The Iron Bull stared up at Skyhold's battlements, unsure of what to think. Normally, they were impressive. He couldn't help but view them in a militaristic fashion. How much gaatlok would it take to hammer them down? How long would it take a team of Ben-Hassrath to scale the walls unseen? Would the Qunari need to employ Saarebas on the field in order to breach them? How many would be needed?

Today, he stared up at them with a feeling of dread accompanied by amusement. He kept his face neutral – which was to say, he left a comfortable smirk on it – while thinking of how to solve the problem. Josephine, standing beside him, looked absolutely horrified.

Sera, of course, was laughing hysterically.

"I fail to see what is funny about this," Josephine said primly.

She normally had a good sense of humour, but the timing… the timing was bad. Even Sera had to see that. Or maybe that's why she was laughing. She was an odd one, even for a bas.

"Breeches," Sera said between wheezes of laughter, as if that explained why.

"Yes, I see them," Josephine said. "But you do realize that we're entertaining the Duke Jessan, Marquise Debaneau, and Comtesse Reneaut today? We expect them to be here within the hour."

"Give 'em a show," Sera said. "And if they don't like it, their knickers'll join the collection!"

She gestured to the stone walls of Skyhold, all adorned with various pieces of underclothing and stolen breeches which had been pinned in place with arrows. Fabric fluttered every which way as the wind danced. It must have taken Sera all night to arrange this. How she'd done it in secret without alerting any of Skyhold's guards was something even Bull was mystified by. They were fairly alert. They were no Ben-Hassrath, but then, no one really was.

The guards had to have been in on it somehow. Most were difficult to bribe, but not all. But what would Sera have bribed them with? For all her thieving ways, she never had much in the way of money. She always spent it so frivolously. Perhaps a promise to not pin their underwear up on the walls as well? That seemed her speed. A few of them probably had their own garments up on those walls regardless of any promises.

"How are we supposed to get this all down in time?" Josephine said in exasperation. "We'll be the laughing stock of the Orlesian court if the Comtesse sees this. She's a notorious gossip."

"Get the mages," Bull said, breaking his silence.

"Impossible. Cullen has the majority of the mage recruits running operations in the east, and Leliana is training the remainder in how to be stealthy an hour's ride out of Skyhold."

"But not Solas, Dorian and Viv. Get them down here. Have them magic some crap up to get this down."

"You really think they can..?" Josephine left the question hanging.

"Worth a try. Better than letting the Orlesians seein' us with our pants down and stuck to the walls, isn't it?"

Sera exploded into more laughter. Josephine sighed, and gave a withering glance at the walls. Bull had never seen her display so much outward annoyance before. Leave it to Sera.

"Very well," Josephine said. "And if they can't manage it, then I guess we'll just have to put Sera in a gibbet as some kind of show of discipline, right where any passing nobles can see her."

"Wait, what?" Sera asked.

"We'll even provide them with tomatoes. Perhaps cabbages," Josephine mused. "Orlesians do so love to throw food at the peasantry."

"I recommend cookies," Bull said. "I hear she really hates those."

"I doubt a thrown cookie leaves as much of a mess as spoiled fruit and vegetables, however. Hardly as satisfying."

"Then don't use baked cookies. Just get wads of raw batter."

Sera stared at the both of them, trying to figure out if they were joking or not. Bull gave her his best, toothy grin. He always thought it looked handsome, but some people claimed it was terrifying.

"You'd have to catch me first before you can put me in any giblet thing," she said. "And you don't run fast enough, and you'd never find me once I hid nice and proper."

"Maybe not," Bull replied. "But Cole can."

Sera straightened at that, a nervous smile crossing her face which quickly turned into a scowl. She crossed her arms and looked away.

"I'll get the mages," Josephine said. "Let's hope they can fix this before it becomes a political fiasco."

Bull had no idea what Josephine told them, but the mages arrived on scene without her. Vivienne gave a look of supreme distaste at the task while Dorian stared up at the walls, and once realizing what he was staring at, doubled over in laughter. Solas maintained a fairly neutral expression, but Bull could tell he was laughing on the inside. That one always pretended to be so stiff and formal, ever the apostate scholar, but Bull knew Solas had a hidden trickster inside of him.

"Really?" Vivienne said. "This is what we're expected to waste our time on now? I'm not Skyhold's janitorial staff."

"Normally, I'd agree with you, my dear," Dorian said. "But I just can't wait for the story of this to get out. The great Tevinter magister, scion of House Pavus, cleaning up dirty underwear in an Andrastian military fort. My father would have a fit."

"And which part do you think would discomfit him more?" Vivienne asked. "The undergarments, or the cleaning efforts on behalf of the Inquisition?"

"More likely the fact that I'm doing menial work at all, and where someone might see."

Vivienne gave a polite laugh, and Bull shook his head. He wanted to see them deal with this problem, not chatting and going on about the trouble of doing an honest day's work for a change.

"Are you going to burn the clothes off the walls?" he asked.

"Heavens no," Vivienne said. "Think of the ghastly smell, to say nothing of the soot and ash. No, Josephine asked us to clean this mess up, not create a whole new one, dear."

"Of course, ma'am."

Damn. He'd really wanted to see something burn. Judging from the way Sera was pouting slightly, so had she.

"We could freeze them, then strike the garments with some telekinetic force. Shatter the pieces, then have someone pick them up," Dorian mused. "It's not so difficult to snap the temperature down so cold."

Solas shook his head. "No. It would work on flesh easier than cloth. All you'd do is make the guards manning the walls very uncomfortable in their armor. Perhaps if we only burned the arrows themselves? Remove the thing holding the clothes up, and they'll fall down?"

Bull scratched his chin. That would be some very precision work. Most mages tended to just flail about with their staves, throwing the elements in every which direction. It's why they were dangerous. Too much collateral damage. Better to just have some gaatlok on standby. You didn't have to feed a cannon, and it didn't try whining at you when you put it in combat.

"No, dear," Vivienne said. "I've seen your work. It's a wonder when you don't set yourself on fire with your technique. I'm afraid if you tried taking the arrows down that way, you'd set the garments on fire. Perhaps if we used some lightning? The force might pry them loose."

"With all these soldiers standing around wearing metal armor?" Dorian laughed. "I'd love to see how that'd go. 'Oh, don't mind me, dear. I'm trying to clean up dirty laundry. Bzzt! Sorry. I missed again.'"

"Let's do that one," Sera said. "Bzzt sounds fun!"

"Why can't you just telekinetically pull each arrow out?" Bull asked.

The three mages turned to him, as if just really noticing him standing there for the first time. Vivienne appeared at a loss for words, while Dorian seemed mildly amused.

"Because," Dorian said. "That would be far too sensible. Also, a lot of effort, and everyone knows that we only use our demon-bothering arts to avoid as much effort as possible."

"It would take a lot of time to remove each arrow that way," Vivienne added.

They were grasping at straws, trying to think of any excuse not to just do it that way. Couldn't let the big, dumb Qunari think up an easy solution. They had to complicate it.

Solas appeared thoughtful. He planted his staff in the ground and sat down, cross-legged. He closed his eyes, and had a soft smile on his face.

"What's he doing?" Sera asked, suspicious.

"Oh, here we go," Dorian said with a roll of his eyes.

"Very distasteful," Vivienne added.

"What?" Sera asked. "Is he doing something exciting? Is there going to be explosions? I love explosions!"

"Nothing quite so momentous," Dorian said. "Solas is doing what Solas does best. He's entering the Fade. He's dreaming."

"What? That sounds stupid. Is all magic so stupid?"

"No," Dorian said. "For the most part, we prefer blowing things up, channeling energy, shifting it from one place to another. We excite the very substance of which things are made, and such is the stuff of fire, or we slow it all down, and such is ice."

"An oversimplification," Vivienne said, her lips drawn in a thin line. "Part of a mage's mind is always inside the Fade. Part of us always dreams. We draw power from the Fade, even as we are inside of it. When we do this, it is as if we make reality, for a moment, like the Fade itself. It becomes changeable, mutable, and we can sculpt it."

"Can you sculpt some hearts into that bit of underwear?" Sera said, pointing to one particular pair of lacy garments dangling from an arrow above.

"Why those ones?" Dorian asked.

"They're the Inquisitor's. What, you didn't think I'd just use anyone's underwear for this, did you?"

"Pay attention," Vivienne said. "You might need this information someday. Not that I expect you to actually remember."

Bull couldn't help but flash a grin. Sera was more clever than most thought. Her antics and opinionated nature made people think her short-sighted and flighty, but she was meticulous and clever. If she weren't such a rebel, and could pay attention to one thing longer than a minute, she might actually make a good Ben-Hassrath.

Vivienne continued, "When we create fire, we're not actually making fire. We're making the idea of fire. We're channeling our minds in the Fade, our sleeping will, and turning it into reality. We use items like our staves to work as a focus, so we don't need to enter a meditative state."

"Of course," Dorian added, "our tools and foci only help so much. When we really want to get to work with the heavy lifting, we need to be more in the Fade. We need to send our minds into it as much as we can."

"Then why don't you do that all the time?" Sera asked.

"Because we're vulnerable when we do. How do you expect us to defend ourselves when we're asleep like that?"

"Good point," Sera said.

Her hands went to her belt pouch, and she pulled out a jar with a yellow liquid. She uncorked the cap and held it over Solas, upending its contents onto his bald head.

Dorian let out a laugh, and Bull asked, "Honey? Why do you have that?"

"How else am I supposed to attract bees?" she countered.

"You know honey doesn't actually attract bees, right?"

"And why would you want to?" Dorian asked.

"Because sometimes shits need to be stung by bees. Like Solas, here. Is he doing something boring with all this meditating shit, or did I just waste that honey?"

"I'm honestly not sure what he's doing," Dorian admitted.

"I pray not consorting with spirits," Vivienne said. "The absolute last thing the Inquisition needs is—"

"Futzing demons?" Sera exclaimed. "Ain't no one summoning demons on my watch!"

She leaned over, grabbing fistfuls of grass from the ground, and threw them at Solas. Most of the blades spun errantly in the breeze, which had begun to pick up, but some landed and clung to the honey on his head.

"Look, everyone, I gave Solas hair!" Sera exclaimed, before doubling over in laughter.

Dorian looked about to say a comment, and then paused, glancing about. Bull noticed as well. The wind was blowing. The wrong way.

"Ah shit," Bull said.

There was a flurry of activity as the wind tore through the courtyard. Soldiers and scouts ducked in every which direction, looking for shelter as the breeze turned into a full-fledged gale. Men and women shouted in surprise, merchants scrambled to slap arms over their wares on their stalls to make sure they weren't blown away. Sera danced merrily, throwing tufts of grass in every which direction.

One by one, the garments and arrows were ripped from the walls and spun aloft into the air. They circled threateningly in the air, like buzzards over a kill.

"Everyone get back!" Bull shouted.

People dodged, running to get out of the way of the falling debris. The wind softened, lightened, until it was just strong enough to gently carry the collected items to the ground.

Solas opened his eyes, smiling, and then stopped. He held a hand up to his head, his fingers coming away sticky.

"Why is there…?" he began, but Sera was already running.

"Just in time," Dorian said. "I can see the carriages coming down the main walkway. We should probably order someone to pick up the refuse before anyone important sees."

"Someone should probably tell that to Sera," Bull said.

It was too late. She was already in the pile of debris, and plucked out the Inquisitor's lacy underwear. She gave a quick laugh, and then put them over her head like a hat and ran towards the oncoming carriages.

Vivienne sighed.

"Well," Iron Bull said. "I suppose someone should tell Josephine she has a scandal to deal with."