The next day Iron Bull and his men headed for the Gates of Andoral to make good on their lie, but it led them to a surprise.

  When they passed through the enormous dark metal gates forged during the ancient Tevinter slave era and headed for the old warden Echoback Fort outpost, they spotted a human rogue and an elven warrior in the far distance.

  The men were being overrun with an unusually large horde of poisonous Quillback beasts. These hunchbacked, blighted monsters on four legs with long sharp snouts, beady eyes and bony feathers jutting out along their spines were keeping the group surrounded. The men looked like they were about to collapse.

  "Double time Chargers!" Iron Bull roared as he sprinted to the men's rescue. His two-handed axe slammed through a nearby quillback like it was cutting butter, drawing the focus to him.

  Hawke let out a roar as he sunk his dual blades into a quillback to send it into a permanent sleep. He was surprised to see Anri's old Inner Circle companion rushing to the rescue.

  "Iron Bull. What are you doing here?"

  "Hawke! What bad luck brought you to play with quillbacks? I hope the wardens aren't up to old tricks."

  "Ha, help me make these beasts charcoal and I'll spill the beans!" Hawke felt renewed energy as the load of the fight was lifted from him, and the quillback beasts found themselves at a sudden disadvantage and eventually dead.

  "Right." Hawke heaved a thankful sigh and jovially greeted his old Qunari friend.

  "Damn, leaving the Inquisition didn't do wonders for your waistline." He joked at Iron Bull's fuller figure in vanguard heavy armor.

  "Pfft. That's what happens when the world is at peace. We all get fat."

  "Do we now?" Hawke lifted a brow with a wry expression.

  "It's an honor to meet you Iron Bull. Hawke has said many good things about you and the Chargers." Fenris cordially introduced himself.

  "Oh, you're him, the badass lyrium machine!" Iron Bull returned Fenris's introduction with wide-eyed wonder. "Krem get your quill and paper ready."

  "SHUT UP." Krem blushed, feeling embarrassed at seeing his favorite character from Varric's Tale of the Champion standing in front of him.

  "The what?" Fenris frowned, which had Hawke burst with laughter.

  "Seriously. What brought you here, perhaps we can help each other out?" Hawke changed the subject once his laughter subsided, which had Krem blowing sighs of relief at seeing his infatuation for Fenris kept safe.

  Iron Bull frowned as he mulled over his boss's instructions. He wondered if Hawke and Fenris were the old friends he was asked to meet up with. He decided to test the premise.

  "We're tracking a Grey Warden."

  Krem looked confused upon hearing the true orders for the first time, but he knew his chief well enough that it wasn't the time to ask questions. Besides, Hawke might wring the answers out for him.

  "What a coincidence, so are we?" Hawke confirmed and gave Iron Bull a knowing wink. "It's confirmed that our orders are aligned."

  "Orders?" Iron Bull's frowned deepened, realizing his Shadow Sect comrades. "My men were asked to hunt down Venatori at the sametime I was to track this warden."

  Hawke got the hint, so he made sure to allude that they had no connection whatsoever with their contact, leaving the Chargers unaware of his and Iron Bull's affiliations. "It seems your patron and mine must have grudges with the same party. Lucky for us."

  Iron Bull nodded. "So let's join forces and do what we came to do."

  "I don't object to that." Hawke shook on the deal.

  Krem puffed out his chest to look stoic before Fenris as the combined group made their way out of Echoback Canyon toward the direction of the Griffin Wing Monument.

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  As they were passing through the Death Drink Springs valley they saw a magical phenomenon they hadn't seen in years.

  Demons were pouring out of a tear in the sky. A literal spatial tear that glowed with a sickly green fade energy. Unlike the rifts Anri used to seal, this one appeared static with a peek of the Fade remaining visible.

  "F—UCK!" Hawke shrieked when a shade slinked toward him: a skeleton hand raised to strike him down.

  Dalish, from the Charges, wielded her bow-not-staff weapon that froze the shade in place, giving Hawke the chance to land a shattering blow.

  "Really handy to have a mage in your band, Bull." Hawke winked at the pretty elf with his thanks.

  "I'm not a mage! It's a bow. A BOW!" She argued rather unconvincingly.

  "Just as well we still have our demonslaying weapons from the old days!" Krem reassured himself as he gripped his longsword tight and swung to take out a Rage Demon.

  The group whittled down the demon numbers but with the spatial rift still opened, more kept coming.

  Iron Bull saw the core problem high on the old mining platform near the creaky Giant's Landing stairway. Two Venatori mages were using orbs that looked like Somnaborium from descriptions Dorian had once shared with him during their Inquisition travels. They appeared similar to the orb that had infected Anri with the Fade Anchor. Yet these ones looked weak, so he figured they were mere replicas with the intention to open rifts. Although that alone was bad enough.

  "See? Vints." He directed Krem's attention to the Venatori enchanters.

  "Right, Chief, so if we take him out, we get rid of these demons and rifts?" Krem yelled out a war cry as he sliced through shade demons to make them dissipate.

  "I think so." Iron Bull answered through his demon kills.

  "Leave this to me." Fenris's eyes glowed as his lyrium-infused power was directed to give him speed.

  He moved as a blur up to the landing, killing the enchanters before they had a chance to react. This was a new ability he had tapped into when Anri had shown him the Tempest Thunderstruck skill. Although the demonstration had also almost set Anri's summerstone villa on fire. Using this skill drained a lot of stamina power, so the recoil was instant weakness where he needed a short rest to recover.

  With the magic empowering the Static Rift gone, the rift could no longer remain open and began to shrink into itself. It closed leaving a nasty stench of sulfur and remaining demons to slaughter.

  As they braced themselves to do some clean up work, three Grey Wardens appeared to do the job for them.

  Iron Bull and Hawke exchanged pensive glances when they saw one of them was a scrappy redheaded and scruffy-bearded man who looked like he had seen better days.

  Hawke sighed when he recalled the drunk he had tried to help back at the Hangman. The man had definitely sobered up and was back to his old fit shape, but the scars to his ego and soul most definitely remained.

  Before he had left for his mission, his conversation with Anri on the matter had been interesting. He couldn't understand why his leader wanted to seek out Alistair Theirin until he was told it was to fulfill a promise to a friend.

  They both understood that trying to sway Alistair to the Shadow Sect would be trying to teach a giant how to read. The man's life was already a tragic tale of royal manipulations, faction distrust and the worst kind of friendship betrayal you could think of.

  When the Hero of Ferelden made Anora queen and saw her father Loghain become a Grey Warden, he had, more or less, spat on Alistair's honor and dismantled his value system for right and wrong, loyalty and fealty.

  The bastard Theirin prince saw the aftermath of the Fifth Blight down empty glasses of cheap swill at Kirkwall's Hangman. A bitterly and forever cynically changed man who lamented his royal birthright, viewing it as some cursed, sneaky, horrible blood magic gone wrong. But this was another reason Anri wanted Alistair to join the cause.

  Regardless, Hawke understood Anri's desire to give the man another chance. Having gotten to know Loghain well, he knew the old-timer regretted Alistair's fate. Being with the Wardens made the former Teryn see how arrogant his thinking had been and the world as far more complex than he realized.

  "I'm surprised to see you here Alistair, or perhaps it's Warden Alistair again." Hawke soberly greeted the man.

  "Right, Wardens, well yeah, I'm wearing this and all. But what brings the Champion of Kirkwall all the way out here?" Alistair eyed him suspiciously.

  Hawke chuckled, "What else brings a desperate man to the Maker's arse end of Thedas? Good coin."

  "Just coin? The last time you were here you had Loghain with you." Alistair's eyes narrowed so much they were squinting.

  "Reasons are different now." Hawke wondered if Alistair had been lurking about the Wardens purely to track Loghain and get his revenge. Well, it was too late for that.

  Alistair's suspicious gaze fell upon Iron Bull and his Chargers. "These heavy hitters are your sell-swords?"

  "We joined hands to take down the same target."

  "That being?"

  Iron Bull saw the rising tension between Hawke and the Grey Warden, so he felt it was necessary to break it.

  "Venatori. They're up to no good."

  "Ha! They're always up to no good, especially here."

  "Well, I guess we've done our bit; we're gonna find some place to camp." Iron Bull changed the subject.

  "Let's head back to the Inquisition outpost, be good to have a roof over our heads while the Chantry hasn't taken full control." Hawke suggested.

  "You're headed back there?" Alistair rubbed his scruffy, bearded chin with a thought.

  "Ser, we could join them?" One of Alistair's warden companions piped up. "I mean, we were a unit for the Inquisition."

  Alistair nodded, seeing an opportunity to learn more about his rivals' intentions.

  "Lead the way."