"By the Dread Wolf!" Merrill cried as Hawke entered her humble abode. "Why is my house always a mess when people are here? It's clean sometimes, I swear!"

"Merrill, don't worry about it," Hawke laughed amiably at his Dalish friend. "Before Orana, my place was always a disaster, too. Now, what did you want to show me?"

Merrill beamed brightly as she waved Hawke closer, but her smile faltered a little when she saw his two followers come inside. "Oh… Anders, Fenris. You came, as well?"

"As you see," Anders replied, stiffly.

"Clearly," Fenris growled.

Hawke sent them each a sharp look, before turning back to Merrill with a sigh. "They insisted on coming along, Merrill. I ran into them on the way."

Merrill set her mouth. "Let me guess; they don't trust you alone with the blood mage?"

"It is not Hawke we don't trust," Fenris clarified.

"Of course," Merrill sighed. "Well, I suppose if you're here, you might as well see what good I've done." She waved them closer as she led them into her bedroom. "Look! I do believe I've fixed it…"

The three men stared at the giant mirror in the corner in disbelief. The cracks were gone, but still no reflection of the room showed. Hawke drew a shaky breath as he felt the magic within the object. It did not feel tainted, as he had expected, but neither did it feel… right.

"Merrill, how did you…?" he began.

"What have you unleashed upon this world?" Anders asked, staring at the mirror in what only could be called fear. His light brown eyes flashed an ethereal blue, but he kept Justice at bay.

"Nothing, Anders," Merrill answered. "You can't unleash anything with this. It's a means of transportation, nothing more."

"Witch, if something can go in, then something can come out!" Fenris cried.

Hawke took a tentative step toward the mirror. "Merrill, have you tried to use it, yet?"

Merrill shook her head. "No, of course not. I'm not certain where it would go. That's why I asked you to come here. I need someone to-"

"You're not thinking of sending Hawke in there, are you?" Anders asked incredulously.

Hawke's eye twitched. "Anders, maybe we should let Merrill finish."

Merrill looked past the mage to give Anders one of her little 'frowny faces.' "I'd never ask Hawke to do that," she said. "I will try to enter it myself. I just need someone to hold the other end of the twine for me."

Hawke raised an eyebrow. "Twine?"

Merrill nodded. "Yes, Varric gave it to me, when I first came here. I kept getting lost, you know, and it did help, quite often. I don't need it anymore, though, but when I tried to return it, Varric told me I might find another use for it. I suppose it could work for this. I might get lost in there."

"So, what?" Hawke asked. "You're going to tie a bit of twine to your wrist and then start exploring wherever that mirror takes you? While I hold on to your life-line?"

"Well, if you'd rather, you could tie it to bed, and just make sure it stays taut," Merrill suggested. When Hawke's face kept its stony mask, she sighed. "Lethallin, this is my burden to bear, the one I chose so many years ago. I thank you for your help with earning the Arulin'Holm, but this part, this part I can do."

"Doesn't mean I have to like it," Hawke grumbled.

"Better her than anyone else, Hawke," Fenris said from the doorway. "As she says, this is her burden, and you should not feel the need to shoulder it."

"Nor should you feel the need to tell me what to feel," Hawke retorted icily. "Merrill, where is this twine?"

Merrill brightened up as she grabbed Hawke's wrist. "It should be somewhere in the front room. I used to keep it by the door, but I think it will be found somewhere else."

Anders and Fenris stepped out of the way for the two mages, but refused to help look for the string.

"'The sun is shining somewhere, and Fortune loves the bold…'"

The owner of the voice softly sang to her otherwise empty room as she sketched the elfin being in her book. It was not turning out as well as would like, and she had been working on it for nearly twenty minutes.

"Why am I so impatient?" she muttered to herself. "No, why did I choose to do this from memory? It'd be easier to find reference for him." As she stared at the half-drawn face, she wrinkled her nose. "I'm gonna have to, anyway, for the markings."

With a sigh, she placed her pencil behind her ear and leaned her head back against the wall above her bed. Absentmindedly, she looked about her room, which felt strangely sparse without all the boxes that had, until recently, cluttered her floor. There was still the disassembled daybed on the opposite side of the room, but aside from that, everything was finally put in its place. She gave a little smirk as she said to herself, "I'm sure I'll find a way to get it messy again, somehow."

She swung her feet to the floor, and stretched her back before discarding her sketchbook and pencil onto her desk. She glanced at the clock next to her laptop. "Only half past ten?" she muttered in surprise. "Better shower now, though. I'll be dead on my feet in the morning."

She walked over to her mirrored closet, reaching out to slide it open, when something caught her eye. Dripping out of her nose was a dark liquid, slowly oozing down toward her lips. "What the…? Have I got a bloody…?" Her sentence trailed away as she felt the beginnings of a sneeze.

'Oh, no,' was her only thought before a loud 'achoo!' escaped her, and blood went spraying all over the glass. She covered her nose with one hand, and bolted for her door, crying out, "Gross, gross, gross, gross, gross!"

She went straight to the sink in the hallway, leaning over the drain and trying stem the flow. "Where the heck did this even come from?" she groaned. She softly blew out her nose, trying to gently remove the clot she felt forming.

"Ugh, screw it, I'm doing this in the shower." She slipped into the door directly next to the sink, and immediately turned on the hot water, using her shirt to remove the blood on her face before stripping and tossing it on the floor. "I need to drink more water…"

Fenris, morbidly curious, stepped a bit closer to the mirror. His brands somewhat ached as they seemed to reach for whatever magic the mirror held. Still, he looked into the glass, trying to see what lay beyond.

"Justice doesn't like it."

Fenris' lip involuntarily pulled back in a sneer as the abomination mentioned his spirit friend.

"He's not saying why, but he definitely thinks this is a dangerous thing. Hawke must be mad to allow her to go through with this."

"We already know he is not what many would define as 'sane,'" Fenris pointed out. "One only needs to look at the company he keeps and what he has done."

Anders threw a sharp glare at the elf. "Yes, I suppose it is strange that he would continue to allow a mage-hating Tevinter elf in his presence. Especially after what he had done."

Fenris repressed the urge to face the abomination and tear his throat. "Silence, mage."

"I can't imagine what Hawke sees in you," Anders continued.

"It is done. Leave it be," the elf warned.

Anders regarded the branded warrior with heated dislike. "I thought he had some sense," he sighed with a shake of his head.

"Do not make light of this," Fenris growled. "Leaving was the hardest thing I've done." He shut his mouth with a snap, partly wishing he had kept his silence. The other part of him knew he had been silent for too many years to truly regret speaking.

But the mage was not through yet.

"Ugh, that was nasty."

She had quickly dashed into her room wrapped in her towel, shivering in the cool air of the apartment. "Cold, cold, cold…" she muttered as she threw open her drawer to pull out her sleepwear. As she quickly slipped on the thin, long-sleeved shirt, she glanced at the bloody mirror. "Ew. I had better clean that up…" She threw another look at the clock. "After eleven? Ugh, now I'm really gonna be dead tomorrow morning."

She eyed the filthy mirror, then her beloved bed. Before she decided she would regret it in the morning, she switched off the light and threw herself into her covers. "I'll do it after class tomorrow."

She snuggled into her sheets, and - as was her nightly ritual - took a final look at the time. She chuckled.

"Eleven, eleven, make a wish!"

'I wish I had just a little more adventure in my life… Even if it's only in my dreams. Ha, yeah, sure; let's dream up an adventure.'

As she laughed at herself, she closed her eyes.

So, she did not see that, in her mirror, her room had started to warp.

"And you were an idiot to leave him."

Fenris finally turned away from the mirror and faced the blonde with a snarl. "And you were fast enough to try to replace me."

Anders drew himself up. "I love him," he declared softly. "You can't even imagine-"

"Do not bear your heart to me, mage," Fenris cut in, his voice dangerously low, "unless you would have me rip it out. And last I heard," he added, spitefully, as he turned his back, "he hadn't even considered you an option."

Fenris continued to study the mirror, which, he noted, had started to shift. He narrowed his eyes, straining to see beyond the swirling mists just past the glass.

So, he did not see Anders shaking in anger before propelling himself at the elf, sending the both of them toward the shifting mirror.

She sat up straight in her bed the moment she heard the crashing. It was far too dark to see anything, but it looked like there were two large animals wrestling on her floor. She leaned over the edge of the bed and searched blindly for her phone. She switched it on and quickly tapped the flashlight app. Her room was filled with the white light.

And she saw the lanky, white-haired man with the elfin ears and glowing markings grappling with the broad-shouldered blonde man with the feathery jacket.

"What the hell?"