Varania returned to Skyhold alone.

She tried to keep herself from overthinking, from rehashing what happened; rethinking every single word he said. She knew it was a pointless exercise.

Solas pulled that polite mask back down over his face and the man she thought she knew disappeared underneath it. His voice cracked when he spoke, pain in each syllable I'm sorry but then he walked away.

It didn't change anything. Whatever his reasons were, he thought they were important and all she could do is wait.

She would wait.

If Varania learned anything from her mistakes, it was that rushing in with fear never solved anything. She almost destroyed herself and her brother from fear. She was terrified she might lose Solas forever. His face was as impassive as stone.

She tried to just keep breathing.

She decided the best thing to do would be to throw herself into the Inquisition for all she was worth. There was plenty to be done and Solas was right about one thing. The last thing she needed to be was distracted. She couldn't fall apart on the eve of trying to take down Corypheus.

If she failed they would all lose everything. She would lose everything; Solas included.

It wasn't helping that the damn Well was speaking, whispering, singing into her head; little quiet things and songs and knowledge she couldn't quite hear or understand. She struggled to hear the voices. They were trying to tell her something. It was something important and it made the hair on the back of her neck stand up, goosebumps prickling on her skin.

She rode back into Skyhold at dawn just in time to see Solas disappear into the Keep. She considered following him but resisted, the knuckles of her fingers white on the reins as she dismounted in the stable. Blackwall gave her a look, cocking his head at her. He was still working on the griffin rocking horse, rubbing at the rough edges of the wood. He nodded in greet and turned back to his work without speaking.

It was how he coped with the demons that plagued him. She wished she had a thing like that, something that would occupy her idle thoughts in the long hours between the dramatic moments. She considered sitting with him for a while, just listening to the scrape scrape of the stone on the wood, taking in the scent of hay and sawdust. Maybe it would calm her too.

From the corner of her eye she spotted movement. One of Leliana's agents came running, wide-eyed and flushed. He seemed helpless to explain what was happening. All he could manage was to ask her to follow.

He led her through the courtyard, steps moving even faster as they passed through the hall into the the garden. There was another equally flustered looking scout standing at the open door to the room where Morrigan kept her Eluvian.

Varania almost didn't want to go any closer but she complied. The Eluvian was open, shimmering in undulations of blue and violet. Leliana wrung her hands as she watched the molten surface, her expression helpless. She turned at the sound of their feet, her face uncharacteristically bewildered.

"Inquisitor, we need your help," she said. Her words were clipped. "Morrigan chased into at the Eluvian after her son. I've never seen her like that before...she's usually-" Leliana shook her head. "Something is very, very wrong. You must go after her."

Varania liked Kieran; she liked his old soul and his unexpected innocence. She still remembered his tears when he learned the man who was his father had been lost in the Fade. She didn't like the idea of stepping into the mirror without being certain where it led, but she was the Inquisitor even if she felt like falling to pieces. She gathered her courage and did it anyway. The magic of the mirror was strong; stronger than she remembered. She closed her eyes tight as she passed through and didn't open them again until she felt the magic recede. She opened her eyes again, blinking, expecting to find the crossroads.

The greenish sky, the queasy unbalanced feeling hit her immediately. There was no denying it. This was the Fade.

How had Kieran done this? How was this even possible? She knew Morrigan had believed that the mirror could be directed to the Fade, but Varania never imagined it was really possible. The Veil, despite the rifts and the anchor, seemed too immutable to breach this way.

She heard Morrigan's voice cry out through the pale, wavering light.

"Kieran!"

Varania stumbled forward, her feet crunching on stones under her feet, even though she knew they weren't really stones. Morrigan's head snapped in her direction, her gold eyes wide, terrified.

"Please, Inquisitor. Help me find my son." Her words were without volume, but choked with emotion. Morrigan's normal cool exterior was shattered.

"Of course. We'll find him."

Morrigan looked at her hands. "The Fade is infinite; he could be anywhere. But he's my son. I need to try."

Varania only nodded. She didn't understand what it meant to have a child, but she could imagine. Even the idea of her brother's child being lost, a little girl she only knew in the slightest, terrified her.

A lump in her throat made it too hard to speak.

So much loss. So much heartbreak. They needed to find Kieran; something had to go right.

Mythal.

How could it...she was Mythal?

Varania's head was spinning.

She had never heard of Flemeth or Asha'bellanar until she came to Clan Lavellan outside of Kirkwall. She was both a fairy tale and a nightmare spoken of in hushed whispers. In her wildest imagining she couldn't have predicted this. Standing front of her was a Witch of the Wilds and all along she had the soul of their beloved Mythal inside of her.

Solas was right. The Dalish were wrong. About everything.

For a moment, it seemed like Mythal was a monster, come to snatch Kieran away, But Mythal...Flemeth...whatever she wished to be called, looked at Kieran with love. Though Morrigan bristled beside her and Mythal's compulsion made Varania keep her still, she would have done it anyway. Whatever Flemeth was intending, Varania could feel in her heart that it wasn't to hurt Kieran. Flemeth held his arms tenderly and made a tiny gesture with her head, a spot in Kieran's chest starting to glow.

Kieran pulled away suddenly and Flemeth's eyes widened. She reached for him and he put up his hand, the voice that came from him deeper, more mature than he'd ever sounded before.

"Wait." His eyes, not gold like Morrigan's or Flemeth's, but a perfectly normal amber brown seemed to look through her. He smiled but it was not a child's smile. "I have something to tell her and soon I'll forget."

A moment of understanding passed between them.

Kieran turned to Varania and spoke. "I cannot help you," he said, an otherworldly vibration in his voice. "What you want..." He made a sad sound but didn't elaborate. She knew what he meant, even if she didn't know how he knew.

Solas.

"I cannot help you," he repeated and the words felt like slivers of ice in her chest. "But you can help another find happiness." He got a far away look for a moment and nodded thoughtfully. "Yes, that will help you see through what you must do. Knowing that love can overcome even the most impossible odds? Yes, that is what you need."

"I don't understand." Her own voice sounded too small in comparison to his.

"You will." Kieran smiled again, his eyes twinkled. "Return to The Fallow Mire. There is another unopened Rift where Watcher of the Skies stands vigil. When you open the Rift, beware. Demons will emerge but not alone. Be careful what you strike at. Not everything from the Fade is a lie."

As suddenly as he began, Kieran fell silent and turned back to Flemeth. He smiled with such heartbreaking trust when he looked at her than it made Varania's chest ache.

"No more dreams?" he asked quietly.

"No more dreams." Her voice...that was the voice the Dalish dreamt their lady Mythal would have. This was a mother, the caregiver. Beside her Morrigan was as tense as a bow string.

A little glow of light. It happened so quickly, Varania wasn't entirely sure what had happened, but when Kieran turned back to them everything had changed. He was just a little boy.

Morrigan's voice cracked and Kieran fell into her arms. "Mother!" She cried out after Flemeth, but she was already gone.