The red templars are exactly what they sound like. They are templars who have been fed red lyrium, and the results are precisely what happened to Meredith in Kirkwall: it improves their powers, grants new ones, and increases their strength beyond what a human body should bear. Over time, red lyrium will turn them into beasts. Crystals will grow inside their bodies; even, I am told, sprouting through their heads. In the end, the red templars will be lost, mind and soul, to roaring madness. —Mother Celeres, of the Grand Cathedral, in a letter to a friend