I am crossing by the front gates later that afternoon, on my way to Solas' cottage, when I hear Varric's voice. "Hey, Bluebird, how's it feel to be back?"

I approach the dwarf, joining him at a fire pit near his tent. "To be honest? It's sort of surreal. It's almost like I was never even gone. It sounds self centered, I know, but it's always a bit strange when life moves on without you, even for such a short time."

"Believe me, I get it," Varric nods, driving a stick wrapped with pieces of meat between burning logs. "Back in Kirkwall, people vanish off the streets all the time, and nobody notices. If theydonotice, they don't say a word. Too busy looking after their own skins to worry about anybody else's. That's one of the reasons we accepted Anders' craziness for so long, you know. He was doing something for the sorts of people no one else gave a nug's ass about, and we all looked the other way. Kept looking the other way until it was too late and bits of Chantry were raining down over the city."

"Is the moral of this story 'everyone who helps people is secretly a terrorist', or am I missing something?"

"No, nothing that blunt," he smirks, though there's no mirth in his eyes. "It's just that you're right. People vanish, life goes on. A Chantry blows up and life goes on. A Breach opens up in the sky, spilling demons and Fade crap all over Thedas, and life goes on. The world just seems to have a funny way of ignoring all sorts of shit."

I hum in response, plopping down in the snow next to him. "Nice way of putting it. You know, Varric, maybe you should consider going into writing. I hear it's reasonably profitable."

"Very funny, Bluebird."

"Wait," I gasp, a shining idea formulating in my brain, "you're anauthor."

"Did you...not already know that? I do actually remember the Seeker talking about it."

"Andyou're decent at lying to people," I continue, a grin spreading from ear to ear.

"Now that's just hurtful," the dwarf places a hand over his heart, wounded. "And to think, I shot a guy in the ballsack for you."

"You did!" I crow, the glorious image of awkward one-balled sex making me burst into another fit of helpless giggling. "Hearing about that was honestly the first time I've really laughed since falling out of the Breach. Thank you."

"All in a day's work," he winks, withdrawing the meaty kebab thing from the fire and blowing on it to cool it down. "Now, what's so important about my being a lying scoundrel of an author?

"Well, uh, I'd like to ask for a favor, and I'd like you to keep it to yourself regardless of whether you accept or decline."

"Alright, call me intrigued," he uses his teeth to tear a hunk of meat from the stick. "Whaddya need?"

I take a deep breath, looking him dead in the eye. "Can you teach me how to read?"

His dark eyes squint a little as he attempts to gauge my seriousness. "You're not pulling my leg, are you," he asks in a way that doesn't sound like a question.

"No. I genuinely do not know how to read or write in Trade, and I think that needs to be quickly remedied."

"Why don't you talk to Ruffles about setting something up? I don't think I'm the best—"

"No, Varric. I can't. The advisors have enough on their plates without worrying about my illiteracy. I'm a fast learner, I swear. I've had to be."Also, because this is verbally English, the grammatical structure should be extremely similar, if not identical."Just basic Trade should be enough for me to get by with this whole Inquisition thing. Please, Varric?"

"Look," he grimaces, "it's not necessarily that I don't want to, it's that I have no idea how to go about doing something like this. I wasn't exactly a tutor for the noble brats back in Kirkwall."

"Okay," I chew on part of my lip, trying not to be offended by being equated to a noble brat. "Well the first step with a new language is usually its alphabet."

He peers at me sideways, sighs, and says, "Fine. Gimme a minute." He returns with a few scraps of parchment, a container of ink, and a quill. "There are thirty-two symbols in Trade that can be combined in a bunch of different ways to make unique sounds…" He writes each of them out in ink, telling me what sounds they make, and allows me to copy them in mymuch sloppier handwriting. Varric chuckles when I smear ink across the parchment yet again, saying, "You write like you've never held a quill before." Seeing the flat look I give him, his grin fades a little, "Oh yeah."

Within half an hour, I've gotten the hang of writing my name, basic pronouns, a plethora of color words, some animals, and two or three simple pleasantries. "Do you mind if we continue doing this? I'll try not to take up too much of your time."

"Half an hour a day? I might be able to manage that," Varric smiles in a roguish manner. "But this doesn't seem like a fair deal. What do I get out of it?"

Shit. How could I have forgotten about payment?

"Oh," I purse my lips, pretending to pout. "Is the ecstatic pleasure that comes with being in my presence not good enough?"

"That much of my time shouldat leastbe worth a mug of ale."

"Per day or per week?" I ask, already fishing through my coin purse. It would eat through my money at drastically different rates depending on how he answers.

His eyebrows lift in shock. "What? No, I just meant one mug of ale." Dropping his voice in a conspiratorial fashion, he continues, "though I'd be a fool to object to moreale if you're offering."

"Yeah, man. Anything you want, within reason. But are you sure? One mug of ale costs barely anything." My objections fall on deaf ears.

"You had some good points, you know," Varric shrugs. "The way I see it, you're about as close to the heart of all this weird shit as Reaver is, minus the glowy hand. Who knows what all is gonna happen? If you're that worried, I'll teach you what I can."

"Thank you, Varric," I say, feeling a pleasant warmth in my chest.

"It's weird. I just wouldn't have pegged you as the illiterate type. You talk like you're well-read," the dwarf frowns. "Really, I sorta thought you were some runaway noblewoman or something. Maybe a wealthy merchant's daughter."

I roll my eyes, "Me, a member of nobility? That'll be the day."If a middle class person from a first world country is beyond wealthy compared to the rest of modern Earth, I guess I am basically noble here. Ew. Am I like the Thedosian equivalent of one of those gazillionaires with four yachts and nine sports cars?

Maybe not quite that extreme.

Varric hands me the parchment I've been working on, shaking his head. "I'm just saying. You're an odd one."

My lips quirk up in a half smile. "What's wrong with being odd?"

"Nothing at all, Bluebird. Nothing at all."