I am woken by the sun flickering in through the open windows. I must have forgotten to close them when I collapsed into my bed. The curtains are waving in a strong breeze that lets fresh morning into the dusty darkness. I haul myself up and he wooden legs of the old, folding camp cot creak and complain as I stand and stagger over to the window. The light stings my aching eyes. I really shouldn't read by lamplight as much as I do. I rub them blearily as I reach out to open the curtain. There is a moment of confusion as my hand passes right through the place where the curtain should be. Then I remember that it is my hand that 'should' be there, and is not.

The sun is already rising over the twin domes of the university's chantry, silhouetting 'Andraste's bosom' (as the students refer to it) dramatically against the skyline. I can hear the quiet music of the fountains in the courtyard below playing in concert with the birdsong choirs perched on the roofs and statues. There are already a few students making their way across the courtyard and underneath the loggia, or else sitting in the new sunlight beside the fountains. Some, I suspect, have not slept during the night. For a few, peaceful moments, I am given the leisure of watching the sunlit scene from my balcony. I can still remember the first time that I arrived in this courtyard as a boy of sixteen, desperate to belong. There are countless echoes and fragments from my time here; thoughts and memories that are still coloured with the emotions I once had, but which seem, now, to belong to another person.

My thoughts are interrupted by an opening door behind me. I turn to see a balding man with a young face, pinched in concentration as he balances a bundle of scrolls in his arms and walks across the room. He frowns and peers at my camp cot, obviously perplexed to see it. Then, finally, he notices me watching him from the balcony. His surprised yelp sends his scrolls tumbling to the floor.

"Maker!" he gasps. Then, looking more closely, "It's you! You're here? I mean, obviously you are… You startled me… umm… Your Worship."

I grin, "Obviously I did."

He blinks at me as if at a loss on how to behave. Then he seems to remember something with a start. "I… I apologise for barging in, My Lord."

I wave my hand at him. "Oh, it's my fault, Thibaut. I'm the one who snuck in during the night and set up camp to lurk here in the dark and ambush you."

There is a moment while Thibaut's face remains frozen in neutral as he tries to decide whether I am joking. Then he gives me a small, polite laugh. "Well, it is your office, Chancellor."

"I suppose it is." I reply. If the truth were told I must look a sight, standing here with the tails of my crumpled shirt hanging out over my half-buttoned breeches. I rub my chin, feeling the young beard growing in, still itching and unfamiliar. Thibaut smiles awkwardly and bends down to pick up his scrolls. I go over to help him.

"I… ahh… apologise. For all of the… clutter, your Worship." Thibaut is the personal secretary to the Chancellor of the University of Orlais. Which, officially at least, makes him my secretary. In truth he answers to the vice-chancellor. When I was offered the position it was clearly thought that it would be an honourary appointment, garnering prestige for myself, influence and donations for the university. As such, the chancellor's office has been turned into an overspill filing space and a treasury for some of the more lavish gifts the university has received. There are new shelves bisecting the room, stacked with books, scrolls and locked chests. I recognise one or two artefacts that had once been in Skyhold's vaults among those shelves. I don't blame the vice-chancellor for the creative use of space, though it does occur to me to check that the wealth stored here really had been entered into the university's inventory and accounts. It would be all too easy for things to disappear into private collections.

"No need for an apology, Thibaut, and please don't call me that. I am not anyone's 'Worship' any more."

"Yes, my lord." he replies.

In fact, there is more than enough room left in the office to accommodate me comfortably. My saddlebags are hung over the back of a chair, and contain all the things that I need from day to day. The weatherbeaten bags have been with me halfway across Thedas and back again more than once. Their arrangement and packing are more of a reflex after all these years, a comforting and familiar daily ritual that requires no conscious thought. The same could be said for the camp cot and bedroll. I tuck my shirt into my breeches and sit down on it to pull my boots on.

As I do, Thibaut shuffles over to the racks of scrolls and deposits his consignment. I watch him as he casts his eye over the racks hesitantly, noticing the spaces where some are missing. Finally, he turns to look at my desk. On it sit three piles of unrolled papers, each weighed down by a heavy book. "I beg your pardon, My lord, but are those…?"

"The research grant proposals?" I interrupt. "Yes they are."

"Oh. I see… It's just that the vice-chancellor has already reviewed them."

"I noticed that, and most stringently. It's seems that the vice-chancellor is a little shy of spending the funds that the Herald's Foundation brings in. Don't worry, Thibaut. You and I will remind her that her caution is unnecessary. The money is intended for the university and it should be spent on furthering the knowledge and enlightenment of Thedas, down to the last sous." Thibaut replies with a weak smile beneath fretful eyes.

I reach into my saddlebags to find the chancellor's seal. Walking to the desk, I search the drawers until I find a stick of wax. "This one is particularly urgent, though. I want you to take this to the treasury immediately." I take a candle to melt the wax onto a page filled with neat writing. Thibaut moves closer to peer over my shoulder. I can feel him tense behind me. "My lord, the vice-chancellor…"

"You can inform her right after you have taken this to the treasury and released the funds." I interrupt, smiling in satisfaction as the thick red wax blossoms out from the edges of the seal. My seal. It takes a moment for it to harden. Then I push it towards Thibaut. "You are to tell her that the chancellor is insistant."

Thibaut looks stricken. "Y… yes, my lord."

"Let me hear you say it. Pretend I am the vice-chancellor."

He hesitates "The.. um… chancellor is insistent, my lord… I mean, ma'am."

"You can do better than that, Thibaut. Come on. Emphasis."

"The chancellor insisted, ma'am."

I grin and slap him on his shoulder. "Good man!" Thibaut half-smiles as I hand him the scroll. "Oh! Could you do me one or two favours before you go?" I continue, lowering myself into my seat at the chancellor's desk.

"Yes, my lord?"

"First, I would like a basin of water to wash in and some breakfast if you can manage it. Then I want to review the scholarship grants if you can find the records? After that I will need to know the whereabouts of a couple of people."

"I will do what I can, Chancellor."

It is the middle of the afternoon when I reach the top of the staircase, a little alarmed by how deeply I have to breath after the climb. Age, perhaps? More likely it is the lack of exercise. It should not be an excuse, but there is little call for a one-armed man to be running around in heavy armour. I knock on the door. There is a pause and a slightly confused "Come in?" from the other side. Within I find a man with a neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard, finely chiseled features and dark hair greying at the temples. "Enchanter." I greet him.

Rhys rises from his desk. He is wearing the long gown of a professor rather than a mage's robes, though the badge of the College of Enchanters adorns his belt and tunic. "Inquisitor!"

I roll my eyes. "How many years does it have to be before people stop calling me that?"

"I'd give it a decade or two," Rhys replies with a smile, "and if you tell me that you won't be disappointed when they do stop I shall call you a liar."

"Tsk. You can't even leave an old man his vanity. That's gratitude for you, when I even brought brandy." I pull the bottle from my satchel.

"Antivan." Rhys nods in approval, "Pour me enough of that and I'll call you whatever you like."

"You have yourself a bargain, Enchanter. You do the honours." I hand him the bottle because, frankly, pulling a cork out with my teeth only seems to work when I am extremely drunk.

We sit and enjoy the first sips of our brandy in companionable silence as I look out of his window. "They have given you a fine view of the city."

"What you mean is that they have put me in the highest tower to keep me out of the way."

I look around. The round office is spacious, taking up the entire storey of a circular tower. It faces out towards the city, away from the courtyard which is the beating heart of the university. "Is it that bad?"

He sighs and leans back in his chair. "At the very least there aren't heavily armed knights to make me stay up here. No matter how much others might prefer that I did."

The back of my neck flushes hot, the way that it always does to herald sudden guilt. "I appreciate that you took the post here. If you haven't been made welcome…"

He shakes his head and waves his hand to dismiss my point. "No, no. It isn't all bad. I enjoy the teaching, even though it's mostly the basics every apprentice knows. Most of the students are amazed to hear even that. To some I am an exotic novelty. Others cross the quads when they see me coming."

"A mage is fire made flesh and a demon asleep." I say, and Rhys looks at me with a frown. I continue, "These people have been taught that all their lives. That's why I asked the College of Enchanters to send a representative. The university should be a place for unlearning convenient platitudes like that."

Rhys takes a deep drink from his glass and makes a non-committal noise. "That's a fine sentiment, but I see as many retreating back into platitudes like that as there are unlearning them. I have heard talk from some of hiring templars 'just incase'."

That is news to me, and something to be snuffed out quickly. "Ex-templars." I add, "The order doesn't exist any more."

"Hmmm… and how long will that last? The College has heard rumours that Madame de Fer's Circle is recruiting 'ex-templars'."

We came around to that sooner than I had expected. Vivienne and the mages who had split from the college are the elephant in every room when I meet mages these days. Will I condemn her? Will I support her? As long as the music plays, we dance.

"I very much doubt that we can give the name 'templar' to those who sign up to be tame bodyguards at the beck and call of Vivienne's loyalists. Let them call themselves that if they wish, Rhys. The Nevarran Accord is dust. The order you knew is not coming back."

Rhys took a long swig from his glass. "Not under this Divine, perhaps, but what about the next, and the one after that?

'If any of us live long enough to see the next.' Is the answer which occurs to me. I keep it to myself. Rhys looks out of his window and his eyes fix on the horizon, where the White Spire gleams above the city. It must be strange for him to look at it every day, an unavoidable memorial of the past. "I also hear that Madame de Fer has petitioned the Divine to grant the White Spire to the Circle." His eyes slant over to me as he chews on that last word. I choose that moment to take a long drink. "So I've heard." I reply, carefully.

"Will she grant it?"

"How should I know?"

Rhys tilts his head and raises an eyebrow. Even I don't believe that, and he does deserve better. I sigh. "If I were the Divine… I have always looked good in extravagant hats. It has to be said… I would see this petition as an opportunity."

"An opportunity?"

"Both Vivienne and the Most Holy are very well aware that the schismatics that oppose Leliana are desperate to see this new Circle throw in their lot with them. This petition shows everyone, very publicly, that Vivienne wants none of that."

Rhys frowns, "For a price."

I shrug. "If the price is the White Spire then we should count it a bargain. Think of the implications. If the Circle gains ownership of the White Spire they gain prestige, yes, but they tie their legitimacy to Divine Victoria. That prevents the schism from gaining strength. This is an olive branch; a chance for the Circle, the College and the Divine to work together instead of flying apart."

Rhys' jaw tightens "You know that they are going to begin harrowings again? How long before they are making failed apprentices tranquil?" his voice slowly rises as he speaks.

"We will be watching to ensure that they do not use the rite of tranquility."

"That is no guarantee and you know it!"

"What is it you want us to do, Rhys?" my frustration bursts out into words before I can rein it in. "Do you want us to round up the loyalists and march them back to your College? They left of their own accord. They chose. Now they are choosing their own rules for themselves. Wasn't that what you fought a war for?"

We are left in a quiet that is no longer quite so companionable. I stare into the warm, dark amber liquid in my glass as if I can find the answers there. As the months since the dissolution of the Inquisition have stretched into years Rhys has become my guide on matters concerning spirits, the Fade and the Veil. There is a well-thumbed copy of his 'Denizens of the Fade' in my saddlebags. In that time he has become a friend as well as an advisor. So I cannot fault him for looking at Vivienne's Circle and her 'templars' and seeing the spectre of his old prison. I take the bottle and pour him another glass as a peace offering. He makes eye contact with me again and his expression softens. "You're right." He says. "They left by their own choice, but most mages come into their power when they are children. They are usually confused and frightened. Are we going to expect them to make a choice too? Will they even get one?"

Another insoluble question. My temples throb.

"You know that my mother is fond of telling us, at length, about how horrified she was when she first saw my father's house after they married. 'I did not graduate with the highest honours from Markham University to live in a draughty hall full of morbid hunting trophies!'" I mimic her voice. It makes me smile. "But by the time I was born we had the finest library and landscaped gardens in Ostwick."

"Are you going somewhere with this, Trevelyan?"

"Proverbs, Enchanter. I'm going to proverbs. The best ones aren't platitudes. Mother always said that a gardener's work is never done. She said that 'only a fool thinks they can make a garden of a wilderness in one season. It takes time, sweat and heartbreak, but only a greater fool never starts. You get your hands dirty and you see what grows, and you always remember that there's none of it that won't go wild or rotten with neglect.' That's why I'm not Inquisitor any more. That's also why I won't condemn Vivienne's Circle as the College seems so keen for me to do. They aren't just a weed that I can pull up. It would just grow back. But if we embrace it, then we can shape it, and they could be a part of the garden."

Rhys looks at me incredulously.

"I don't have all of the answers." I press on, "Nobody does. We are all making this up as we go along, just like we always have been. That's why I think this bargain is so important. At the very least we need a way for the College and the Circle to talk to one another. Just because you are rivals does not mean that you must be enemies."

"Thedas is a very big garden 'Inquisitor'." Rhys replies, not unkindly.

I pour myself another drink; a big one. "Then we are going to need a lot of gardeners, aren't we?"

"That brings me to the reason for my visit." I continue, "The University is putting together a research expedition and I would like our College of Enchanters representative to join it. You had something of reputation as a field researcher before the war, I hear, and this would be in your area of expertise. If you aren't too comfortable up here in your tower, that is."

Rhys doesn't say anything for a moment. He just sits back and looks at me thoughtfully, which is what tells me he is interested. "Go on." he says after a while.

"Stone-Bear Hold, in the Frostback Basin. I'd like you to research the Avvar augurs, their relationship with spirits; their gods, as they call them. Especially the way that they train their apprentices."

Rhys narrows his eyes and smirks. Now I am certain that he is interested. "Isn't that rather a dangerous place… and subject, frankly?"

"Not so dangerous a place as it once was, and the view of Cloudcap Lake is worth the journey all on its own. Most of the budget is being spent on security. I know an excellent mercenary company with a reputation for doing unconventional jobs. Just don't talk to their captain too much about spirits and you'll get along famously."

"That deals with the hazards of the place, but what about the subject? How do you imagine the Circle will react when they find out that the College has people dabbling in 'primitive, irresponsible spirit worship' and 'abominations'?"

"That's why it has to be you. No-one else is as qualified. You know the dangers, and you know the possibilities. You also know why this could be so important. I wouldn't be asking if it weren't."

He pauses again, his thumb running along the edge of his beard. "Do the Seekers know what you are asking me to do?"

"I have no secrets from the Seekers."

"And they approve?"

"They agree that it is necessary."

After a long pause he knocks back his brandy and sets the glass down. "Alright 'Inquisitor', I'm in."

I grin and toast his good health. Then I pour him another drink.