Storming the Castle - Under the Keep

Vigil's Keep. The home of the bastard that murdered his family in Highever. Gareth silently seethed at coming here, but he knew it was to help his cousin Macha. It was lovely to see her again, even though the circumstances could have been better. He pledged to aid the Wardens for a time, before he would go back to the Bannorn to govern his land. He had brought his entourage of soldiers and found out something was wrong. The Keep was being attacked, but by what, he did not know until one of the other Wardens had informed him it was Darkspawn. "Again?" He groaned, having had enough difficulty sleeping just seeing the nightmarish features of those creatures in his dreams when his home was under siege.

They were all to seperate into teams, and Gareth split his soldiers evenly to assist each group. They may not be wardens, but they have killed Darkspawn in the past. Gareth made his way down the cellar with a group of Wardens he never really got to know during their march north from Lothering. During the weeks it took to get to Vigil's Kepe, he mostly talked with his cousin, catching up with her. He wasn't sure if she remembered her betrothal to him before the massacre at Highever, and he wasn't going to press her to go through with the wedding if she did not. When she's ready, or when she refuses. Time will tell. He thought to himself.

The warden leading their small team was a man of few words. Very few. Gareth was pretty sure these were the most words Griffinhart ever said to him at once the whole time they'd travelled together. Gareth had his sword and shield ready, prepared for the horrors to cut anew.

Ianto kept to the back of their group, checking behind every now and again as he crept along the darkened hall a few steps behind the others. He figured that planning on becoming a Warden wasn't exactly going to do them much good right now, and he should leave the front to the actual Warden who could actually sense actual darkspawn. It also didn't help that their team leader and resident Warden was a mage, and Ianto felt that he was probably best kept to the back so that he didn't accidentally offend him by just generally existing. You never knew when a mage was going to take a Templar, former or not, to task for just generally existing. Warden Griffinhart (which was either not his real name or an incredibly ironic name) seemed like a good man—a good, serious, silent, scary sort of man. Ianto had no intention of getting on his bad side when he hoped to be on the same side soon enough.

He'd largely kept to himself on the journey between Lothering and Amaranthine. He'd gotten used to being on his own, since leaving the Circle, and he hadn't known what to say to anyone else, anyway. It had been a slow-going, easy trip, right up until just a few hours ago when that guard had come running along the rainy road towards them. Since then, everything had been action and chaos held together only by the practiced commands of the Wardens who led them. No one had been expecting this, but the Wardens had risen to the occasion remarkably, in Ianto's opinion—when the Circle had been overtaken by abominations only a year ago, most of the Tempalrs had scrambled,  all of their careful training forgotten. It was no surprise to him now that Wardens were made of stronger stuff.

Still, he hadn't exactly prepared himself to get thrown into a hoard of darkspawn all at once. So far, it hadn't wavered his conviction to join the Order, but . . . while they'd been on the road, he'd tried to avoid taking Lyrium too often, and now he wasn't exactly working at full capacity. He knew, he knew, that King Alistair, a Warden himself, had been a former Templar, and he suspected that no one would hold the need for lyrium against him given that. Especially now, when it was more important to work efficiently without worrying about appearances or embarrassment.

It wasn't too bad. His mind was still clear; he could still fight. If there was a slight tremor in his hands or the occasional twitch or shudder wracking his shoulders, it was nothing he hadn't felt a hundred times before. Even so, better hope that this went quickly, for all their sakes.

Warden Griffinhart called back, and Ianto paused, looking up. "Um - here?" he called back. They'd all faught through the Main Hall, pushing forward as a group for the doors that would take them down into the cellar. Somewhere ahead and below them, there was a breach that was allowing the darkspawn to enter the Keep, and if they didn't hurry, they'd be swarmed by them. Warden Cousland (he was noble enough himself to know that she'd probably prefer Warden Cousland to Teyrna Cousland) had grouped them all off to see to specific parts of the Castle, and had made sure that their group was led by a capable (Ianto assumed—Warden Griffinhart looked plenty capable to him) Warden since they were about to go into the thick of the darkspawn incursion. They'd be hopeless without a Warden at their head, sensing where those monsters were.

"Ah — " he started up again, feeling that, as the rear guard, he should provide something a little more useful than a weak roll call. "We've cleared the first stairwell. The door to the Main Hall is closed above us. Warden Cousland said it should be a pretty straightforward path ahead." She hadn't said how long of a path, though—instructions had been cut down to the absolutely minimum given their circumstances. Apparently, though the beardy fellow had a better idea of where they were going. Ianto thought he remembered his name was Maddox.