A/N- Thanks again to Skeasel for her excellent beta work. Reviews and criticism welcome.

CHAPTER 3

A Name For People Like You

9:41 Dragon
22nd Firstfall

The Free Marches
Southern Base of the Vimmark Mountains

39 Days

They were now two days east of Kirkwall and Varric was beginning to chafe with the constant friction from the horse's saddle. As he and Anders rode towards Ostwick through the southern cliffs of the Vimmark Mountains, the pain in his thighs and thin air served to compound Varric's irritation. The fact that he was not headed in the direction of his intended destination (the lodge in Wildervale was over the mountain and in the opposite direction) and that the farther east they traveled, the uglier and more barren the locales got, only served to make matters worse.

The trail had, over the last half of a day, devolved into a narrow stretch of land between the cliffs leading to the sea below and the stark, unscalable rise towards the mountaintops. The land was rocky and uneven with thin strips of dead grass here and there. Given their altitude, everything was coated in a fine sheet of moisture, which meant the horses had to travel at a slower pace. Worse still, a cloud front had steadily moved down from the peaks above until they could only see clearly about ten yards in any direction. The view of the sea over the cliff-side had been swallowed up by the fog; not only had the trail lost its single pleasing aesthetic quality, but their pace had now slowed to barely more than a crawl.

"I think," Varric said, wiping wetness from his forehead, "I'm beginning to understand why no one I know rides horses. We could do this faster walking."

A few steps ahead of him, Anders brushed a hand through his hair, trying to get the damp strands to stop sticking to the back of his neck with little success. "I always thought it was because no one could find a damned horse."

As if in response, Anders' horse, a chestnut mare with big brown eyes and a blonde mane, whinnied and shook her head.

"Hey, hey," Anders said to the mare, "take it easy. Don't I take you to the nicest places? I mean, look at all of this… damp, empty rockiness."

Stroking the dark mane of his smaller, Orlesian black pony, Varric said, "Don't talk to your horse, Blondie."

"This from the man who has, on more occasions than I care to remember, gotten into drunken arguments with his crossbow… who more often than not has won."

Varric attempted to judge the current distance between the mountainside and the cliffs. He guessed it was about thirty feet. With them being roughly in the middle, leaving fifteen feet on either side, and a horse able to, at a moment's notice, gallop at seven or eight feet in a matter of seconds…

"Bianca can't suddenly decide to chuck you off the side of a cliff… well, she can, but she's a lot less likely to."

"Point taken," Anders said. He stroked the mare's mane and bent down, whispering what sounded like an apology in her ear.

The road ahead began to rise after a while, slowly but noticeably, with boulders looming ominously ahead, resting uneasily against the mountainside as though weighing the pros and cons of rolling downhill at any moment.

Varric adjusted in his saddle again, trying to ignore the discomfort on his thighs. "What did you mean, back at the manse-"

"What?" Anders shouted back. The mage, while Varric hadn't been looking, had gained several yards, and was too far away. His shout reverberated off the mountainside.

Several fist-sized rocks clattered down the rocky slope next to Varric, as if drawn to the sound of the human's voice. He eyed them and the boulders ahead warily, pulling a little on the reins of the pony, who begrudgingly increased his speed.

When he'd caught up with Anders, he said, "Slow down," as quietly as he could.

Anders looked back at him and rolled his eyes, obligingly slowing his horse. "At this rate, we won't reach Estwatch until the new year."

"Now's not the time to start making up time," Varric said. "Back at the manse, you said you didn't have anything of Merrill's, so you couldn't scry for her to get her location."

Anders nodded. "Right…" Off of Varric's blank expression, he continued. "When you're trying to magically locate a person, you need a personal effect. Something they carried or owned, something that meant something to them. It doesn't always work, but-"

"What did you have of Hawke's," Varric asked.

Anders gave his a bemused smile. "What difference does it make?"

"Just answer the question, Blondie."

Anders returned his gaze to the trail ahead. "I didn't. Have anything of Hawke's, I mean. I used a Tevinter amulet she gave me once."

"And that worked?"

"Thankfully. Apparently, at one point our friendship meant something to her. Otherwise, I would've been staring at an empty map of Thedas."

"Will wonders never cease," Varric added.

Anders ignored his sarcasm and for a moment the two of them rode in silence, horses clopping and distantly, very distantly, there was the constant crash of waves against rocks below.

Anders grinned.

Varric raised a brow with suspicion. "What?"

"It's nothing."

"What is it?"

"You…" Anders smiled at him, "You've been calling me 'Blondie' again for a while now."

Varric made a face. "Don't read too much into it."

"Right," Anders laughed. "Sure."

"I mean it. It's just a lot more comfortable than saying 'Anders.'"

"Sure, sure."

Varric harrumphed, frustrated. He shook his head. "There should be a name for people like you."

"People like me? Mages, you mean?"

"No. People, idiots-"

"Hey, thanks."

"-idiots, mired in politics-"

"Politicians, then? Theologians, philosophers, master debaters, I'm a great master debater, you might even call me a professional master debater, I don't even need anyone else to be in the room when I master debate-"

"The likelihood of Bianca chucking you off this cliff is growing by the second, just so you know."

"There's a word for everything, Varric."

"Don't ever say that to a writer, Blon- dammit,"

Anders laughed.

Varric glared at him. "No. Someone who gets so wrapped up in a cause against man or government, law or rule or philosophy, that they take drastic action to scare everyone into agreeing with them, or to change the world to better suit them."

Anders' smile slipped from his face. "I didn't… I mean, my point wasn't to… I wasn't wrong, Varric."

Varric opened his mouth to respond, but Anders quickly threw his hand up.

"The point! The point wasn't wrong. Maker, if I could've done it some other way, if I could… if I could take back the, the deaths…" He looked gravely out at an ocean he couldn't see. "But I can't. If those people, good or bad, if they hadn't died, I and every other mage would still be living in fear, most of us trapped within the confines of stone towers, locked away from the world like beasts to be chained."

"There should be a name for people like you."

The incline they were walking up continued to get steeper. Now with every step of the horses hooves on the ground, Varric could see bits of grit and pebbles shake loose and start rolling back down the path behind them. He had a horrible image of one of the horses getting spooked in the fog and bucking up, failing to keep balance on two legs, horseshoes skidding on the slippery, dew-wet rocky terrain beneath, horse and rider falling backwards at a rough angle, the edge of the cliff a breath away with naught but sharp death beneath a veil of thick, white mist-

Varric pinched his brow with thumb and pointer finger, squeezing his eyes shut. "Fear-monger, scare tactician, horrorizer-"

"Freedom fighter," Anders said, not without a semblance of pride.

Varric barked a short laugh, opening his eyes. "Don't be ridiculous."

Anders smirked. "What, I don't get to play?"

"By all means, feel free. That's just a silly name."

"Why? I fight for freedom. Freedom fighter."

"It sounds more like freedom stole your sweet roll and you're looking to get it back."

"Stole my sweet roll?"

"Picture Broody having a conversation with a mage from Tevinter who called himself a freedom fighter, how do you suppose he'd see it?"

Anders reached into a pack at the side of his saddle and pulled out a hardbound, leather canteen.

"Alright, I'm picturing it," he said, unscrewing the cap. "Mage says something like, 'Oy there, elf; my those are some pretty tattoos. How fares your day?'" Anders took a swig with one hand, his other back on the reins as the chestnut took a sharp turn to avoid a large bedrock outcropping. "Who are you to speak to me, human?" This voice, clearly an imitation of Fenris, pulled a chuckle from Varric.

"'Why of course, I'm a mage from Tevinter, and I'd like to think of myself as a fre-uck, gluck,'" Anders clasped a hand to his chest, mocking the throes of death. "'OH! Oh, the horror, that's a hand inside my chest, crushing my squishy bits! For the love of Andraste, please, tell Mitsy… ugh, that I love her!'" He leaned back on the horse, head towards the sky, gurgling, water spilling out the sides of his mouth as if it were blood.

Laughing, Varric clapped. "Bravo, Blondie. I'm sure that's exactly how it would've gone. Doesn't stop freedom fighter from being a silly name, though."

Anders took another gulp from the canteen and shrugged, replacing the cap and tossing it to Varric. "A far sight better than 'scare tactician', I think."

Varric drank from the canteen, feeling the water run down the back of his throat and cool the burning warmth in his chest. He smacked his lips, thinking. "Terrorist."

Anders gave him a long, calculating look. "Piss off."

"What? Doesn't mean you wouldn't go home at night and kiss Mitsy and the kids, make a nice meal."

"Piss off."

"'Freedom for every mage, by any means necessary,' right? I think that's it. Terrorist. Anders the terrorist."

"Give me back my canteen. Terrorists don't sound like they share their water."

"How about, 'Blondie, the terrorist,' then?"

Anders seemed to contemplate this. "…alright, one more swig, then you can die of dehydration."

Varric nodded. He sealed the canteen and, as the horses rejoined around another outcrop, placed it back into Anders' side-saddle pouch himself.

"Hey. Ahead there," Anders said, pointing up the incline, "looks like we might be catching a break."

Varric saw what he meant. As they continued up the trail, they appeared to be cresting the fogbank. With any luck, they'd be reaching better visibility and drier land within the next hour.

"Looks that way."

Anders smiled, grabbing the reins with both hands and steadied himself, seeming slightly renewed at the chance for better weather. Varric unconsciously imitated the action.

The mage looked to him and his smile fell a little. "Varric, do you really think… y'know… she wouldn't really kill one of us, right?"

"Only if we show up together."

"I'm being serious, dwarf."

Varric shot him a look, all humor having left his face. "So am I. When we get to Hercinia, I'm putting you up in an inn for the night. I'll take a boat myself-"

"Don't be stupid-"

"-I'll take a boat myself past Estwatch. It'll be a day there and back, at the most."

Anders scoffed. "The two of you are closer than blood, I don't believe for a second that she'd take a dagger to you. How long has it been since you last saw each other?"

"Three years."

"Well, they say that time heals all wounds."

"Medicine and magic heal wounds, Blondie, time just amplifies the process."

"I was speaking metaphorically."

"So was I. You think you're the only one with magic? Words are the most potent magic in the world, and when wielded with grace and talent they can mend broken hearts and make blind men see."

"So what's the problem?"

"None of us were graceful or talented. We were a band of horny idiots and fools, and when wielded by idiots, words rend hearts asunder and everyone winds up blind. And if left that way, time still amplifies the process. After three years, we're just miserable husks stumbling around in the dark."

"…Maker," Anders said. "What happened?"

"Nothing we're going to talk about."

"Varric-"

"I said it's nothing we're going to talk about. Period. This is one story that doesn't get told."

Anders' lips thinned and his brow furrowed, though from annoyance or hurt feelings, Varric couldn't tell. "Why not? …look, I know I'm no one's idea of a great guy right now, but I wasn't the only lying bastard in our merry band of fools and idiots to betray everyone's trust, and I'd like to think that when it all comes down, seven years of having someone's back actually means something."

"All past grievances aside, Blondie, it's got nothing to do with you or what you did. I just don't like telling stories with unhappy endings nobody deserved. You don't go through so much shit and blood, tragedy and deceit and heartache just to have it end like it did." Varric tasted bile in his mouth. He spit, wishing he'd taken another sip from the canteen. "You don't just throw in a dead kid and a twist at the end of it for some bullshit melodramatic flair, and any writer, man or Stone or Maker who would, should be tarred and feathered and dragged through the streets. He should have his testicles removed forcibly by a frenzied mabari-"

"Varric, what are you talking about? What kid, what twist?"

Varric felt the rarest of things, his throat constricting around a lump and tears building up behind his eyes as the fog finally began to clear a little. He blinked furiously and cleared his throat, gave the reigns a short, sharp tug and pressed the sides of the black pony with his boots. He picked up in speed, clopping past Anders and up the trail.

"It's over. And I'm done talking for a while."

Resigned, the mage followed suit.

Still, try as he might, Varric couldn't outrun the memories.