When I got back to Haven and studied the adventuring avenues available to me, I discovered that the only important thing left to do was contact the mages in Redcliffe. Well, that or talk to the Templars, who were having their own troubles, but I wanted to deal with my own kind first. I checked everything I could, made sure nobody needed me to locate any more livestock in the Hinterlands, that no RaMOs were left lying about, and none of my companions had anything interesting to say. That last one had been the case for a while, actually. It was odd, they’d had some very compelling stories to tell after I first met them, but then they all just started repeating the same things no matter how many times I tried to talk to them and get them to say something new. Very strange.
Okay, everyone, I haven’t been entirely truthful with you. I had one more minor piece of business to attend to before attempting to talk Grand Enchanter Fiona out of any potential stupidity. But, as it was right on the way to Redcliffe Village, I consider it to be part of that overall trip. Way back when I was describing my first journey to the Hinterlands, I mentioned a dragon flying around and how you shouldn’t just run right up to it, you should go do other stuff first. Well, I felt that enough inquisiting had taken place and valuable experience gained for my crew and I to go toe-to-toe with the big, scaly beast, who had taken up residence in, and burned most of, a valley near Redcliffe.
The master of her domain.
I have to say, fighting a dragon was about as epic as I could’ve hoped. When we first entered the valley, I was a bit disappointed because all she did was fly around overhead taking fire-breath potshots at us as we fought our way through her offspring. Not very sporting, if you ask me. Only when we’d cleared the area and the monster landed in a huge open area nearby did the fight start in earnest. It was everything I expected a tussle with a living engine of destruction to be with one notable exception: several times during the fight, she summoned help. You’d think that a dragon vs. four creatures that didn’t even stand up to its knee would be a lopsided fight in the big lizard’s favor, but she kept flying off, landing on a nearby cliff, and spitting fireballs at us as dragonlings made run-ins. Even less sporting of her. Apparently even dragons can succumb to moments of cowardice. Another thing I realized as we battled the beast was how utterly amazing Cassandra is. Her tasks in this fight included, but were not limited to: hacking away at the dragon, holding its attention, dodging fire in ball and stream forms, and somehow not dying in the process. All of which she accomplished. I mean, the rest of us contributed, sure. But it’s honestly not as difficult as you might think to fire death from all angles at a dragon, especially as your warrior friend is deflecting the claw swipe of a fully-grown high dragon with her shield, causing the fully-grown high dragon to recoil in impotent pain. I had always assumed she was a human, judging by the look of her, but she must be some kind of golem made of something sturdier than flesh and bone for her arm to have survived the sheer force of those blows.
Absolutely badass!
Honestly, this was easily the most difficult fight up to this point in my inquisiting. One thing that didn’t help in that regard was the fact that, hopefully without sounding too arrogant, I’m quite talented in the art of using magical fire as a weapon. As it turns out, this isn’t a particularly useful talent to have when one is going up against a creature that is basically fire in flesh form. I think most of my normally scorching spells just kind of tickled the thing. So, I was relegated to throwing lightning, raising barriers, and bringing my colleagues back from the brink. I’d never had anybody get knocked out of a fight, even temporarily, until we kicked in the door of the Fereldan Frostback. But, thanks to Cassandra and whatever she’s made of, a never-ending supply of ammunition, and an arseload of non-flamey magic, we carried the day and scoured the valley of all things scaly. And so, it was finally time to go talk to Fiona and see what plans she had for the mages. After a quick nap of course. I figured that we’d earned one after slaying a dragon. And after waiting what had to have been several weeks, if not months, what with all the far-flung destinations I’d traveled to in the meantime, for me to come to that inn to initiate the talks, I figured the mages wouldn’t be too upset about hanging on for a few more hours.
