Just because he’d shouldered his bow didn’t mean Nivak was any more at ease. His ears only half-heard the words this little gaggle of strangers uttered among themselves and he watched them for trouble from the corner of his eyes, turning the majority of his gaze across the rest of the encampment. Guthor had found and delayed a clothing merchant, he could see, while Daermal and Kharai hid from the wind in the shelter of the great steps up to Orzammar’s gate and ignored the confused glances thrown at them by the door guards.
Even with the wind and open air casting sounds about strangely, Nivak heard the strange thundering beats long before their source appeared. He could swear he’d felt it, too, violent tremors echoing up from the solid ground and through his feet. The scout hadn’t even known darkspawn armies to make that sound and his bow was fast in his hands again, though Lythe quickly reached over and touched his arm in caution, so he nocked the arrow loosely and kept it pointed to the ground.
The strange ground-beats slowed and then creatures strode into the camp, men riding upon their backs. Four-footed as brontos were, but with such sleek grace, they almost distracted him completely from surveying the party at large. But something Lythe saw made her gasp and he heard her disbelieving murmur: “By every Ancestor that ever walked before me and guided my path! I haven’t seen that since…!”
She trailed off, eyes tracking the one soldier who had parted from the rest and now approached the gates. Behind them, the exile boy called a query, and he wasn’t the only one who wanted to know what Lythe did – Nivak freed a hand to jostle his sergeant’s arm and bring her back to the present.
Lythe shot him a look of amazement (he could see her eyes were wide through the slits of her helm) but then turned away again, staring at the one man in the blackened armor and grey cloak. “The symbol he wears, the griffons! He’s a Grey Warden!”
Then her hands were speaking, calling to their comrades across the way, and Daermal and Kharai jerked upright in response. The Warden appeared to be approaching the doors, and they were in just the right place to listen in if it was indeed an audience with the guards that he sought. Nivak huffed a little amusement, shouldering his bow again. No dwarf anywhere admired the Wardens like his sergeant did, he was certain, and he couldn’t say he was surprised that she would want to know what had brought a Warden to Orzammar.
And here she was, by pure coincidence, on the surface escorting an exile at just the right time to see the Warden arrive. She’d be spouting that “Ancestors’ guidance” stuff for months now.