Chapter Text
Broken stairs led nowhere, yet another flight of stairs that led to some ruined floor of what once might have been a dwarven dwelling stripped of walls and ceiling. Or down into a collapsed cellar, a lower floor filled with rubble and acidic water seeping from the walls. Maybe a tomb tossed and emptied, long ago looted.
This time the broken stairs led to something.
The great stone creature crouched over the altar, fat and grotesque, draconic and demonic. The statue clasped its several pairs of hands, hands clasped in offering, in acceptance, in delight, in warning, and one pair wrapped over its own leering mouth.
“What is this?” Varric asked.
Sebastian shuddered. “Clearly some demon,” he said.
“It doesn’t look like any demon I ever read about,” Hawke said, looking up at it. Below the statue lay an altar, a stone slab with four sacramental vessels. Each bowl was empty, any offerings long since stolen.
“You read about demons?” Sebastian asked. “Why?”
“My father’s books,” Hawke said. “In Lothering. He didn’t get to take anything from the Circle but once we were able to settle down he wrote a great deal. He wanted us to have access to his knowledge in case…”
…in case one of them came into magic.
“Then you should recognize Dumat,” Anders said, looking upon the creature of stone.
“The old god?” Sebastian asked. He scowled at the altar, lip curled in disgust.
“God of Silence,” Anders said, his voice oddly slurred. “Four sacrifices, four offerings to the Old God. Two of them are carried with us, the crown and dagger never left this prison. The two we seek are a sacred urn and a scroll of sacrament. Such scrolls were robust things, enchanted to survive the Ages intact. If it is here, it shall be found. I still remember the words.”
“What would an offering to a dead god accomplish?” Hawke mused. He reached out to touch the carved creature, stopping short only when Sebastian grabbed his wrist to keep him from touching it.
“You’re nae doing what I think you’re doing,” Sebastian warned.
“I’m not touching it,” Hawke agreed, pulling away. Sebastian let him go then scowled at the stone statue and spat on the ground.
Hawke grabbed Sebastian by the gorget and shoved him against the wall next to the altar. “I’m not insulting a god in His house, either,” Hawke warned. “Dead or no, demon or no, it’s rude to insult a god in His house. Whether that’s a Chantry or a shrine in the Wilds or an Enclave or an altar in the Deep Roads, it does not matter! I am not the kind of idiot who goes around insulting gods in Their houses, to Their faces! I know better.”
“Some gods should be insulted,” Sebastian warned. His hands reached up to hold the wrist that pinned him next to this heathen altar.
Neither man drew a weapon, instead locked in a contest of wills as they both glared each other down.
“There’s a story there,” Varric said.
Sebastian looked away first. How could he not. Hawke might regret killing him, but he would still be dead. Varric didn’t seem to care, instead enamored with the idea of another story to hear and twist and retell and take credit for. Even Justice seemed enamored with this blasphemous statue of the Old God Dumat, the first Archdemon who nearly swallowed the world before Andraste first Sang her songs to the Maker.
He would take no part in this blasphemy. Neither would they let him stop it, it seemed.
“I still remember the words,” Anders purred.
Sebastian stood out of the statue’s line of sight, far enough to stay out of it while close enough to keep watch in case of darkspawn ambush. Varric stood much closer, leaning against the stone wall to the side with Bianca in his hands.
It was Anders who knelt before the altar, four items in the dust on the floor around him. Hawke sat upon the floor next to him, curled up in a manner that almost looked comfortable. Only someone who knew him well would see the tension in his body, long lines of bunched muscles ready to spring with weapon unsheathed.
First, Anders held the crown above his head, as though about to place it on his own brow. He did not, instead offering it to the statue and then placing it into the first vessel. “Blessed are You, Dumat,” Anders said in a clear reverent voice. “Silent and strong, secret and wise. We bring You gifts, sacrifices to Your greatness.”
“This isn’t right,” Varric whispered, barely loud enough for the sound to reach his own ears. Anders never sounded like this. Not even when Justice was in control. Was it just the weirdness of this Grey Warden tower getting to him? Did all Grey Wardens turn into this eventually? Larius certainly seemed to suggest so.
Next, Anders picked up the dagger. He drew it across his own palm, the thousand year abandoned dagger still sharp enough to draw blood. He didn’t gasp, no sign of pain at all as he held the blade to his bleeding palm, allowing the blade to drink, to bathe in his blood. He placed the bloody knife in the fourth vessel and called out to the darkness. “O Dumat! O Lord of SIlence. Accept these offerings made in Your Name! Grant us Your power and all that we seek!”
Sebastian shuddered as he tried not to watch or hear or pay attention to what happened behind him. He’d watched Merrill call upon the power of her own blood often enough, this was no different. Except it was. For one, Anders wasn’t a blood mage. Why was he acting like one? How could he stomach doing this?
Then Anders picked up the urn. He held it in one hand, his bleeding palm held above it to drip blood onto the ancient gold. Blood glistened on the metal, shining like rubies that shrank and faded and disappeared as the blood seeped into the metal. Drinking. He raised the urn like an upheld chalice offered for the statue to drink. “Gold and jewels,” Anders said, offering all that he had and more. “Meat and blood. Sacrifices to Your hungry heart.”
Kath Hawke felt the magic of the altar shift, something awakening after a thousand years of dormancy. Something was very wrong here. Justice wouldn’t let Anders do this, would he? Justice never struck him as one willing to worship anything or anyone, not when he himself remembered being a god to the Avvar.
Finally Anders picked up the ancient scroll, a roll of parchment gilded and enchanted to survive thousands of years untouched. He didn’t unroll it, he didn’t need to as instead he placed it in the second vessel and then bowed. Anders bowed so low where he knelt that his forehead met the dust upon the stone. “These are our offerings, O Lord of Silence,” Anders said.
Hawke knew then exactly what was wrong as the statue began to change, the sense of it awakening.
That wasn’t Anders.
That wasn’t Justice.
This was someone, some thing else, offering sacrifices to an old god.
Hawke rolled to his feet and his arm darted out to swipe all four vessels off the altar to smash upon the dusty stone.
The impostor screamed, many sharp teeth bared in indignant fury. The altar burst open, long-clawed creatures crawling out of the rift there. Rage demons awash in flame and fury answered the screaming call, as did smaller darker shades too weak to take on forms of their own in this Realm.
“That’s not Anders!” Hawke shouted, drawing his weapon.
Bianca’s strings sang as Varric brought her up to fire into demons that loomed. Sebastian drew and fired into the melee, drawing screams of rage from Rage.
But it was the impostor, the Anatomist who howled as he raised the Anatomist’s blade and plunged it into his own belly.
“That’s blood magic!” Varric screamed. “Anders isn’t a blood mage! That’s not Anders!”
“In the name of the Maker, by the blood of Andraste, I command thee to LEAVE!” Sebastian shouted the beginnings of the exorcism. He had to believe it would work, faith fueled so much power in this Realm and in the Fade, but nothing seemed to happen to Anders. Nothing except the Anatomist turning blank white eyes upon him.
Maker, his eyes were solid white.
Hawke roared and charged, heedless of who he fought. All that mattered was putting down this creature, this thing that had possessed his lovers. That wasn’t Anders, but neither was it Justice. This Anatomist was something else entirely, something that had taken his loves from him with no promise of ever getting them back.
He could never forgive that.
Shades swarmed Varric, looming over him as he stabbed with Bianca’s bayonet. Sebastian had to abandon the attempt at exorcism, instead firing into demons that tore and slashed with burning claws and dusty faceless maws.
Instead Hawke fought the Anatomist alone.
It wasn’t Anders’ magic. It didn’t feel like Justice’s power. It was something else entirely that tore through Hawke and tore at his muscles inside his own skin. It was monstrous, the terrible knowledge of the Anatomist taken to murderous heights. Hawke screamed in an agony so powerful it threatened to overwhelm his own Reaver’s talents.
Except…
Hawke hadn’t tasted lyrium in days, not since his last draught in Kirkwall. He didn’t have one here. But he still tried it, he still drew upon what lyrium remained in his system to… to…
The Cleanse was barely strong enough to break the Anatomist’s hold over his insides. But it was strong enough. Hawke bared draconic teeth and snarled at the Anatomist who looked like his lovers. He brought the club-like edge of the golden key up, swinging it underhand to knock the Anatomist in the jaw, throwing him to the floor.
“I love you,” Hawke whispered. “I’m sorry.” He stood over the Anatomist and raised his weapon for one decisive strike.
Justice raised clawed hands and pulled upon Anders’ magic. The paralysis glyph enveloped himself and Hawke, freezing them both in place.
Time stopped.
Meanwhile, Sebastian stabbed his knives into the last of the shades, ruining its form. The shade crumbled to dust that lay still, dead, it was over. Except…
“Shit,” Varric whispered.
The glyph around Anders and Hawke was perfect, shining and slowly spinning like a summoning circle on elfroot.
“Anders is possessed,” Sebastian said.
“Yeah, we know,” Varric said.
Sebastian shook his head. “I dunnae mean Justice, tha’s something different.”
The glyph slowly rotated on the ground, delicate lines unhindered by stones or dust. And one of the forms within that circle began to move. Slowly, carefully, with great effort, Anders began to move within the paralysis glyph.
“Give me one good reason not to finish it,” Varric warned. He raised Bianca.
Anders breathed slowly, his movements so slow, every movement came at a different speed than the rest of them. Hawke still didn’t move at all, his face twisted in righteous fury with tears frozen on his cheeks and mouth open in a silent scream of agony. Blood paused in its trickle from his nose and ears, from the corner of his mouth, painting his teeth red. Even his fingernails bled.
Sebastian’s hand curled over Varric’s shoulder. “That’s Anders,” he said. “His eyes. They were white.”
Anders looked at them with begging, pleading, golden eyes. They had irises, pupils, they were eyes. For now, at least, he was himself. For some definitions of.
And still he fought his own paralysis glyph, slowly pulling himself out of the center of it and then out through the outer ring. Finally he collapsed to the dusty floor gasping and coughing and not moving. “I’m going to lay here for a minute, if that’s okay,” he mumbled.
“What was that?!” Varric demanded.
The glyph collapsed and Hawke finished his swing. The golden key embedded in the ground where Anders once lay, the killing blow cracking the dusty stone. Hawke looked around in frantic Need, a bloodlust and a desperate madness. Until he saw them.
Sebastian stood with one hand on Varric’s shoulder. Varric still held Bianca ready, cocked and aimed at Anders who lay face down on the dusty floor.
Hawke sobbed and fell to his knees. He’d just… He’d almost… And…
And it would have been…
Hawke screamed into the darkness of the Deep Roads.
The statue above the altar did not react as ropes pulled it down, shattering upon the dusty ground. The altar would lure no others here, would accept no offerings. No god remained here to accept them. Whatever spirit or demon masqueraded as Dumat would leave this place, forced to hunt elsewhere.
Justice drew Anders’ hands along Hawke’s ruined muscles, torn and ripped and bleeding internally. Anders’ magic wielded with a spirit’s power made quick work of the damage done with an Anatomist’s knowledge and a blood mage’s greed. This was not the honest magic of using his own blood, this was theft. Theft of power, burning Hawke’s own blood to rip him apart from the inside.
Justice’s own belly wound had been tended to, the organs within healed and the abdominal wall merely wrapped closed within the armored corset. Healing would wait for later, after he felt he’d Atoned for his actions.
“There is a Presence here as strong as the Blight itself,” Justice said as he worked. “Blight Song is an alluring presence that Anders has neither heard nor felt in years, save for those days Warden Stroud gave himself to me in Agreement.”
“Okay, that is a LOT,” Varric said. “You’re saying Warden Stroud made an Agreement with you? For what?”
Justice did not answer that. Instead he continued in his assessment of their situation. “Now, here, so close to a Presence this strong? That Sings as loud as an entire horde? He has not felt such a Presence since Amaranthine. It was able to overpower him so strongly that I could not resist for him.”
“What is it?” Hawke asked.
“I believe it is the one who demands your death. Warden Larius cowered to hear the name Corypheus. I do not doubt he fears what we just experienced.”
“Could this Corypheus take Anders again?” Sebastian asked.
Justice looked at him, the spirit’s blank eyes somehow full of sadness. “If I falter,” he said, confirming the worst.
“How do we keep you from faltering?”
“Anything,” Hawke whispered. “Just ask.”
Justice smiled softly, a glimmer of hope as Hawke folded him in strong arms and pulled him close. But it was not Hawke to whom Justice looked this time as he made his request.
“Sing for me, Sebastian.”
Lady of Perpetual Victory
Your praises I Sing
Gladly do I accept the Gift
Invaluable of Your Glory
Let me be the Vessel
Which bears the Light
Of Your Promise
To the world expectant
The air itself rent asunder
Spilling light unearthly from
The Waters of the Fade
Opening as an Eye to look
Upon the Realm of Opposition
In dire judgment
And in that baleful Eye I saw You
O Lady of Sorrow
Armored in Flame
Holding in Your left hand
The Glaive of Redemption
You descended on feathered wings
And a great Voice
Thundered from the top
Of every mountain and pinnacle
Across Creation
All heads bow
All knees bend
Every being in the Realm of Opposition
Pay homage
For the Maker of all Things
Returns to you
Sebastian’s constant recitation of the Chant of Light followed them through the depths of the tower, the Deep Roads stretching out in a terrible lie of promise. There was no way out despite what their eyes told them, every tunnel turned and twisted to bring them back here. Every tunnel except one.
One set of stairs leading up, back into the tower. Up in a direction they’d never seen or been.
“This way,” Justice said. “It comes from this branch of the tower. Corypheus waits at the top.”
“I’ll kill him,” Hawke promised. “Corypheus will die by my blade for what he’s done here today.”
“Do not make an Oath unless you are willing to be held to it,” Justice warned.
“I gladly make such an Oath, Justice. I swear it to You.”
Justice pulled him in for a kiss, long and slow and threatening to turn desperate. Except the world seemed to shift, the ground heaving once. Justice let Hawke pull away, just enough to look into his eyes. “The Oath is made,” Justice whispered.
Hawke didn’t regret it, he couldn’t. Corypheus would die by his hand.
As would anyone who stood in his way.