Nahariel is crossing the threshold of Skyhold to join a caravan bound for Emprise, hood of her own cloak raised against the damp chill, when the rift blazes to life in the courtyard.

Her head snaps back, eyes staring, transfixed as if the sickly light it shed were a spear through her heart. Rift. The courtyard. Sina.

Suddenly everything she carried was on the ground, her feet scrabbling in the churned, freezing mud in a desperate bid for speed. Her hood dropped back as the hunter sprinted directly into the wind, the cold rain plastering strands of dark hair to her cheeks. Rounding the turn into the courtyard, her foot slipped beneath her, sending her hard to her knees on the muddy stone. Even as she bared her teeth in pain, she spent no thought on it. She could see the courtyard now, and her rapidly dilating pupils were filled with demons. Demons, and the crumpled form of her beloved First.

A noise tore out of her throat that was not unlike the screeches of the dark creatures themselves, and then she was running again. In such an animal fear was she that her hands made themselves claws, forgetting entirely the blades at her belt.

This was how, with a second shriek, the dark-skinned hunter's body slammed fully into the demon of despair that approached Siuona Dahlasanor.