Kelch Administra

"It's here."

The party stopped as soon as Celestine uttered the words. They had now seen action for themselves and it suddenly seemed that much more real to them that she was actually a mage, and not just a girl that dressed up strangely.

They had travelled up a ridge, following a path among the Tevinter ruin in the general direction Duncan had indicated the old Warden post would be. It was already late noon and the group tried to get through the Wilds as fast as they could – none of them relished the thought of spending the night in that place.

Eventually, the path had allowed them to split off from the ruins but still travel up the rest of the ridge. Erik had suggested that they take that route since it seemed that the darkspawn favoured the ruins themselves. This way they would hopefully avoid several encounters with the monsters.

They were near the edge of the ridge when Celestine spoke up, looking over it they could see where they had already travelled that day, albeit the view mostly obscured by fog. The mage slowly stepped forward, drawn to a pile of ash on the ground that the group had not noticed before.

"It feels… familiar."

"Uhm, that's a good thing, right?" Alistair chuckled nervously. "I specialise in killing darkspawn, demons…well let's just say I never got that far in my training."

Erik looked at Elisa and nodded. They knew the feeling as well. No amount of alcohol would erase the memories of that first day of command from the twins' minds. The sensation crawling across your back as hair prickled, the deadening of scent and the fading of ambient noises. It was all too familiar.

"I'm afraid it's not," Celestine said, inspecting a pinch of the dusty ash, which seemed to have withstood ages of lying atop a hill, neither wind, sun nor rain having disturbed it.

"This feeling…." Celestine shook herself and stepped away from the ashes, dropping those she had been inspecting. As soon as they landed and disturbed the ones that were already lying there, the pile erupted.

"Maker," Ser Jory breathed out as the ash seemed to solidify and take shape.

"Demon!" Elisa cried out, her blades materializing in her hands.

Alistair got into a ready stance. "I knew I should have taken notes on those silencing techniques."

The creature was now almost fully formed. It looked unlike any living creature could have, with a writhing, twisted body that still seemed to only materialize a foot from the ground. Arms almost as long as a man and as thick as wooden struts protruded from a bulge that had to be its torso and a hood-like appendage stuck out from it, a single glowing eye leering at the party.

"Celestine Amell, we meet again." The voice was hollow and rang inside their heads, completely bypassing hearing.

"Uhm, Tina – a demon knows your name," Alistair said aloud. "Somehow that doesn't seem like a good thing to me."

Celestine looked at the creature eyes wide and mouth slightly ajar. "You…you were there in the Fade during my Harrowing."

"Aah… you remember. I was surprised that… mmm, Veeshaz did not get its way with you…it normally always does."

"Only a fool would fall for the pandering that pride demon used!" the mage said scathingly. She had now recovered from the shock of seeing the creature materialize before her and was carefully readying her grip on her staff.

"Mmmh… I suppose that means I get all of you to myself, hmmm…. In the physical realm too; you and your friends shall make such a delicious meal."

"Nobody touches my friends." Unbidden flames sprang to life, licking from Celestine's staff as she spoke, and sparks slowly began to form on her hands as well, eyes glowing with inner fire.

"My, my, mmm…so possessive. Shouldn't you at least want to try and share? I can offer you the…"

The creature was cut off as two tiny points of silver appeared from its torso, then it simply dissipated into a cloud of ash once more, losing all form as the traces of the fade vanished. The rotting scent of the Wilds rushed to fill in the space and the chirping of bugs and frogs in the background returned.

"Gah, that smell always gets you after it's been gone," Erik muttered, seemingly unperturbed by what had just happened.

The two silver points turned out to be the tips of Elisa's daggers, which she had driven up to their hilt into the demon's torso. "Maker, but they love to talk if you don't open up swinging."

The flames had vanished from Celestine, who now wore an expression of surprise and confusion.

Ser Jory and Daveth looked like they were trying to recover from what had probably been utter terror. Seemingly the stories spread by the Chant about demons inspired far more terror than those that history taught of darkspawn. Thankfully, no-one commented on this.

Alistair chuckled nervously. "I don't suppose you have any other demons from your past we might run into."

Celestine looked at him, her expression having turned thoughtful. "Well…I never actually killed that Pride demon that tested me during my Harrowing. It did say that we would meet again, so I suppose we could expect it to crop up at some point."

Elisa swore as she heard that. "Pride demons are a bitch to kill."

"Yes," Celestine said, nodding. "I do get the impression that this is not the first encounter that the two of you have had with demons. I myself had never encountered them before my Harrowing." A vision of flames everywhere and burning corpses filled her mind, screams dying as the inferno took them. Celestine shook her head. Not now! She had trained for this all her life!

Erik laughed mirthlessly. "We have."

The Cousland twins got enquiring looks from the other party members, but Erik did not respond. Neither did Elisa at first. Eventually she broke the silence. "The Battle of Red Tide."

Ser Jory whistled slowly. "Maker, you two were there? You couldn't have been older than your sixteenth nameday back then. We heard stories about that back at Redcliffe – how the Cousland's Commander rallied the auxiliaries and saved the Teyrn's forces from the necromancer."

"Hold on…" Alistair started, but stopped himself when he saw the silent signal from Celestine, who was looking at him meaningfully with a finger pressed to her lips. Some things were best shared only when those sharing them felt the need to. He nodded in response, understanding.

Thankfully neither Daveth nor Jory noticed this exchange. Alistair cleared his throat to break the suddenly oppressive silence. "Well we can't sit about in the Wilds all day…unless one of you packed for a picnic."

"Ooh a picnic!" Elisa said, jumping up and clapping her hands, the sombre mood from a second ago seemingly forgotten. But then she pulled a face. "I'd prefer not to have to eat in a place that smells like ass though."

"Not to mention darkspawn surprises," Daveth said.

"Yeah, I wish we could have taken Alfonse. He would sniff them out a mile away!" Nothing seemed to dampen Elisa's newfound excitement.

"Greeat, now I feel like I'm substituting for a dog." Alistair sighed.

"Why you would want to inflict the scent of darkspawn upon my faithful hound is beyond me," Erik said, shaking his head.

"Good point. They do smell a great deal worse than this place does on its own."

The group had started moving up the ridge again, ordeal with the demon almost forgotten. They ran into more darkspawn along the way, but dispatched them quickly with the system they were slowly getting used to, of Alistair and Erik taking the brunt of the attacks while the others picked off the monsters. Ser Jory ensured that none of the creatures made it to Daveth and Celestine while they launched their ranged attacks and Elisa dealt with the enemy on her own, vanishing and reappearing all over battlefields. There had been several occasions already where Celestine apologised profusely for catching the other woman in one of her spells, but the Cousland merely waved her off, citing that it was her own fault for not looking before leaping – or at least announcing to her allies where she would be leaping.

Finally they reached the top of the ridge, where a large circular ruin dominated the area. The darkspawn seemed to have been the thickest here since crossing the makeshift bridge, but they rid themselves of of the monsters quickly.

"You know, I'm beginning to wonder what's so special about Grey Wardens," Elisa mused., "We seem to be dealing with these buggers just fine."

"There are…other things, that make Wardens necessary," Alistair mumbled.

"Ooh, yes this whole secret joining thingy," the Cousland continued. "I wish you people would tell us more!"

"And," Celestine interjected, "I don't think any of us are what you would call 'run of the mill' individuals."

She pointed at Ser Jory. "Our good knight was recruited after winning the Grand Melee at a tourney, not that I know anything of such things, but it sounds impressive." She pointed at Daveth, "You got into enough trouble with the law to make it to the noose, only to be snatched from it." She pointed at Alistair, "Templar material, good enough to fight demons, good enough to fight darkspawn. I knew some of the Templars from the Circle; some of them were frighteningly skilled. Elisa and Erik, well…Erik fights as a knight would and Elisa is a damn massacring machine." Finally she pointed to herself, "And me, well…walking time bomb."

Alistair looked at her for a moment and then spoke up, "What's a bomb?"

Daveth nudged him in the ribs with his elbow. "I think it's how Qunari do fire magic without…magic. Heard that the dwarves have been trying to get it working as well."

"Oooh, a metaphor."

The party then split up among the ruins, scouring them for any traces of the documents Duncan mentioned. After the better part of an hour of searching Daveth finally called out, "Hey, I think I got something here!"

They all assembled where the roguish man was rifling among some ancient scrolls and crates; most of the parchment seemed to have rotted away and whatever had been written upon them had long since faded.

"Damn, if the treatises are still here they're pretty much useless now," Erik muttered.

"Looking for something?"

The whole party turned around as one, weapons drawn upon hearing the strange feminine voice from behind them.

Ser Jory gasped, voicing everyone's thoughts, "A Witch of the Wilds!"