Because we're the best squad, obviously."
"We're not calling ourselves the Star Knights. See? Even the Lieutenant thinks that's a stupid name, she's laughing at you!"
"We decided on a name, Lieutenant. We're just going to be Stel's Team. It's the only thing everyone could agree on, so... we hope you don't mind."
Estella's pace faltered for just a moment; she sucked in a shaky breath, clearly tilting her head up for the space of a few seconds before resuming her forward progress. As they walked, the fog started to form almost into distinct shapes, most of them falling apart as soon as Vesryn's or Estella's passage disturbed the air. Some of them looked familiar, almost, but they didn't hold their shape long enough to be sure.
"Genny, is that you?"
That voice was the clearest yet—it stopped Estella cold. From the fog emerged the shape of an elderly man. He was clearly composed of it as well, but held together with much more sharpness and clarity. The surface of the apparition seemed to cover a layer of light, like there was a wisp inside the cloud or something similar. He moved forward, not stopping until he was within a couple feet of Estella, squinting in a slightly-exaggerated fashion before smiling with relief.
"Oh, it is. You'll not believe the dream I just had, Genny. Such a strange one—you were dead and then there was..." He trailed off, reaching forward as if to lay a hand on the side of Estella's face.
She flinched almost violently, taking a hard step back and nearly hitting Vesryn. “Leave me alone," she rasped, stirring the fog violently with her hands.
The figure disappeared for a moment, but reformed again a second later as though nothing had changed. “Genny? Your hair is... it's the wrong color. What have you—you're not Genny!" His face contorted; the apparition's mouth opened and let out a bellow, a sound of pure betrayal and rage. It flew at them both, passing harmlessly over them with a gust of frigid air. The drops of fog that had condensed on Vesryn's armor froze in place.
He'd almost had his spear down in time to do something useful if the apparition were indeed a threat to them, but it turned out not to matter, and Vesryn quickly assumed a more neutral stance. Though the figure was gone, the fog hadn't lifted, even if it seemed to no longer be toying with Estella. There wasn't much he could do about any of it, a fact that didn't sit right with him. At least Saraya's demons could be beaten and burned at for a time. As for Estella's... he understood the first part easily enough, the squad she'd lost when she somehow survived the explosion that created the Breach. But the second part he was entirely unsure of. It seemed to bother her a great deal more effectively. He wanted to help, but these sorts of things were often private, and unlike the demon, Vesryn had no wish to intrude on that if he wasn't wanted.
"Are you alright?" he asked, settling for that. It felt inadequate, as likely none of them were alright after this, but it was all he could think to say.
She glanced back at the question. Frost streaked down through the dirt on her face, but she smiled briefly. Unconvincingly. “I will be, when we get out of here. Better not to stop, I think." Returning her attention forward, she started walking again, the little light in her hand still valiantly fighting through the fog.
"Truer words were never spoken," Vesryn said to himself, continuing forward behind her before the fog could remove her from his sight.