In 9:41 Dragon Age, the elven mage Valya and a group of mages from the Circle of Magi in Hossberg join the Grey Wardens at Weisshaupt for safety from the ongoing Mage-Templar War. With rebel templars rampaging through Thedas and rebel mages assembling a terrifying army at Andoral's Reach, the Wardens are the only safe harbor for both neutral mages and templars seeking to flee the conflict. The organization is beginning to see groups of both seeking asylum and purpose.

Upon reaching Weisshaupt, Valya is tasked to search the fortress' library for accounts of Wardens abandoning their posts and behaving unusually, as well as records of talking Darkspawn, beginning with the Fourth Blight. From these instructions, Valya locates a lyrium-laced war map inscribed with Elvish, which leads her to a hidden journal detailing the last days of the elven blood mage Warden and griffon rider Isseya and her brother, the legendary hero Garahel who ended the Fourth Blight.

As she reads Isseya's first hand account of the battles during the Exalted Age, the journal reveals that during the Wardens' struggle to defend and evacuate Antiva City, as well as secure the assistance of the Free Marches in ending the Fourth Blight, Isseya was tasked by the First Warden to put the Wardens' griffons through a Joining ritual. This ritual ultimately led to the creatures' corruption. As Garahel and the Wardens attempt, along with the dwarven Warden-Commander of Antiva, Turab, to secure Antiva City and also make diplomatic ties with Starkhaven's ruling family, the Vaels, Isseya also begins to regret condemning the griffons to madness and death.

In secret she contrives a way to remove the taint from griffon hatchlings and contain it within herself, accelerating her own corruption but--hopefully--protecting the new generation of the Wardens' battle brothers and sisters. This effort becomes particularly poignant after Garahel falls slaying the archdemon Andoral during the Battle of Ayesleigh, along with the deaths of many of the mature griffons and their Warden riders in the final battle of the Fourth Blight.

Isseya manages to purge the taint from a clutch of eggs obtained from Amadis Vael's griffon. Amadis was Garahel's lover and the eggs of her griffon, Smoke, were sired by Garahel's griffon, Crookytail. Convinced the Wardens of the Exalted Age are not fit stewards of the griffons and hoping those of the future will be, Isseya uses magic to hide the eggs in suspended animation in a remote location that would later become home to a statue of Andraste, the "Red Bride." Isseya then takes her griffon, Revas, on one last flight before secreting her journal away at Weisshaupt rather than live in a world without the noble creatures.

Driven by her research to find this treasure in the present day, Valya then travels with a small group of companions to the site and is able to reanimate the eggs. They hatch, one chick in particular looking identical to Garahel's Crookytail. The hatchlings appear to be free of the taint, bringing Valya hope that they will rise again.