Samuel searched for weeks, looking for any sign of Gale, but he was having no luck. Elias was fine without him around, getting plenty of support from his advisers, so Samuel was able to focus solely on finding Gale. He just hoped he wouldn't be too late.

He searched everywhere he could think of, tracking down any leads that sounded like Gale or Galeria, but every time he came up empty handed. Then finally, one day nearly seven months after she disappeared, he got a solid lead: an elven woman with hair as gray as stone travelling from the shores of the Waking Sea near Amaranthine. He tried to make the journey to Amaranthine as short as possible, but by the time that he reached the large city she was already gone. He tracked down some of his old contacts in the city, asked around for any other news or sightings of her- getting pointed towards Denerim.

Reaching Denerim, however, he found that once again he was a day or two behind her. He did find out that she was travelling with a merchant- an elf just like her- and that they were headed for Gwaren. It would take two days to reach Gwaren from Denerim. Determined to catch up to her, Samuel pressed onward as hard as he could, but when he finally found her, he was not prepared for what awaited him.

Gale and Varine had made their way towards Gwaren to sell the final wares of their journey, but they were stopped on the road by bandits and things escalated dangerously quick.

"Let her go!"

"Shut it, wretch!'

Gale grunted as the bandit chief slammed his fist into her solar plexus. She wheezed, her body sagging as the men who held her captive pulled her arms back even further. Wincing, she forced herself to ignore the pain and looked up at Varine. "It'll be alright, Rinnie, I promise..."

Varine was terrified, understandably so. She struggled against her captor, pleading for them not to hurt Gale and to let them go, but it was to no avail. The more she struggled, the more her captor grew impatient and lost his nerves.

"No, don't!" Gale watched in horror as Varine let out a whimper before falling silent and going limp after her captor struck her in the back of her head. "Rinnie..?" No answer came and Gale began to panic. "Come on, Rinnie, stop messing around..!" Still no answer came and the man restraining Varine tisked as he tossed Varine's motionless body aside. "Rinnie, wake up..! Rinnie..! Rinnie!"

In that moment, Gale's mind went black and Galeria took over. Galeria had grown very fond of Varine as well and seeing that Gale was imminent danger, she went into protective overdrive. Even she lost a bit of control and her vision turned red as she retaliated against the bandits, slaughtering every last one of them.

As Galeria stood amidst the carnage, she could hear someone else approaching and she spun towards them- barely stopping herself in the knick of time when she recognized the voice that called to her.

"Samuel..?"

Samuel cautiously approached her, seeing that it was Galeria in control. "Galeria? It's alright, now."

Galeria's enraged state subsided and her vision returned to normal, but she found that she could not give control back to Gale for some reason. "Samuel, you need to leave."

"No. I've been looking for you for weeks. I'm not letting you out of my sight again."

Galeria stared at the gory scene before her, her heart sinking. "What have I done...?"

"What happened?"

Galeria stepped through the bodies until she reached Varine's. She sank to her knees and held the young elf maiden, her chest heavy as the guilt began growing more and more.

"Galeria, what happened?"

"We were attacked... They were trying to rob us... Varine, she... they hit her... she wouldn't wake up... Gale was in danger, too... I had to protect her..." Galeria looked up at Samuel as he knelt in front of her. "Samuel... I am so sorry... I lost control... Gale lost control... and now... I can't give it back..."

"First things first, alright? Let's get you somewhere safe, then we'll find somewhere we can give Varine a proper burial."

Galeria nodded. "O-Ok."

Galeria followed Samuel as he led the way and tried to put as much distance between the carnage sight as possible. Galeria had placed Varine's body into the back of their wagon, guiding the horse forward as rain began to fall. Once Samuel felt that they were safe enough for the moment, he grabbed a shovel from the back of the wagon and found a place out of the rain to dig a grave for Varine. Once it was ready, Galeria carried Varine over and placed her gently into her earthen tomb- standing back as Samuel filled the grave and placed a stone marker at the head of it.

Galeria remained silent as Samuel offered up a prayer, something she suspected was unusual for him, and simply placed some Andraste's Grace she had found nearby atop the gravestone.

They stood in silence for several moments, Samuel unsure of what to say to Galeria. He had a hunch that this Varine meant more to Gale than Galeria, but seeing how upset Galeria was over Varine's death made him think she herself had also grown to care about this elf maiden.

"Who was she?" he finally asked, hoping to break the silence more for Galeria's sake than his.

Galeria did not speak right away, but when she did, Samuel could just hear the heartache in her voice.

"She was a companion and a lover to us. She was determined to stay with Gale even after she found out about me. She wasn't scared like she should have been; she knew somehow that we wouldn't hurt her. And we never did. She had the same affect on Gale that you do and she offered herself to Gale whenever she needed to feed on someone's blood. She protected us in her own little way, brought Gale peace of mind after she sank into a deep depression upon leaving Skyhold."

Samuel watched as Galeria struggled to keep her composure and he hesitantly reached up to touch her shoulder. "She meant a great deal to both of you."

Galeria's eyes welled with tears and she nodded, unable to hold them back any longer. As she sank to her knees and began to sob, Samuel knelt beside her and tried to comfort her as best as he could. He let her cry as long as she needed, then looked down at her when she began to calm.

"Samuel... I know you promised Gale that if she or I-"

"Hush, let's not speak of that right now."

"No, I need you to hear me out..."

Samuel looked down at Galeria as she met his gaze. "Alright."

"I cannot give her back control... she cannot take back control... we are stuck like this... please... it isn't her fault... don't take her life..."

Samuel could see the desperation in her eyes, begging and pleading with him to break the promise he made to Gale. "Come on, let's get you out of the rain."