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The ancient Grey Warden fort rose out of the swamp like a moldering sentinel; that the crumbling structure still stood enough to be recognizable was a testament to its construction. The last bastion before the wilds of the Anderfels sprawled out beyond it, it was a sight to behold. Blight had already reached it by the time they had, overtaking the walls and the ancient ballistae, and rendering the main gate impassable. Still, they'd managed to find a way in, climbing up to an upper level that allowed them entrance. Davrin was the first up, following Assan who chirped from above, Rook and Taash just behind. He was grateful to them both—more than he could accurately put to words—but, perhaps most especially, to Rook.
So what if they'd made a deal? Were he in the same position, he would have put the mission above the individual. That was the difference between them, he supposed: he was free to what if while Rook made the hard choices.
He was grateful saving the griffons had not yet become a hard choice.
Once inside, the first thing Davrin realized was how much colder it was. The stone seemed made of ice, soaking up the chill of the night; when a draft whistled through the corridor, it sent a chill down his spine that wasn't entirely due to the temperature. Something about this place seemed off, wrong in a way he couldn't verbalize, but he whistled a command to Assan to stay close as he glanced at Rook, whose expression was as perplexed as he felt. He wasn't the only one who felt the wrongness of this place. Cold as a tomb and twice as stuffy, the air was so still it felt like a blanket of ice.
"Look," Rook said, "a griffon."
Davrin looked at the sculpture with a mixture of consternation and wariness. It wasn't unusual for griffons to be used as decorative elements in a Grey Warden fortress. The large urn at its base, however, gave him pause. A sickly feeling sluiced down his throat like cold treacle, making him queasy as his brain fought the truth.
"No," he whispered quietly, "it can't be—" Assan let out a small whimper at his side as horror dawned. "Griffon bones."
If he thought he was horrified before, it was nothing compared to what they found in the next room.
Where the previous had been a claustrophobic passage from the outer hall to the interior, this room was cavernous, with large vaulted ceilings and centuries old tapestries hanging on the walls—and shelves upon shelves of urns just like the one they'd seen before, rising far above their heads. Assan curled his body around his legs with a mournful sound, his tail giving a sad flick. Davrin's hand automatically went to the scruff at the griffon's neck, rifling through the new feathers soothingly. His throat tightened as he lost count of the urns stacks on the shelves.
All those griffons.
All those lives lost to the blight—for every griffon had had a rider, likely multiple.
He knew the Fourth Blight had been bad, spanning a decade, and that it had taken all the griffons with it.
He knew it and yet it had not prepared him for the reality of it.
Rook wandered quietly, reading inscriptions, her gloved fingers passing gently over the nameplate of one with a frown. Finding a dusty ledger on a nearby table, she flipped through the delicate pages, the frown only deepening. "Looks like someone tried to keep a record of them all," she said softly, her eyes flicking to Assan first, then to him. "There must have just been too many of them after a time, because it drops off."
Davrin turned from her abruptly, eyes burning as he crossed the room. Once they rescued the other griffon fledglings from the Gloom Howler, he'd see what he could do about making sure the Order recognized the sacrifice made rather than hiding it away here in shame. With new leadership, perhaps there was a chance for the wardens to right what could be righted.
He found a large ornate chest set against the far wall, obviously in some sort of memorial to someone. Not someone of great importance, he thought, or they'd be elsewhere but not no one, either. They'd tracked the Gloom Howler all the way here, which must have made this place important to it. Perhaps something in the trunk could tell them more about what it wanted.
Using the heel of his boot to break off the rusted lock, the lid gave a mournful groan as he opened it, centuries of dust making a small cloud in the air. So still was it, within the walls of the fortress, the particles lingered in suspension before the cloud slowly dissipated. Impatient, Davrin tried to hurry it along with a wave of his arm, peering into the chest in curiosity. Something called him immediately to the wooden box within, his blood thrummed to the faint connection he felt to it.
Stained black with silver banding tarnished with age, he wasn't sure what about it compelled him, only that it…called to him. Not unlike the blight did, he realized with more than a little discomfort. It was clearly old—from the Fourth Blight, he guessed—but what it was doing in a chest in a Grey Warden fortress was unclear. The lock had disintegrated at some point and he opened it with relative ease, only to be disappointed to find its contents no more helpful. Only an old, dried out vial with a nasty crack in the lip remained, rolling across the bottom of the box.
Whoever had stored it there must have cleared it out, he thought, moving to set the box aside.
As he did, he heard the faintest whisper.
"No."
He jerked his head around, his eyes scanning the large room for Rook. "You say something?"
She shook her head, her expression perplexed as she rifled a hand through Assan's feathers. The griffon leaned into the touching, pressing his face into her thigh for comfort.
Blinking, he turned back to the box. Had he imagined it?
No, he was certain he hadn't, and it was confirmed a heartbeat later when the word came again.
"No."
"We have no choice."
This voice was louder, firmer. Tired. He could feel the regret as if it were his own.
"Put the griffons through the Joining."
The box dropped to the stone floor with a clatter and he hastened to pick it up only to recoil at the last second.
"Davrin?" Rook asked from behind him. Concern tinged her voice, but he waved her off.
Forcing himself to pick the box up, he held it gingerly between his hands. Had they really—no, he'd surely misheard…whatever it was speaking to him. Davrin had heard of crystals that could hold on to fragments of memory, like the unsettled spirit in Arlathan caught in panicked loop or the remnants they'd encountered in Dock Town, but this felt…different. Like something trapped in time.
He set the box safely away from him and reached for another object stored within the chest. A rough wool blanket. Though it was full of moth-eaten holes and disintegrating with age, it was similar to the one Assan slept on next to his bed each night. As he held it, no voices came as he'd suspected—hoped—feared, in some sense—they might. The blanket was warm, as if it had been left out in the afternoon sun; heat radiated off it as he held it close to his face, assuming he'd smell nothing but mildew and age. Instead, his nostrils filled with the familiar scent of sunbaked feathers and something musky and feline-like—a scent that had become his constant ever since he was sent with Lancit and Remi to care for an impossible clutch of baby griffons.
As if the blanket, too, held onto a memory.
Not his, but someone else's.
Next, came a cluster of stiff leather straps, dried and brittle from where they'd sat in the chest for hundreds of years, undisturbed. He moved past them quickly, part of him fearing what, if any, memory they held, but he froze at what came next. Davrin could only describe the thing as a saddle. One made especially for a griffon. There really had been griffon riders back then. The thought would have thrilled him as a boy. Even as an adult, the confirmation brought exhilaration and disbelief. As he ran a hand over the seat of the saddle, however, all he felt was sorrow. Overwhelming sorrow, deep in his bones. He heard a griffon screech in rage and terror and knew, instinctively, it had not come from Assan.
On and on, he pilfered through the items in the chest, looking for some clue as to who it had belonged to. None of them reacted to him the way those first few had; he didn't know whether to be sorry or grateful to be spared. Slipped between the pages of a book too fragile to examine past its cover, was a forgotten scrap of parchment. Carefully, Davrin tugged it free. A drawing—rudimentary and amateurish—of a griffon with a floppy ear and a distinct tail. It hit him, then. He knew who this chest belonged to.
"These things," he said aloud. "I think they're Garahel's. Most of them, anyway."
Rook swore low, she and Taash instantly questioning him. Davrin ignored them both.
The great hero of the Fourth Blight. The stories of the elven warden who'd been risen from an alienage to such great heights circulated even among the Dalish. He looked at the chest with more reverence than he had before, his hands moving even more carefully, his back straight.
The items were of no real significance, as far as he could tell, but whoever had placed them there had done so with great care. Why this place? Why surrounded by the bones of so many fallen griffons?
Near the bottom of the chest, he found a small rock, just big enough to sit comfortably in the palm, its indented surfaced worn smooth as if someone had spent a great amount of time rubbing there thumb over it. He tipped it into his hand, his own thumb fitting comfortably in the dip. As soon as his fingers closed around it, the memory captured him.
A child's laughter.
"Isseya." A small voice said. "Promise you won't forget me in the Circle, that you'll come back when you're able."
"I promise," came the reply—equally as small, equally as frightened. There was a pause. "Don't be afraid, Garahel. We'll be together again, like we always have."
The memory faded and Davrin loosed a breath. That one he couldn't make as much sense of, for all it had been the clearest, but it seemed to confirm his suspicions about the items in the chest.
At the bottom of the chest now, the last item was a length of fabric folded neatly, its blue-black color catch him off guard for its familiarity. The delicate weave—fragile, now, after so many years—was not dissimilar to that which the Gloom Howler cloaked itself.
As soon as his fingers brushed the cloth, his senses were assaulted. Straw and waste and the tinny stench of blood; a rheumy cough, and angry, wheezing squawks. Dread spooled around his spine—only partially his own; Davrin closed his eyes against it, making the nauseating sensations all the worse for it.
Distantly, he heard Rook say his name again, and a hissed vashedan on its tail, his companions' concern for him palpable. It didn't matter. He had to see it through.
He could smell the blight, hear the gruesome pulse of it, alongside the too-rapid beat of a griffon's heart.
No, no, no, no, he thought in unison with the voice in his head, knowing—as they must have known—that the creature would not survive. He felt himself wishing there were something he could do, knowing full well there wasn't.
This had already happened.
There would be no altering it.
The staccato rhythm beating alongside his own heart began to slow…to slow…to…slow to nothing, until all that was left was his own pulse thumping sorely in his chest. It felt as if the breath had been stolen from him as the griffon died—or was killed, he wasn't sure—only that the grief he felt was not entirely his own.
If the Gloom Howler had brought the griffons here, it must be for a reason, and he feared he knew exactly what that reason was.
His fingers twisted around the fabric, he stood, securing it to his belt.
"Let's go," he said to the others, ignoring their mutual looks of surprise, and the way they glanced at each other as he pushed past them. In his mind, all he could see were those baby griffons—they'd be the same size as Assan now, he supposed, realizing with a twist in his gut that it had been months since they'd been taken—scared and cowering in their cages, maybe already blighted if he was right about the Gloom Howler's plan.
The gargantuan skeleton in the next room seemed to prove it.
"Is that—" Taash began.
"Andoral," Davrin supplied for them, mouth flattening.
This place wasn't just important to the wardens because of the griffons. It was where they'd entombed the archdemon who'd brought on the blight in the first place. The reason for their sacrifice.
He drew his sword and heard the schick of Rook's daggers being pulled from their scabbards just behind him. Glancing at her, she gave a jerk of her chin before signaling to Taash, the three of them beginning to fan out as they moved deeper into the large room.
If he'd thought the previous room had been cold, it was nothing compared to the frigid air in here. Darker and larger and more intimidating for all the dragon at its center was long dead. There was no telling what they would find—what trap they were walking into—but they were as prepared as they could be. He just needed the Gloom Howler to show.
As if summoned by his thoughts, a screech split the air as he met the others on the platform. Ice sluiced down his spine as the Gloom Howler came into view—commanding a horde of darkspawn. He shouldn't have been surprise, and on some level he wasn't, but it was worse than he could have expected. There were only three of them against—he lost count of them, tearing another down with a grunt.
"There's too many!" Rook called out. "Davrin, we have to retreat!"
No, no, not while they finally had the Gloom Howler in their sights. Not until they found the griffons. He glanced around quickly. "The ribcage!" He called back, pointing toward the large bone structure. "Get to the ribcage!"
He didn't stay to see if they followed, turning on his heel and taking the distance at a clip, shrugging off the hand of a ghoul as it clawed at him.
Taash made it there first and Davrin slipped in behind them, Assan squawking agitatedly.
"Davrin!" Rook cried and when he turned to look a reaver was bearing down on her. Her arm was outstretched toward them, but she was still too far.
Swearing, he wrapped an arm around a rib, clinging to it, as he reached for her, hand splayed for her to grab as soon as she could. She was close enough he could see the fear in the whites of her eyes as they flared wide. The reaver swung for her just as she took a running leap.
Davrin caught her, his hand closing around her forearm and pulling for all he was worth until she was safe behind the cage of bone. There was no time for thanks as he backed them up, out of the reach of the ghouls clawing at them.
"Secrets long buried will have their day!" the Gloom Howler cried, the rasp of its voice setting Davrin's teeth on edge.
"Whoever you are," he called back as he raised his sword, "face me!" The horde went preternaturally still as soon as the words left his mouth, and his heart thumped in his chest as they split, allowing the Gloom Howler to rise above them. Before he could think better of it, he demanded, "What are you?"
"A ward against the darkness."
"You are the darkness. You're a monster!"
"Where are the other griffons?" This from Rook, who stepped up beside him.
"I liberated them."
"What does that mean?" she asked, her voice on edge. "What are you going to do with them?"
"Free them from the tyranny of the wardens."
Davrin shook his head in disbelief. "The wardens protect the world from horrors like you!"
"They created the horrors! The bones of griffons abandoned in this…cauldron! Proud warriors forgotten."
"Who are you?" He demanded again.
"Their salvation!"
Davrin watched in dread as the Gloom Howler revealed a dagger from beneath its cloak, raising it high above its head before burying it deep into Andoral's skull. Blight from the dragon's marrow corrupted the blade almost instantly, its violent red pulse visible even from this distance. His stomach turned as the creature held it out almost in awe.
"The blood offers protection."
Protection? With archdemon blood?
Put the griffons through the joining…
No.
The resistance he'd felt. The overwhelming grief. His free hand brushed the fabric at his belt, but it was quiet, as if it had spent whatever magic it had possessed trying to get the message to him the first time. But what did it mean. His eyes narrowed on the Gloom Howler, on the wisps of fabrics that was its cloak, the wheels in his head turning. He didn't think it was Garahel. He didn't think it was Garahel, at all, but if he was wrong…
"Isseya!"
The Gloom Howler went still and Davrin's heart turned over.
"This isn't what you wanted!"
Its malformed hand clutched at the blighted dagger. He took a breath and pressed on.
"It didn't protect the griffons then and it won't protect them now!"
For a moment, he thought he'd done it. He'd thought he'd gotten through to whatever madness had a hold on it. Perhaps that was what had made him bold enough to keep pushing.
"Just tell us where the griffons are, Isseya."
The Gloom Howler dropped the dagger and it fell to the platform with a clatter. It let out another screech as it beat at its head, as if trying to knock something lose.
"Silence! You are some demon from the Fade and I will not be tricked!"
"No!" Davrin roared, pressing close to the edge of the rib cage in desperation. "I want to protect the griffons just like you!"
As if in agreement, Assan unfolded his wings, prancing impatiently beside him.
The movement caught the Gloom Howler's attention. It looked between them for a long moment—long enough to make Davrin feel ill.
"The friendship between warden and griffon…" the Gloom Howler spoke in a hushed tone, almost mesmerized by the sight of the juvenile griffon. Its head tilted as it looked him over, raising a shaking hand. "Crookytail…and Smoke. Garahel and Amadis would have loved you." Assan made a confused noise, sitting back on his hind legs and tilting his head in a mirror of the Gloom Howler's. Turning to Davrin, it said, "Protect him. That is your duty."
Davrin loosed a breath. "I—"
But he was too late. Whatever clarity the Gloom Howler had possessed dissipated let out a scream of pain rising far above their heads. Davrin raised his sword again, ready for the darkspawn to attack, but they didn't. It took him a minute too long to realize they were retreating entirely, leaving them alone as they returned to the tunnel they'd opened into the fortress.
"What was that?" Taash asked low when it was clear they weren't going to have to fight their way out.
"I don't know," he replied. He really wasn't sure how to put to words everything he'd experienced this night, not yet, but there was a kernal of hope that hadn't been there before, easing a tiny fraction of his worry.
"We still don't know where the griffons are," Rook pointed out, frustration evident in her voice.
"No, but she won't hurt them."
"She?"
Davrin nodded, sheathing his sword.
"If we found her the first time, we can find her again." He looked in the direction the Gloom Howler had gone, the blighted dagger abandoned on the platform. Turning back to the others, his expression was determined. "And I think I know what will convince her to give the griffons back." He placed a hand on Assan's head. "I think I have to prove I'm worthy of them."
Taash snorted. "How are you gonna do that?"
"I'm not sure yet, but… " Pulling the fabric from his belt he studied it a moment. "I felt her grief over the griffons from before. I'm sure of that. And that makes me certain she doesn't want to hurt them." He looked between Taash and Rook. "Which means there's hope we can convince her we want the same thing."
Whoever this Isseya was, Davrin felt an odd kinship with her. As long as the blight madness didn't convince her to repeat the mistakes of the past, he was confident he could convince her to give the griffons back. To him, if not to the wardens.
They just had to find her first.