THE FOREST

At night, with the encampment behind her, it was almost possible to believe she was alone in the forest.

The distance and the trees made the crackling of flames sound smaller somehow, like a friendly little camp fire. The flapping of canvas and creaking of tent poles was almost lost beneath the sound of the wind fighting its way through the leaves overhead. You could almost forget a small contingent of armed and dangerous folk slept nearby. Some strangers, some friends. Some... undecided.

She was looking up at the stars as the footsteps approached. She recognised the step, distinctive in its heavy yet careful tread, and did not need to turn and look to know who was approaching. For a few more moments she could stand alone with only the glittering points of light for company, just as she had before... Before everything changed.

"Inquisitor." Varric spoke softly, creating an illusion of privacy that somehow excluded the nearby sentry from the conversation. "Can't sleep?"

"We are not in Skyhold now, Varric." Her words were clipped and precise, but not harsh. Some had said the way she spoke made her sound cold. "Nor are we at a parade or in a throne room. You can dispense with the title, I think." Turning to face him, she found the dwarf standing just behind her, next to the tree she had been leaning back against. It looked like he had pulled on his coat without bothering with a shirt and was now holding the coat mostly closed against the chill with one hand. The other held onto the stock of the ever-present Bianca, his crossbow resting over his shoulder, always ready. He always seemed so... small, but she knew him better than that.

"Sure... Isileth," Varric replied, saying her name a little uncertainly as if it were unfamiliar to him.

"And in answer to your question," Isileth continued, "no. I have not slept well for... quite some time." Not since That Day, of course, and Varric clearly got it; he nodded, understanding in his eyes. "And what about you?" she asked. "I am surprised to see you up at this late hour."

"You always ask after everyone else first," he said after a pause, frowning a little. "I've noticed that about you. I'm not sure if that's a leader thing, or a qunari thing, or what." Varric shrugged. "Maybe it's just you. I mean, you don't really give away much, nothing personal anyway. Not even to–"

"Varric." Isileth interrupted the dwarf firmly before he could go any further. Perhaps a little too firmly; she could see the shock in his expression, carefully but not entirely masked. "If I do not share much about myself with others," she said more gently, "it is because I choose not to. I do not... trust easily." One side of her mouth quirked up. "I also have no interest in my life story ending up in one of your books."

Varric chuckled.

"You could do a lot worse than me," he pointed out with a smile, "you should hear some of the things people thought about Hawke before I put them straight. The Seeker thought he'd engineered the whole Kirkwall thing as part of some dastardly plan to spread chaos."

"Chaos is certainly what we got." Isileth winced as the pain returned, a flash of intense discomfort that had become terribly familiar. After a moment it faded, as it always did... for a time.

"Does it... hurt?" Varric asked, barely above a whisper. Isileth realised that in addition to the wince she had begun to rub the palm of her left hand with the fingers of the right, as if trying to massage away a cramp.

"Sometimes," she admitted. "Usually before something... big happens. Occasionally for no reason at all as far as I can determine. It is not a reliable indicator or anything," Isileth warned, "so do not get your hopes up."

"It's a shame it isn't," Varric laughed, "because then I'd know when it was time to run in the opposite direction!"

"You would never do that, though," Isileth said, offering up a rare smile, "would you?"

"No," Varric replied almost glumly, "I wouldn't. I'm not sure if that's disappointing or a good thing."

"Definitely good."

"Why thank you, your Eminence-ness!"

"Enough of that," Isileth said mock-sternly.

"As you command!" That grin of his was not going anywhere. Isileth sighed, not entirely playing the game, and looked back up at the stars. They stood in silence for a time, each in their own thoughts. Hers were dark.

"I was thinking of just before I arrived at the conclave," Isileth began cautiously, unused to talking about herself so specifically. She rubbed her upper arms to keep away the cold her sleeveless vest exposed her arms to... and to ward away unwanted memories. It did not work very well. "We were camped for the night somewhere not unlike this, comrades together around the fire, laughing and joking about the easy pay and how they would spend it. I was on watch, but in such safe lands all I watched was the stars." Stars that her eyes were drawn to again and again almost every night since. "That night I felt very separate from the rest of the company, like I was alone in that forest."

Isileth turned to look at Varric again, who was watching her and listening attentively. "They are all dead now," she said dully, "like so many others who were there." A sigh shook her shoulders with the slightest shiver. The nearby fire popped suddenly in the silence. "It would have been my last job, too, my contract was up."

"A difference of a few weeks might've put you somewhere else entirely," Varric murmured. "Your friends might still be alive, and you'd be... doing whatever it is you do when you aren't being a mercenary."

"Just so."

"None of which is your fault."

"I know that!" Isileth hissed hotly. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the sentry glance in their direction before returning to watching the unremarkable section of forest he had chosen to focus on. Isileth took a deep breath and pulled the tattered edges of herself back together behind the facade. "I know who is to blame," she stated coldly, her eyes boring through trees and hills alike, searching for the foe. "And I will not let them get away with what they have done and are still trying to do."

For his part, Varric just nodded. The wind rustled through the leaves, and clouds slowly crept over the horizon into view.

"I... wanted to be an explorer," Isileth said in a tentative, almost apologetic voice.

"A– a what?" Varric actually sounded surprised, which was something of a first. The sudden frost that had appeared in the air between and around them seemed to recede.

"I always wanted to travel around, find strange ruins and temples, and explore them. Find out things no one knew or remembered any more, discover lost treasures, and solve mysteries." She turned back to the dwarf, whose raised eyebrows seemed to be attempting to depart his head at speed. "You wondered what I would be doing if I were not a mercenary. That was it."

"Which explains why you always want to explore every corner of every strange place we come across," Varric said in slow realisation. "It all makes a disturbing amount of sense. You know, for the people who have to follow you everywhere when you have a desperate need to know what's in a cave or behind a particular hill." He shook his head. "How did I miss that?"

"I expect these distracted you somewhat," Isileth said and pointed at her most prominent feature.

"Not many people see beyond the horns," Varric said a little stiffly, "but I'd like to think even I can see you as more than just another qunari. I'm not completely blinkered, you know."

"You are right, and I am sorry – that was unfair." Isileth ran her fingers through her dishevelled hair, suddenly self-conscious, and pushed it back between her gently curving horns and behind her ears. "Not many do, though. It made it hard to start out as... well, an explorer, for lack of a better word. No one wants to hire a qunari guide when they think that all we are good for is invading kingdoms and threatening bystanders for money."

"People are funny that way," Varric said wryly, his smile letting her know she was forgiven for her previous remark. She flashed him a lightning smile in return as thanks.

"And then to be able to afford to finance my own expedition I had to take on the only work anyone would give me," Isileth said, shaking her head, "and the mercenary contract paid well. So before long I was invading and threatening with the best of them."

"I know a little about finance problems," Varric smirked. Of course he did.

"And to think," Isileth said after a moment's consideration, "that it all stemmed from one little adventure as a child."

"Oh really?" It was the sort of thing guaranteed to pique Varric's interest.

"When I was a small girl–" her audience snorted at the thought "–I was looking in an old building that had suffered a terrible fire. I fell through the weakened floorboards and found myself in a stone-lined tunnel. It ran in both directions and had many branches. I wondered at my amazing discovery. Had I found the Deep Roads of legend? Some ancient elven hold? The crypt of a long-dead wizard?"

"It was a sewer, wasn't it?" Varric was plainly trying not to laugh and not doing a very good job of it.

"Absolutely," Isileth nodded. "I only realised later after I had thoroughly investigated the place. Mainly it was the scolding I received when I returned home in triumph that, uh, drove it home. But from that day on I wanted to find such places for real and make my name as a great adventurer." She smiled at the thought and Varric grinned in response.

"It makes for a great–" Varric suddenly stopped speaking, his voice and expression frozen in dismay. "You... just made all that up, didn't you?"

It took all of Isileth's willpower to keep her expression under control and maintain the almost wistful smile that was already threatening to slide off and reveal the laughter underneath.

"I'll leave that for you to work out," she told him and began to walk back to the Inquisition encampment, leaving the spluttering dwarf behind her.

She felt much better.