"Oy! You! Wake up, you!" Thom Rainier curled tighter into the thin blanket he'd been provided, on a cot that was probably more comfortable than he deserved. The wraith at his bars grumbled and scraped her dagger across them. "Broodybeard, ahoy! Drag your arse out of bed and make with the escaping."

"Haven't you forgotten that an escape usually implies an open door?"

Tumblers turned and clanked. Sera chortled. "I've got deft hands and fine tools, I have. Now. The door is open. Or unlocked. Or the lock is utterly ruined at least. Now up and at em, Blackiebutt. We've got places to be."

"How did you even get in? There are guards all over the place."

"Dorian put em to sleep, or sent em to the Fade or somewhat. Said he was gonna give them the sweetest dream they ever had, getting weird with 'the handsomest altus in all of Tevinter.'" She stuck her tongue out. "Don't have any problems with his confidence, do he?"

"He oozes the stuff like a gurgut drools."
"Eyyyuuuuh, yuck." She cackled, assured as to the potency of Dorian Pavus' spell even if she enjoyed picking on the man. "Remember how that one did in the Black Fens, yeah? I didn't think that my-well, my little booties were already ruined by the leeches and water-ness, so were everyone's (so were little Sister Birdybrain's when she came to take a look-see and didn't she get pissed right off)-but, yeah... poor Inky-doo. His whole..." She sighed. "The best part was that the gurgut spit was totally... and it made the dye in his... it looked like a rainbow! A soggy, sad little rainbow like the kind Solas lives under."

"I know what they're doing." Rainier pressed his forearm to his eyes. "They've sent you to torture me. The headsman or the gallows... that's too quick. I've got to suffer, before I die. I could see it. Nightingale had that evil, flinty look in her eyes."

"Lady Featherbottom's eyes are creepy, and stupid, and do not belong in a face as pretty as hers." Sera pondered half a moment-the only length her leaping imagination could handle, probably. "I'd say she should cut out someone else's and give them a try, to match her pretty face, but that evil bitch might just do it. Yuck!" She spat. "I don't want no-one's eyes on my conscience, not even for a good cause." She leaned against the bars. "Now are you coming or what?"

"Or what. I've done terrible things, Sera. I deserve whatever they're going to do to me."

"Oh, terrible things." She stuck her tongue out. "You killed some stupid noble and his stupid noble brats that would have grown up to be stupid nobles. They never did me no favors and wouldn't piss on me if a dragon flew over. On the other hand..." She rubbed her chin. "You did lie. You're not really Blackiebutt, but I didn't know the real one, so..."

She spat on the floor, kicked it with the toe of her shoe, looked like she might string an arrow and put it through his throat on the spot. "I guess you're as close as I'm going to get. I friggin' hate lying liars. But... you kept an ogre from smushing me in Valammar, so you weren't lying about being a darkspawn whacking bad arse, or I guess not wanting me to get pulpitated, but..." She stamped. "Why does it have to be so fuggin' complicated? I like doing things with friends; we steal stuff, smash stuff, have a laugh, have a pint and go home."

"Doing things with friends. It sounds a whole lot like being a soldier."

"Nah, that's where you're wrong." She finally smiled, the radiant grin that made her plain, pug-nosed face into something spectacular. "Friends don't do what people tell them to; soldiers do. That's what got you up-fucked arse, mate."

"And friends don't ever get that way?"

"Oh, Maker no... we're usually there or worse. But friends stand by friends. That's why they're not so many of em."

"Well, you've smashed the lock and you're stealing me... I guess we're going to have a laugh, have a pint and go home?"

"The pint'll have to wait-those guards are going to be right well pissed off when they wake up and find out that they haven't been doing the sideways twist with Dori-do-and I don't feel a whole hell of a lot like laughing." She drew her dagger. Blackwall tensed before she started cleaning her nails with it.

"Don't know if you'll feel like it, either, once we get back to Skyhold. Chesty McHair and Our Lady of the Shitshooting Ravens are all about forgiving you-they figure that Hawke and the Warden kicked around with folks just as bad or worse, Lady M for one. Cassandra, though..." Sera shuddered. "Like a storm cloud, that one. She can't decide if she wants your head on a plate or your guts for garters, and you know it's easy for her to bend Inky's ear from the same pillow."

None of that really mattered. Well, it did but didn't seem so important compared to what surged out of his throat and pushed through his lips next. "What about Josephine? What does Lady Montilyet think?"

"Awwww, sweet." Sera, for all she didn't feel like laughing, giggled.

"Tell me, damn you, or I won't move."

"You might if I get Bull in here to whonk you on the head with a frying pan and drag you, yeah."

"He's here, too?"

"Dorian don't go far without him."

Blackwall nodded his approval; they were a good, if odd, pair. "We're getting far afield. Tell me about Josie."

Sera outright cackled, this time. It was the sweetest sound Blackwall had heard in weeks and, at the same time, he was more thankful for the potency of Dorian's magic than he could have ever expressed. Finally, she calmed. "Ah, what does Lady Maria von Prissypants think, what does she think. Who do you think organized this Chasind goat rope, anyhow?"

It was music to Blackwall's ears. He stood. "Let's move fast-we don't want Dorian to get worn out holding a spell for too long, even if he's having a fine old time. I won't be much use until I get a sword but... until then I've got my fists."

"Right on!" Sera winked. "Let's get moving, then."