Thank you all for reading! Apologies for the unscheduled posting gap - between my schedule and FF's update and email issues, it's been quite a month. Special thanks as always to my incomparable beta, suilven!

"Tell me, Josephine, do I really have to do this?" Thule opened the door a crack and looked out at the people gathered around the throne and then hastily shut the door again. "This wasn't my idea."

"I know it wasn't, Inquisitor, but now that everyone knows he's here, something has to be said publicly."

She didn't show it, but Thule knew Josephine was as angry at Leliana for going behind everyone's back to sneak Blackwall out as he was. It had seemed the perfect solution—leave him to the Orlesians, who had the first claim on him, let him pay for his crimes. Blackwall was happy, Celene was happy, Thule was happy. But apparently his spymaster had not been happy, so now the whole mess had come tumbling down around his head. And Josephine's.

Even at that, everything would have been fine, but one of the scullery maids had gotten lost in the rooms below the keep and found Blackwall asleep there. She'd thought he was a ghost at first and run screaming, and then couldn't find her way back, but eventually a search had commenced and Blackwall had been found.

"What are you going to do?" Josephine asked.

"Wring Leliana's neck," he snapped.

"She won't let you catch her," his Ambassador responded practically.

"Then I'll hide and jump out at her."

Josephine raised her eyebrows and looked down at him, her expression making it clear that she thought it was past time for him to get over his snit and resolve the situation once and for all.

"Fine," he sighed. "Fine. I'll do it. Have him brought here and let's get it over with."

"As you say, Inquisitor."

She left the room and Thule followed, climbing the dais and taking his seat on the throne. He felt a little ridiculous up here, to tell the truth … and a little not ridiculous, either, which disturbed him. The last thing he wanted was to get used to being a person in power. Someday he would defeat Corypheus, and when that happened he would no doubt rapidly find his usefulness to Thedas at an end. It behooved him to remain prepared for that day.

When everything was ready, Josephine climbed the steps and approached him. In her formal voice, she said, "For judgment this day, Inquisitor, I must present Captain Thom Rainier, formerly known to us as Warden Blackwall."

There were hisses around the room; Blackwall's deception had not gone over well within the Inquisition. Thule was glad Harding was away from Skyhold at the moment; she had been upset enough when Blackwall left. Having him back, as Rainier, and held up for judgment would have been unnecessarily hard on her.

Rainier was brought forward, hands chained together, face pointed down at the floor. Thule had yet to see him look up since he had been found. That Rainier was well aware of his own shame was a point in his favor, but only a point.

"His crimes," Josephine began … and then she stopped, shaking her head. "You are aware of his crimes."

"I believe we all are, now," Thule said,

"Now that he has been brought here, the decision of what to do with him is now formally yours."

"Orlais doesn't want him back?"

"Now that we have him, the Empress says we have her blessing to do with him as we see fit, given that he was one of your companions."

The real truth was that Celene was outraged, and this was her polite way of sticking it to him that his organization had dared to interfere with Orlesian justice. He didn't blame her a bit, and had sent a very carefully worded letter of apology her way. He was still waiting to hear if it had mollified her at all.

"Don't think you've been saved," Thule said now to Rainier. "Your life is mine now."

"Whatever you paid, it wasn't worth it." Rainier kept his eyes on the floor, but his voice was loud enough to be heard in the back. "I was ready to be dealt with as harshly as the Empire deemed necessary; you might think of yourself as a man without scruples, but your justice will be far more generous than I deserve, whatever the sentence may be." He took a deep breath. "There is more than enough evil in the world because of me. I accepted the punishment; I was ready for all this to end."

"You don't think that was taking the easy way out?"

"Do you think the years I've spent since then were easy? I lived with the guilt and the shame and the fear and the burden of being someone I wasn't, of trying to be a better man than Thom Rainier had ever been, for years. If I was willing to part with my own sorry life in a final atonement, that is between the Maker and me and those I killed and those I betrayed, and it's nothing whatever to do with you!" Rainier's voice had been rising as he spoke, and now he lifted his head at last and looked Thule full in the eyes.

"On that, we are completely agreed," Thule told him. "Which is why I am sending you where you have been meant to be all this time, where your skill with a blade is still needed—to join the Wardens. They can decide your fate."

There was an easing of tension in Rainier's shoulders at that. "As you command."

"You know as well as I do the dangers inherent in becoming a Warden, and living as one."

"I do. I accept those dangers. I welcome them. If I die, it will be no less than I deserve. If I live, I'll make it count."

"Very well." Thule stood up. "That concludes our business for the day," he said in a louder voice, for the benefit of the assembled company.

They dispersed slowly, murmuring.

"Shall I make arrangements to have him sent north to Weisshaupt?" Josephine asked quietly.

"Yes. As soon as possible."

"Very good, Inquisitor." Making a notation on her clipboard, she headed for her office.

As she often did, Leliana had her dinner delivered to the Rookery—today as much to avoid the Inquisitor's unhappiness with her decision in regard to Rainier as because of all the work piled up on her desk.

It was hard to focus on the dispatches and the coded messages, or on the otherwise very tasty chicken and potatoes, while she was still thinking about the cold anger in Thule's blue eyes when he had faced her down earlier. Leliana was used to acting on her own, with very little oversight, being trusted to know the right thing to do. In this situation, she still believed her choice had been the right thing—but she couldn't deny that the Inquisitor ought to have been informed before she made the decision, and kept apprised of the steps she was taking. She had gone outside the scope of her work, undermining the Inquisitor's authority, stepping on Josie's toes, and infuriating Cullen, who had strong opinions about the responsibility an officer had to the men who served under him.

But she couldn't regret what she had done. Didn't everyone deserve the chance to atone? Rainier had stepped up and confessed to what he had done, he had surrendered himself to a higher authority. Who was to say that she wasn't the authority the Maker had intended to deal with him all along? Why else had he been brought to her attention all that time ago, when he was still just an itinerant Warden hiding in the Hinterlands? Surely that made him her responsibility. Didn't it?

Nathaniel paused at the top of the stairs, smiling at her. "You know you did the wrong thing, but you're sure you did the right thing, and you can't get the two to agree. Is that it?"

"Why are you always here?" she snapped at him, uncomfortable with his continued ability to articulate the turmoil inside her just when she was trying to quiet that turmoil and push it back into the darkness where she could ignore it.

"I have nowhere else to go."

"That's a sophistry. You could go anywhere. Weisshaupt, Amaranthine, the Free Marches … You could go to Seheron if you wanted, spend your days fighting Qunari."

"Why would I want to do that?"

"Why wouldn't you?"

Nathaniel shrugged, settling himself on the chair across from her desk and stealing the bread off her plate. "I don't think I have anything against the Qunari. And I don't particularly like the Tevinters."

"Then you could go to Minrathous and use your famous stealth skills to begin assassinating the Magisterium."

He tore off a piece of the bread and ate it slowly, his eyes on her as he considered the suggestion. "Is that what you want me to do?"

"Do I look as though I care what you do?"

There was no smile on his face, but there was one in his eyes as he tilted his head a little to regard her with amusement and a warmth that drew an answering warmth up from the pit of Leliana's stomach. "You don't look it, but I think you do."

"Don't be ridiculous." But there was a breathiness to the words that belied her attempt at tartness.

"I've been accused of being many things in my life, but rarely ridiculous. Perhaps I should try it." He was still eating her bread, still watching her with those dark eyes that seemed to see so far inside her, and Leliana shivered.

"I wish you would let me work."

"But you weren't working," Nathaniel pointed out. "You were sitting here trying to justify your actions to yourself and making excuses for your coworkers' anger. You have to own what you did, Leliana. You chose this, you had good reasons and emotional reasons that I think you're afraid to deal with, because then you would have to admit that you have feelings, and needs, and desires that being Sister Nightingale isn't fulfilling."

She looked down at the page in front of her, not able to focus on what it said. "I have responsibilities. People's lives depend on me. The Inquisition depends on me."

"It depends on the others, too. But Josephine finds time for her fine clothes and expensive wines, and the Inquisitor finds time to write love poetry for Cassandra—very bad love poetry, incidentally—that he thinks no one knows about, and the Commander finds time to solace his soul in the Chantry and in the Undercroft. Alone amongst the Inquisition's leaders, you try to live with nothing but work. Work and bleak memories of women who you loved who chose death over you."

Her head snapped up at the last words. "How dare you!"

"Because I've been there. I wallowed in your darkness, Leliana, for a long time, and it led me …" He shuddered, turning his head away. "It led me to be vulnerable to Corypheus's influence, and in that vulnerability to kill my own people, people I considered my brothers and sisters. What you are doing is dangerous, Leliana. Dangerous to you, and because of the position you hold, dangerous to others."

"And you think you can do something about that?"

He shrugged, looking suddenly less sure of himself. "It's better than nothing, isn't it?"

"I … I don't know." She pulled the page toward her again, resolutely turning her eyes to it. "Now, if there's nothing else?"

Nathaniel unfolded himself from the chair, and even though she was not looking, she noticed the grace of his movements. "You let me know what else there is, Nightingale." And he was gone, the huskiness of his words hanging in the air and making her skin tingle.

Lilias had been trying to find a time to speak with Dorian about the communication from his family, but she felt awkward about it. None of this was her place. She barely knew Dorian; she knew nothing about Tevinter other than what she had heard from Fenris, and she didn't think Dorian was exactly the type of Tevinter Fenris had been familiar with; and she had no standing within the Inquisition.

"Lethallan, you must stop hesitating," Merrill said to her. They were sitting at a table in the Herald's Rest while Lilias tried to get her courage up. Dorian was at the bar next to a burly Templar with dark skin and a bald head. Quite a looker, as well, Lilias noticed. He and Dorian weren't speaking, but she could see their shoulders pressing together.

"I don't want to interrupt."

Merrill followed the line of her gaze. "They don't want anyone to think there is anything to interrupt."

"Exactly why I shouldn't."

"There was a time when you would have simply walked up and knocked their heads together." Merrill's green eyes rested on her gently and with sympathy—but also with a certain sense of disappointment, or so Lilias felt.

"Does anyone actually miss those days?"

"I do. And I think you do, too."

She wasn't wrong. Lilias had to acknowledge that. But these were different times, and this was a different place. She flagged down the serving girl and spoke to her briefly. In a few minutes, the expensive glass of wine she had bought Dorian was delivered to him, he spoke with the bartender in confusion, then turned around and frowned at her. She beckoned him over.

He approached, carrying the wine. "This is an excellent vintage, Champion, but I'm afraid you—"

"Please, call me Lilias, and I didn't send you a drink for the reason you're imagining."

"Ah. Well, then, in that case, I'm intrigued."

"Intrigued enough to join us?"

"Is this a clandestine meeting? I love clandestine meetings."

He wasn't going to love the one she was about to inform him of, Lilias was certain. She took a deep breath and leaned across the table as Dorian sat down. "I have something I need to speak to you about, and I really don't think you're going to like it."

"Do tell."

"Your parents have been sending letters to Mother Giselle."

He froze, his entire body utterly still for a long second. It almost seemed as though he had ceased to breathe. His grey eyes lost their sparkle and dance and took on a flat hostility. "You know this how?"

"She told me."

"You. She told you and not me, or the Inquisitor?"

Lilias nodded. "I don't understand it, either."

"And what is it that Magister Halward and his blushing bride want of their absent offspring?"

"According to Mother Giselle, they want to reconcile."

Dorian snorted a laugh, but without humor. "That will be the day."

"You don't believe they care about you enough to want you back?" Merrill asked him. "I know what that's like. It's very sad."

He glanced at her. "Sad is a word for it. Pathetic is another. They don't care for me; only for what I represent to them."

"Which is?"

"Security for the bloodline. They only want me back if I can provide them with heirs bearing the Pavus name and beauty—and magical talent."

Merrill frowned. "That beautiful Templar isn't going to give you children; they know that, right?"

He blinked, startled, then roared with laughter. Genuine, this time. "Not for lack of trying, I assure you."

Merrill thought about that, then blushed furiously. Lilias grinned. There was still something so innocent about her friend—deceptively so. People underestimated Merrill at their own cost.

Dorian sobered, leaning forward, but the anger was gone now, replaced by a wistfulness and a sorrow. "They know that who I am cannot provide them with what they want. It's why I left. It's why I can't imagine that what they want now is as simple as a reconciliation between loving parents and child."

"Apparently they want you to meet with a 'family retainer' in Redcliffe, who will take you to meet your parents at an undisclosed location. Mother Giselle was encouraged not to tell you about it at all, just to trick you into going. It smelled very much like a trap to me."

"And she approached you with this hare-brained scheme and you brought it to me? In that case, Lilias, I am in your debt. In another person's hands this situation might have led to my waking up in chains in Qarinus, being forced to procreate against my will."

"The Inquisitor would be furious if that happened."

Dorian smiled. "Dear man, he would, wouldn't he? No doubt that's why he was left out of this."

"Probably."

"And why would they imagine I would travel with a member of the Chantry?" He shook his head. "This is incomprehensible to me. So naturally, my curiosity knows no bounds and I must go. Will you go with me?"

"Do you want me to?"

"Well, if it all goes horribly awry, we may have to escape and kill everyone. It's always good to have friends on hand in such a situation." Dorian sighed heavily. "I cannot believe my father. Of course he couldn't write to me directly—how much better to contact some southern cleric on the sly. Much wiser." He looked across the table at Lilias. "This is the Tevinter way—never approach from the front. Always come in from the side, hoping the quarry is distracted."

"You imagine that's how your father thinks of you, as his quarry?"

"I don't have to imagine it; I know it." He smiled suddenly. "If this is some Venatori connivance, I will be utterly disappointed."

"In their lack of imagination?"

"Precisely. Thank you for coming to me with this. I'm sure it would have been easier simply to go along with the plan to hoodwink me into going to Redcliffe blind to what awaited me, and yet you chose to be upfront."

Lilias shrugged, uncomfortable with the praise. "I've been hiding in the shadows for too long. It's time to come out and face the world—I thought I'd start with you.'

"And I'm glad you did. Now, we've all been serious for entirely too long. Allow me to buy you both glasses of this excellent wine and let's talk about something truly important—men."