The unconscious women were brought to Solas's room, while Dagna inspected the orb that had caused this. Solas was tending to Sera and Vivienne, with some assistance from Cassandra briefly before he had turned away for a moment to translate the rune the Inquisitor found, translating on another paper the common tongue. His eyes widened very slightly as he read it over, mumbling elven to himself. Each of the unconscious were laid down on couches (one of which had to be brought in) next to each other.

Cassandra continued to keep a watch over them, pacing back and forth as she did, arms crossed. Dagna was holding the orb, squinting at the surface of it, trailing a finger across. She could feel tiny etches in a language she could not read in its surface. Solas soon turned away from his work to take it from her, inspecting its surface. He gave it back to her.

"The magic in this was spent when they interacted with it," he said, "it is slowly recharging its magical energies. It should take about three days to fully recharge; we should have it stored safely until then."

"Did you manage to translate the rune?" Dagna asked. "I didn't get to have a peek at it yet."

Solas sighed. "It is not a rune at all, but instead an inscription with information regarding that object. The Inquisitor should be here. She needs to hear what it said...excellent timing, Inquisitor." he turned as Dawn walked into the room, frowning, eyebrows furrowed.

"Have you got news?"

"Some." Solas affirmed, hands behind his back. "That rune was not truly a rune, but a message, perhaps regarding that orb. It said 'to understand, you must walk in their footsteps.' That is all it had to say."

"That tells us nothing." Cassandra argued. "It's too vague. What does that even mean?"

Solas turned to the women on the couches quietly. "We shall see."

Vivienne was first to stir, and she groaned as she tried to rouse herself. Her head was pounding, and she winced, pulling a hand to her head to cast a minor ice spell to soothe the pain. She stopped short at the feeling of hair that did not belong to her; coarser and longer than her very short, close-cut scalp.

She tugged very gingerly at it, and winced at the uncomfortable feeling of hair being pulled. Heart dropping and gut wrenching, she tried to cast the ice spell. No magic sprung from her fingertips, and she couldn't feel the magic within her. She jumped into an upright sitting position, opening her eyes to find Cassandra, the Inquisitor, Solas, and Dagna staring at her silently.

"Are you alright, Sera? How do you feel?" Trevelyan asked softly.

"Sera?" Vivienne asked, "Oh..." She looked down at herself to find a slightly tattered red dress with plaidweave tights upon skin much paler than her own. Plucking a hair out and pulling it into her vision, a blonde strand with split ends was revealed. Doing her best to show no alarm, Vivienne stoically looked back up to the others. "Can you bring me a mirror, please?"

Solas pulled hand mirror off of his desk and handed it to her. Vivienne grasped it and held it before her face, revealing the wrong one; pointed ears, blonde hair, gray eyes, all belonging to an elven face, not her real one. Doing her best to compose herself, Vivienne returned to the mirror to Solas and looked around, stopping at the sight of her own body in an adjacent couch, still not awake.

Continuing to bite back any sign of the terror in her gut, holding back a look of horror she wanted to make, she looked squarely at the Inquisitor. "Inquisitor, darling, I think I know what that orb did to us."

The others gasped. Dawn recoiled while Cassandra covered her mouth with gloved hands, eyebrows practically ready to fly off her face from how high they rose on her forehead. Vivienne sighed. "You can tell."

"You're talking exactly like Vivienne," Solas replied, rather calmly, "the real Sera would never call anyone darling like you do. I translate the rune the Inquisitor found. It said 'to understand, you must walk in their footsteps.' I believe the meaning is now evident."

Dagna cleared her throat. "On the bright side, the orb is slowly recharging its magic, so you should be able to use it to switch back with Sera in about..." She hesitated. "...three days."

Vivienne let out the most exasperated sigh she had ever made. "Three days. This is just wonderful. Sera's doing to be in my body, saying and doing horrible things. I fear for myself." She paused as she watched Sera- well, Sera in her body, begin to stir.

Sera's head was also pounding, and groaned loudly at the sensation. "Oww. My head. Hurts. Like a bitch." She also moved a hand to rub her head, though she froze when she didn't feel her hair. "Where'd my hair go?" Sera sat up, blinking her eyes open. She screeched and fell off of the couch at the sight of her own body staring with an exasperated expression at her from the other couch.

Stuttering, she glared at Vivienne. "You a demon here to fuck with me? You're a fakey! I'm Sera! Not you!" She looked around and found the others staring. She pouted. "Inquisitor, why aren't you doing anything?! Use your mark or something! Get rid of her!"

"Sera," Vivienne stated coldly, "slow down and take a good look at yourself. I am no demon, though I'd rather contend with one of those than this mess."

Sera growled. "Why are you talking like Vivvy? Why does my voice sound like Vivvy? Am I in the Fade? What..." She looked down and jumped out of her skin to find Vivienne's expensive fashion on her. The power of magic tingled in her veins as she held a hand up to see her skin darker than what it should be.

She began to whimper, gut wrenching as Solas handed her a mirror. She looked into it for only a split second before dropping it, screaming in horror, pushing herself against the wall. "What the fuck?! What's going on?! Someone make it stop! I...I have to be in the Fade, right? This is all just demons fucking with my head!"

"Sera, calm yourself," Solas ordered, "this is not permanent. There's a way to reverse this. The orb that did this to you is recharging."

Sera's breathing had gone into hyperventilation as she panicked. "Then bloody bring it here so I can get my body back before Madame Fancypants here ruins it!"

Vivienne scoffed. "Please, my dear, as if I'd harm you. I'm more worried about you damaging my body. It's a threat more real than whatever damage I could do to you in this body."

Dagna's chagrin was not hidden from Sera, who continued to breathe heavily. "Sera, listen, the orb needs about three days to recharge. You'll be turned back, but its magic is still..."

Sera gasped, grimacing even more. "I'm stuck as...as Miss Bitch-Face Extraordinaire for three days?!" she cried out, throat raw. Cassandra sighed.

"There's nothing you can do about it right now. You'll make it through this, just be patient."

Dawn nodded in agreement. "You're just going to have to find a way to work together through this. We'll inform the rest of the inner circle-"

"-but no one else other than them, my dear," Vivienne interrupted plaintively, looking disgusted, "I can't have any of my other contacts find out what state I'm in. This is humiliating enough as it is."

Sera glared at her. "How do you think I feel? If any of the Friends find out, I'll never hear the end of it. That I was a pompous bitch-ass noble for three whole days!"

Cassandra made a disgusted noise. "You two have to calm yourselves. If you want to keep it a secret, you have to work together and not become hysteric. It's three days. Both of you can do this."

Vivienne and Sera glared at each other for a few moments before they both stood up, resigned with their status. "I'm going to have to teach you to at least control your magic for the time being, Sera, dear." Vivienne said as relaxed as she could. Sera scowled.

"I don't want to learn piss about magic! I'm not a mage!"

"Right now, you are," the Inquisitor pointed out, "you don't have to learn any complex spells or rituals; just enough to control it carefully."

"But..."

"Do you want to be inconspicuous or not?" Cassandra barked. Sera grumbled but said nothing more on the matter. Vivienne took her by the hand.

"I'll take her to the basement by the vault. No one's down there, usually. After that, I think I should get myself some new garments." She gave another look of distaste to her clothes. "Plaidweave. Disgusting."

"Hey!" Sera protested, "My clothes are fine! Don't you dare put any pompous, fancy, floofy shite on my body!"

"Of course not, darling, that would draw far too much attention." The enchanter reassured. "But I think anything other than this...tattered red dress would be better. Perhaps a relatively simple blue dress, accented with yellow...no, gray...would be good on this complexion."

"Too fancy!" Sera cried as Vivienne practically dragged her out, both parties looking miserable. The ones left in Solas's room were silent for a few moments, until the Inquisitor finally let out a groan.

"This is going to be a long three days." she bemoaned.