Unknown - Dragon Age

Maric coughed uncomfortably. “Well . . . your group is here in the Deep Roads, aren’t you?”

The dwarf glanced at his fellows, and they exchanged an amused if grim chuckle. He looked back at Maric. “That is because we are seeking our deaths, human.”

Katriel moved to stand beside Maric, lowering her head respectfully toward the dwarf. “You’re . . . all of you, you’re the Legion of the Dead, aren’t you?” It was only a suspicion, considering what little she knew of the dwarves. But there were only so many of them who would be out in the Deep Roads and away from Orzammar, and these—with their skulls painted

onto their faces—brought up something from her memory, a tale she had thought forgotten.

The dwarf seemed impressed. “Aye, you’ve the right of it.”

Loghain shot up a brow, glancing toward Katriel. “And what is that, exactly?”

“I know only a little,” she protested.

Sighing with exasperation, the dwarf turned back to the others with him and mulled over an unpleasant decision. After a moment he shrugged. “Collect our fallen,” he ordered them, “and bring the surfacers back to the camp with us.”

Loghain lifted his sword threateningly, Rowan standing resolute beside him. “I don’t remember us offering to go with you,” he stated in an even tone.

The dwarf paused and regarded them with amusement. “I’ll give you that; I didn’t think you surfacers would want to stay here and let the darkspawn swarm back down on top of you the moment we’ve left . . . but by the Stone, if that’s what you truly want, I’ll not stop you.”

Maric stepped forward and gave the dwarf a pained smile. “We’ve had a difficult time down here, Ser Dwarf. Please excuse our manners. We’ll gladly go to your camp.” He then shot Loghain an incredulous look that said, What are you doing? Loghain stared back at him, and then at the dwarf, before reluctantly sheathing his blade.

The dwarf shrugged. “So be it.” He hefted his warhammer onto his shoulder. “And the name is Nalthur. You’ll not fall behind if you know what’s good for you.”

15

It took several hours for Nalthur and the rest of his Legionof the Dead to lead their guests back to the camp. They carried the bodies of their slain companions reverently, first wrapping them up completely in cloth and then carrying them high overhead. They sang a sad dirge in a guttural, unfamiliar language, their march almost a funereal procession through the underground with their blue lanterns lighting up the passages around them.

The song echoed off the stone walls of the Deep Roads, carrying far into the depths, a challenge to those dark places that here life still existed. Alone in the Deep Roads, these dwarves cared when someone died. Katriel could not understand the words, but she knew it spoke of loss.

She watched Maric as he listened to it, his eyes far away. Did he think of his mother? He reached over to Rowan and comforted her, and Rowan let him. Her eyes were far away, too, and Katriel remembered she had lost her father only recently.

So, too, were Loghain’s eyes dark as he listened to the funeral dirge. They had all suffered great losses, and how many of them had had time to properly mourn?

Katriel had added to their losses, as well. She knew that. She watched Maric’s tears, watching him mourn with Rowan under the sapphire lanterns, and she felt emptiness in her heart, knowing she could not join him. She did not deserve to join him. A vast chasm was opening up between them, and he didn’t even know it, one that she would never be able to cross.

She wondered if she would cry if Maric died. She had never cried for anything, since the bardic training she had received had wrung the sympathy out of her; a necessity for a spy whose loyalties were up for sale. Sympathy was a weakness, she had learned, and yet now she wondered. Part of her quailed at the thought of living without him, but need was not love. She had no idea if she was as capable of love as she was of treachery.

She saw the dwarf, Nalthur, studying her carefully. And she watched him turn and study Maric and Rowan and Loghain in turn, intrigued by their mourning. Perhaps he thought they cried tears for his fallen comrades? For all she knew, they did.

As the hours wore on, it was simple to see they would have been lost. Twice they passed intersections where the dwarves turned without a second thought. Katriel craned her neck at those places to look for signs of markers or anything at all to indicate where the other directions might have led, but there was nothing but rubble and decay. Whatever corruption the darkspawn spread, it covered everything as they proceeded farther in, like a slick coating of filth and oil.

It was a frightening thought, to her. The farther they went, the more she realized that the chances of finding their way back to where they were diminished. They were now completely dependent on the dwarves for their lives. Maric seemed willing enough to trust their fate to Nalthur and his men, but

that was part of the problem. Maric was far from infallible. He trusted her, after all, and thus his instincts were more than a little suspect.

Still, there was nothing else for them to do now but follow.

Eventually they arrived at another outpost not unlike the one they had found when they first entered the Deep Roads, although this was far more intact. The massive gateway that bisected the passageway had been repaired, the heavily armed dwarves standing guard outside snapping to attention as soon as they saw the blue lights approaching. The cavern beyond was small but high, with reinforced walls and a number of smaller caves radiating out from the core.

Dominating the center of the cavern was a great statue of a dwarf, holding up the ceiling as if it were a tremendous burden upon his shoulders. It was not unlike the great statue they had seen back at the ruined thaig, though this was much more majestic. He wore a large helmet with horns as broad as his shoulders, and his armor was a coat of linked octagons covered in glittering runes.

It seemed that the dwarves had done a great deal to clean up the outpost and push back the filth. Even their supplies were neatly stacked, right down to the last cup on a table. Nothing was left astray. Cleanest of all, however, was the statue. It was possible that they had even cleaned it first.

“Is that Endrin Stonehammer?” Katriel asked, staring at it in awe. She had seen a painting once, in a tome that told of the oldest dwarven legends, but it had been a faded depiction, and not a good one. To see a likeness in the flesh, so to speak, rendered in such magnificent detail . . .

“That is King Endrin Stonehammer,” Nalthur muttered angrily. “And mind how you speak that name, woman. We’ll make only so many allowances for surface folk.” Without waiting for a response, he turned to the warriors who filed through the gate behind him. All of them halted in unison as he spread his hands

high over his head. “We have survived one more night, my brothers and sisters!” he shouted. “One more night to deliver vengeance on the spawn that stole our lands! One more night to spill their blood and hear their cries of terror!”

The dwarves thrust up their weapons as one and roared in approval. “It has been one hundred and twelve nights since our deaths!” he shouted, and they roared again. “And tonight five more of us have found peace.”

The shouting died, to be replaced by a somber silence as the wrapped bodies were delivered forth, passed overhead from dwarf to dwarf until the five lay before Nalthur on the floor. “Rest well, my friends. For one hundred and twelve nights you lasted. Now it is time for you to return to the Stone, in the sight of the First Paragon.”

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