<strong>North of the Woodland Clearing<br/>Somewhere North of Ostagar</strong><br/><br/>Eluv'yan and Mathius made good time, considering their situation.  Mathius had correctly guessed that the northern woods were thinner.  As they continued on in short bursts, the trees shifted to thinner, shorter birches and pines.  They were farther apart than the southern vegetation, increasing visibility, but their roots were gnarled and just below the dirt, waiting to catch a careless foot.  Patches of dense brush occasionally obstructed their path, thornbushes and biteme shrubs growing in dense thickets up to the waist.  The horns were an omnipresent sound, individual peals melding together into one constant note blown by a hundred mouths.  They didn't fade away as they moved north, but they didn't draw any closer either.<br/><br/>A dense fog began to quickly coalesce, drifting amongst the trees.  Soon after, small flakes of snow began to drift silently to the ground.  Combined with the night, the snow and fog drastically reduced their visibility.  Above, the nighttime sky began to glow an eerie orange-red as the light from the Darkspawn horde's torches and fires lit up the underside of the clouds and caught on the falling snow.  At least there was no wind, and their exertion kept them warm enough to avoid frostbite.<br/><br/>Close to half an hour after leaving the clearing, the forest broke.  A stone road lay before Eluv'yan, running north-south.  Despite the dusting of snow, the Imperial Highway was clearly in disrepair.  The road was paved with gray stones, their hard edges softened by centuries of exposure.  One arm of a stone arch rose out of an earthen mound on the side of the road, like the bleached rib of some long dead great beast.  The sky to the south was a bright red, and the southern road trailed off into a red smear of fog and falling snow.