David Gaider - The Calling

He felt himself blushing. He didn’t really want to talk about this, but the way she stared at him with those dark eyes, it was as if they were boring into his skull. “Katriel,” he answered quietly.

“Did you love her?”

“What kind of question is—?”

“Did you love her?” she insisted.

“Yes.” It was a painful admission. He would have looked away, had she not held his chin tightly. Fiona looked into his eyes and smiled warmly.

“So you punish yourself for what you did, for the rest of your life?” Her eyes teared up as she shook her head, baffled by him. “Maric, you said back on those stairs that you had changed, that you wanted to live. So live! You have every freedom that I never had. Use it! You want to repay this elven woman you wronged so badly? Make sure that nobody ends up like her ever again.” Fiona released his chin and blinked away her tears, frowning bashfully for crying in the first place. “There were all these stories about the wonderful Maric the Savior, and I thought for certain it was all just lies. That it was simply a genteel front like my master used to have, smiles on top of the sickness. But Ferelden got lucky and has a good man as its king.”

“I’m not such a good man.”

She snorted incredulously. “Only a good man would say that.” She took the wet cloth from him and studiously began to wipe his face with it. He let her, watching her quietly. Then she paused, looking at him with grave seriousness. “You need to forgive yourself, Maric. Or I’m going to have to punch you in the head, I swear it.”

It was almost the same thing that Katriel had said to him in the Fade. The thought sent a pang of regret through him, but still he laughed at Fiona’s expression, and it felt good to laugh. She cracked a smile at that. She went to wipe his face again, but he reached up and took her hand, and stopped laughing. “Come with me,” he said earnestly. “To Denerim.”

“We’re not even out of the Deep Roads yet… .”

“We could both die, I know that. Come with me anyway.”

Her smile was polite, but he could see the refusal even before she said it. “I am a Grey Warden,” she sighed. “And an elf. And a mage. And even if that were not enough, I am suffering from the taint. My time is limited.”

“I don’t care about that.”

“I do.” He saw that there would be no arguing with her. “And I care about you.”

He leaned in and kissed her. She was taken by surprise, just about to speak again, but quieted as she accepted his embrace. He leaned her down to the floor, his kisses growing more passionate, knocking over the dwarven basin so that the cold water ran along the stone and soaked into their clothing.

They barely noticed. Duncan seemed mostly bemused when he woke them up a while later, clearing his throat loudly just outside the entrance of the cave. When they finally exited, their clothing sopping wet and their armor hastily rearranged, he chuckled at them. “So I guess you’re not going to be complaining about each other anymore?”

Fiona’s face reddened and he grinned.

He hadn’t let them sleep longer, he said, because the darkspawn were closing in. That was when the amusement ended, and they picked up what few supplies they wanted to take with them and headed out quickly. Maric saw the dark circles under Duncan’s eyes and felt badly. The lad could have used some sleep, himself, and yet Fiona and he had selfishly used the time up for themselves.

Still, Duncan didn’t complain. He also seemed more determined, somehow. Maric wasn’t sure he could put his finger on it.

They spent half their time running, the dark corridors speeding past, and while Maric tried to remember the route the Legion of the Dead had taken to reach the outpost, he couldn’t piece it together. It wasn’t long before he realized he wasn’t recognizing the corridors at all.

They kept the punishing pace for several hours, pushing themselves hard. Duncan’s apprehensive expression told him that the darkspawn could not be far behind, although Maric couldn’t hear the telltale sounds of their approach. The Deep Roads were quiet. Only the sounds of their footsteps echoed, and as the time wore on, Maric noticed that the signs of the taint around them were lessening.

“Are we getting close to the surface?” he asked nobody in particular.

Fiona and Duncan glanced at him, but said nothing.

Another hour passed, the three of them sweating profusely as they trudged. They were definitely moving up a slope; the pain in Maric’s legs told him that much. While it slowed them down, they continued on. Up was where they wanted to go, after all.

At the top of the slope, the light from Fiona’s staff slowly revealed that the corridor came to a dead end. The roof here had collapsed long ago, leaving the end of the tunnel completely filled with rocks and debris and no way around. They ground to a halt, staring at all the dust with wide eyes.

“Well, so much for that,” Duncan grumbled, wiping his forehead. “We’ll need to turn back, and quickly, or we’ll meet the darkspawn halfway back to the last intersection.” He turned around to do just that, but even before he took his first step, Maric held up his hands.

“Wait. Do you smell that?” Maric had become so accustomed to the stench of corruption in the tunnels and the musty smell of the dust that he almost thought his nose had simply stopped working out of self-defense. But as he stood there not ten feet from the massive pile of rocks, he could have sworn he smelled …

“Fresh air,” Fiona breathed. Her eyes suddenly bright, she approached the rocks and clambered up the slope until she reached near the ceiling. She grinned and looked back at them. “I think this leads outside! I think the surface is past here!”

“Are you sure?” Duncan asked.

“I can’t see any light, but there’s definitely air coming over the rocks here at the top.” She reached up with her hand and pushed it past a number of the larger chunks, frowning in effort. “Yes, I can feel it.”

Maric scratched his chin, thinking. “Maybe this led to one of the doorways that sealed the Deep Roads off from the surface? One that’s not there anymore.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Duncan sighed. “We’ll never be able to dig our way through all this in time to do us any good. The darkspawn will be on us long before then.” He glanced back down the passageway into the darkness below. “At least it will be easier going down then coming up.”

“No,” Fiona stated. She climbed back down the rocks toward them, clutching her staff in her hand firmly. She had a dangerous look that made Maric nervous. “We are getting out of here. Now.”

Duncan stared at her, his mouth agape. “You don’t mean … ?”

She stopped in front of them, frowning severely. “Stand back. Well back.”

They did as they were told. Even as Maric and Duncan ran back a ways down the passage, already Fiona was concentrating. Swirls of magical fire were gathering around her hands and working their way up her staff, the flames suddenly growing hotter and more pronounced.

She didn’t unleash the energy, however. She held the staff above her head and closed her eyes, her mouth moving in a silent chant. The fire grew. White energy began to course around her body, lighting up the entire tunnel like it was daylight. The staff shook, and it became obvious that the magic was difficult for Fiona to control. She gritted her teeth and clutched the staff tightly, and a halo of flames slowly surrounded her.

“She’s mad!” Duncan exclaimed. “She’ll bring the roof down upon us.”

Maric was not so sure. “Maybe we should move back a bit farther… .”

The fireball, when it was unleashed, shook the entire tunnel. There was a massive flash of light and a roar of sound that deafened them, the backlash of force from the blast throwing them both back several feet. Several large chunks of rock fell nearby, followed by a swarm of thick dust and smoke that choked him. He gagged and coughed, thinking for a moment that Duncan might be right, but then he felt something else.