David Gaider - The Calling

With a bellow of effort the creature heaved the masonry boulder up at Fiona. She lifted her staff, shouting as she summoned another spell. A white flare burned around her staff as another lightning bolt lanced forth from it, striking the boulder in midflight. With a resounding crack that filled the cavern, the boulder shattered into a cloud of dust and a thousand shards that flew in every direction.

Fiona stumbled backwards, pale and weakened, and the ogre began a lumbering charge up the stairs toward her. Maric pulled himself up to his feet, his leg burning with agony. He ignored it and began to race up the steps after the creature, taking two or three at a time.

The ogre got to the top of the stairs, towering over the mage. Though she held up her staff and made a feeble attempt to summon a spell, there were only swirls of light around her and nothing more. The ogre roared in victory.

Maric reached the ogre from behind and, shouting a loud war cry, he raced up the creature’s large back, allowing his speed to carry him. He plunged the dragonbone longsword between its shoulder blades, the enchanted blade thrusting through thick hide and bone. He bore down on the hilt with his weight, pushing it even deeper until the sword shook from the effort.

A gush of cold ichor erupted from the wound, splattering on Maric’s face. The creature squealed in torment, arching its back and clutching at the air with its taloned fingers. It tried vainly to reach for the impaled sword, twisting about frantically. Maric tried to hold on, but the hilt was slick with ichor and he lost his grip. Tossed aside, he landed on the dais, his head cracking forcefully against the stone.

The ogre arched back even farther, screeching and trying to get at the source of its anguish. Maric could see the tip of his sword jutting from the front of its chest. Slowly it teetered back, and then toppled. It crashed heavily to the stairs and then began to tumble down to the bottom, picking up speed as it went.

A cloud of smoke surged across his vision, stinging his eyes. He could feel the heat of nearby flames, hear the sizzle and pop of the darkspawn corruption as it burned. He heard Hafter barking loudly somewhere off in the distance, and then Duncan shouted. He couldn’t see anything at all. There was a ringing sound, too, and Maric realized it was his head. It throbbed dully and he couldn’t move.

“Maric!”

It was Fiona’s voice. He discovered that he had closed his eyes. The sounds of battle suddenly seemed very distant, as if they were happening somewhere else and not quite relevant to him. A sense of weakness and peace descended over him. His eyes fluttered open to find the mage looking down at him. Her face was pale with exhaustion, her short black hair coated in ichor that dripped down across her forehead. She was holding him in her arms, and he felt blood oozing from his head. She looked so frightened, he thought.

He wanted to comfort her, but couldn’t. His hand felt leaden and not quite under his control, and while he tried to reach up to her, he missed her completely.

“Maric! You need to get up!” Fiona shouted frantically. Then her attention was drawn by something he couldn’t see. She stared off, dread filling her eyes as the darkspawn humming suddenly got much louder. It filled the entire cavern, and Maric could almost picture another wave of darkspawn piling in from both passages.

“That’s too bad,” he muttered. “I’d hoped we’d gotten them all.”

“There’s no end to them.” She looked weary, the fight all but gone out of her as she watched the darkspawn horde’s inevitable approach. Kell yelled somewhere far off, and Hafter howled in pain.

He stared up at her and smiled wanly. Somehow it didn’t seem so terrible. He felt bad for young Cailan, but he knew that Loghain would do right by the boy. Far better than he could ever have. He had felt a hollowness for so long, an emptiness that just grew worse with each passing year.

Yet here, lying in her arms, Maric felt strangely content. He looked up at Fiona’s face and thought only how beautiful she was. Those dark eyes had seen so much suffering. He wanted to tell her that there was no more need to be frightened, that everything would be all right now.

And then a wave of magic struck them, a power colder than anything Maric had felt before. His vision clouded into a pure white, and then he sank into darkness. The only thing he found himself regretting was that he was alone.

“Duncan.”

The word penetrated Duncan’s brain only slowly, and it took him a moment to realize that he was gradually coming out of unconsciousness. Inch by inch he crawled up out of the fuzzy haze of pain that enveloped him. He remembered fighting. He remembered the ogre charging into the cavern, and then being overwhelmed by the endless waves of darkspawn. A spear had stabbed through his gut, gone right through him and out the other side. He remembered the blinding pain, the blood bubbling up out of his mouth and the creatures leaping atop him. And then—

—he started awake, sitting up far too fast. The pounding in his head became excruciating agony. He winced, pressing his hands to the sides of his head as if that might prevent his brain from exploding. That’s certainly what it felt like was going to happen, anyhow. That’s also when he noticed there were heavy iron manacles on his wrists.

“What the blasted … ,” he muttered.

“Not so fast,” the voice cautioned him. “We’re all wounded.”

Still pressing on his head, Duncan opened his eyes slowly. There was light in the small chamber, a harsh orange glow emanating from a strange amulet that hung near the door. It was enough to make his head throb, and he looked away into the shadows.

The voice was correct about one thing: He was bandaged. He could feel the thick bandages around his chest, all stuffed with some kind of material that felt warm and itchy at the same time. There were other strips of cloth wrapped around one shoulder and his left thigh, injuries he didn’t even remember receiving even though they pulsated painfully enough now. The cloth used for the bandages looked yellowed and suspect. Best not to examine them too closely.

“How are you feeling?”

The concerned voice was Fiona’s. He blinked several times, getting used to the amulet’s glow, and saw her sitting next to him. The elf looked quite a fright, her hair matted with dried ichor and her chain shirt not only splattered but possessing several gaping holes. Her skirts were tattered and filthy. She, too, was manacled as he was, their restraints connected by rusty chains to a stone wall behind them.

The others looked no better. He could make out Kell in the dim light, one of his legs heavily bandaged and little left of his leather jerkin other than a tattered vest. Yellowed cloths covered much of his upper chest, dark stains seeping through in two spots. Hafter slept next to him, the hunter stroking the hound’s head absently. The dog was unbandaged, but his fur was covered by enough wet, reddish areas that he was likely wounded as well.

Utha sat beside him with her arms around her knees. She had several cuts on her face, and her brown robes were almost black with blood and soot. The dwarf didn’t look pleased, he thought, and she grimly examined her manacles as if she could find some way to break them open just with the intensity of her gaze.

King Maric was lying on the floor on the other side of Duncan. He was still unconscious, his head covered with a thick bandage soaked through by an alarming amount of blood. His silverite armor was dull and black, and covered in so many splatters of ichor and blood, he couldn’t really tell if the man was injured anywhere else.