David Gaider - The Calling

“The dwarves gave me a key.”

She nodded. “Then we camp here until morning.”

“What?” Duncan spluttered with indignation. “Can’t we go in now? Where it’s warmer?”

The Commander turned a level gaze toward him, and he immediately shrank back from her. “We have no way of knowing whether there are darkspawn behind that door,” she said tersely. “Just because the King did not find any there eight years ago does not mean the situation will have remained the same.”

“Can’t you detect them?” Maric asked. “Isn’t that what Grey Wardens do?”

“I tried. I felt … a strange presence, very faint. I cannot tell if it is because the darkspawn are far below or because the doorway is simply too thick.” Without waiting for a response, she turned and snapped to one of the large warriors standing nearby, “Julien, tell the others to spread out and find someplace close with shelter. I want to keep an eye on this doorway to night.”

It wasn’t long before the Grey Wardens had efficiently set up a camp just over the next rise. Snow was piled high on top of it, but at least it offered relief from the sharp winds, and that was better than they’d had all day. Maric felt a bit useless as the others bustled around, setting up tents.

Kell gathered a small pile of frozen wood, and before Maric could ask how he planned on turning that into a fire the hunter produced a small flask from his pack. He poured out a bit of the contents, a bright yellow liquid that began to sizzle as soon as it touched the wood, and within moments a healthy blaze materialized.

“Impressive,” Maric commented.

Kell grinned. “It works on darkspawn, as well. Sadly, we only have a little.”

Before long, dusk gave way to night. Darkness pressed in around them, driven back only by the flames of the campfire. Above the hills, a black sky filled with clouds seemed to go on forever, lit by a moon that never quite seemed to show itself. The blizzard thankfully ended, though the wind continued to lash across the landscape, scouring the fields of snow smooth.

Within the camp, tension filled the air. Maric could see from the grim faces of the Grey Wardens that they didn’t look forward to the morning any more than he did. At least they knew what they were likely to encounter in the Deep Roads. When he first came here, he hadn’t had a clue.

Once the tents were set up, Kell headed off with Duncan and his warhound to hunt. Genevieve strode to the top of the bluff, as from there she could keep an eye on the doorway. The warrior stood up there, one leg propped on the rocks and her cloak billowing behind her in the wind as she kept her watch. It was an intimidating pose, Maric thought. She seemed even more intense than before, if that were possible, as if she expected the doors to burst open at any moment.

He turned to the dwarven woman with the coppery braid, Utha, who shared the frozen log they had dragged next to the campfire. Her face was pretty, he thought. Most of the dwarves he had ever seen looked as if they were hewn from stone, all hardness and rough edges. This one, however, seemed almost soft. She stared into the blaze with an unsettling serenity, and was so very … still.

He couldn’t imagine ever being like that. Even now his head was filled with worry—what was Loghain doing, for instance? He had left a note explaining his plan, but the man might assume it was fake. He might believe that Maric had been kidnapped, and probably had the army searching for him even now. Loghain rarely desisted when he was determined to have his way.

And then there was Cailan, his young son, now no doubt wondering where his father had gone. His mind immediately shied away from such thoughts. No, he wasn’t still at all.

Maric nudged the dwarf and pointed toward where Genevieve kept her vigil. “Is she always like that?” he asked. “Do you know?”

She regarded him with an impenetrable look, her brown eyes glittering in the firelight. She made several strange signals with her hands, and belatedly he remembered that she didn’t speak.

The two warriors sat on the other side of the fire from them, and stopped their quiet whispering to each other as they noticed Maric’s confusion. Nicolas, the blond and more talkative of the two by far, leaned toward him. “Utha tells you that it is love that drives our commander.” The man’s Orlesian accent was cultured and warm.

“Love? You mean love for her brother?”

He nodded. “They were very close.”

“Can you tell me about him? I barely know anything about him. How was he captured? How can you even be certain he’s still alive?”

The brown-haired man, Julien, picked up a long stick he had been using to tend the fire and began shifting several of the logs. Sparks flew, and when Nicolas glanced at his companion they shared a guarded and wary look. Maric had heard perhaps three words in total from Julien since they had left Denerim, and all of them had been directed at Nicolas. Still, the man’s dark eyes said plenty. They said right now that Nicolas shouldn’t be telling Maric any more than was necessary. More Grey Warden secrecy.

Utha frowned, raising a hand and agitatedly gesturing at the men. The fluttering of her fingers seemed to punctuate her words firmly. Nicolas scowled in response and reluctantly nodded. Julien said nothing, his eyes only darkening with concern.

“What did she say?”

“She says we have no right not to tell you more,” Nicolas muttered.

The dwarven woman continued to sign at Maric, and then waited patiently as Nicolas translated. “His name is Bregan, and until one year ago he was Commander of the Grey in Orlais, leader of the order within the Empire. He held that position for a very long time.”

“Did he quit?”

“He did not. He left the order for his Calling. It is a rite where a Grey Warden enters the Deep Roads alone.”

“Alone!” Maric exclaimed. “Why would someone do that?”

“To die,” Utha signed. “A far better fate than to allow the darkspawn taint to overtake our aging bodies. Every Grey Warden knows when their time for the Calling comes, and every one of them who has entered the Deep Roads for their Calling has died, until now.”

Maric pondered this for a moment. Duncan had already explained to him how the Grey Wardens drank darkspawn blood in a ritual they called the Joining, taking the taint into their own bodies in order to effectively combat the creatures. They were more than simply skilled at fighting darkspawn; they knew them intimately. They sensed their presence, sometimes even gleaned their intent. This information was not something many people knew, and Genevieve had only grudgingly allowed the lad to impart it to him.

He wondered if it was the same taint that he had encountered in the Deep Roads years ago. He remembered it well, covering everything in the underground passages like a vile, black fungus. Maric had been fortunate not to contract the darkspawn’s plague during his time there, and had always wondered if Rowan had. No one had ever been able to determine the nature of her illness, and though Maric had tried everything to help her, he had been forced to watch her wither away before his eyes.

It had been painful. Rowan had been a vital woman, and the slow sapping of her strength had galled her. Toward the end she had become a shadow, wanting nothing more than for the pain to simply stop. Maric had held her skeletal hand and felt his heart break as she had begged him in a cracked and hollow voice for release.

No, perhaps it wasn’t so difficult to imagine why the Grey Wardens might prefer to go on this Calling of theirs.

The idea that anyone would make such a sacrifice, however … that they would subject themselves to a corruption that would slowly eat away at their bodies solely to combat a menace that hadn’t threatened Thedas since the last Blight centuries ago?