"Killer, Curly," Varric's gravely voice said from the door, and Killeen straightened and turned, relieved at the interruption. "Got someone here you should talk to."
Following Varric into the room was a female dwarf, a slight swagger in her step. She looked around and raised an eyebrow. "Love what you've done with the place."
Varric sighed. "Curly, Killer, this is Bianca Davri. She knows a little about red lyrium, and I know Killer was looking into it."
"They christen you Killer?" Bianca asked. "Because if so, that's impressive."
"Killeen," Killeen said, aware that Cullen had gone still at the reference to red lyrium.
"Less impressive," Bianca said. "Is that teapot empty or do you just have no manners?"
"Bianca," Varric said. "Curly is the Commander of the Inquisition, and Killer is his second-in-command."
"Then they should know better," Bianca said. She pulled a chair over to the desk and hoisted herself up on to it as Cullen collected himself and poured another mug of tea. "So, red lyrium. I know where it's coming from."
"Where?" Cullen asked immediately. Then he glanced at Fel. "We're going to busy for a while. Run down to Master Dennet and tell him we'll be late this morning."
Fel hesitated, the conflict between delight at unaccustomed responsibility and dismay at being excluded from an interesting conversation clear on her face. Then responsibility, and Killeen's repeated lectures on the importance of obeying even unwanted orders, won out, and she nodded, slipped from her seat, and darted from the room.
"Cute kid," Bianca said, not sounding impressed. "You must be proud."
"She's not —" Cullen said immediately, as Killeen said:
"I'm not —"
"Whatever," Bianca said, bored already. She sipped her tea, pulled a face. "This really is the arse-end of Thedas, isn't it? Can't even get decent tea. Anyway, red lyrium. The entrance of the thaig where it was first found has been leaked."
"How, exactly?" Varric asked. "You didn't explain that, earlier."
"How should I know who you told?" Bianca asked. "I mean, I don't imagine Bartrand carrying his own pack. Anyway, that's not what's important."
"What is important?" Cullen asked, mild exasperation in his tone.
"Red lyrium is lyrium that has the Blight," Bianca said.
"So two deadly things combine to form something super awful?" Varric said. "Great."
"No, Varric," Bianca said. "It means lyrium is alive. Minerals don't get blighted. If lyrium does …"
Not a poison, or a toxin, Killeen thought.
A disease. A parasite.
Living in the veins of Templars like mistletoe in the branches of a tree, killing the host little by little …
Killeen looked at Cullen, found his face blank with the same horror she felt, and without thinking reached out her hand.
His fingers closed around hers, almost hard enough to hurt. "We need to stop Corypheus's source," he said to Varric. "The theory can wait."
"I'll talk to the Inquisitor. She's due back from the Hissing Wastes today," Varric said. He jerked his head toward the door. "Come on, Bianca. Better we get this over as quickly as possible, before certain people learn you're here."
Bianca hopped up from her stool. "Aw, Varric, always so concerned about me … except when you aren't."
"You can take care of yourself," Varric said as they went out together. "I'm concerned about me."
Killeen realised she was still gripping Cullen's hand — that he was still holding hers, his thumb brushing slowly across the heel of her palm and back again as he considered the information Varric and Bianca had brought. The steady, gentle movement, so like his touch that morning, ran directly along her nerves without troubling her brain, loosening her joints and starting a slow flush of heat through her body.
She cleared her throat, and Cullen started, let go of her hand as if were white hot, then cursed mildly as the movement made his desk rock slightly and tea slopped from his cup over several pieces of parchment. "I could have sworn the floor in here was even when I left."
Running footsteps and then Fel appeared at the door, breathless. Her face fell when she saw the dwarfs were gone. "I — told — him," she panted.
"Thank you," Cullen said. "Now go and ask Ser Dorian if he has any new requests for the book merchants."
The girl nodded, whirled, and raced away.
"I'm going to get fat with her running all my errands," Killeen said. "And Pavus is going to turn her into a nug after five minutes of her questions."
"It'll be good for him," Cullen said, unmoved. "Kill —" He paused, rubbed the back of his neck.
"Well, I'd better spend part of today at least talking to Harritt," Killeen said briskly, busying herself with the latest armoury report. "From the looks of this that new pack of recruits from Emprise Du Lion are using their training swords to chop wood."
It distracted him, as she knew it would. "Could be that last load of iron from the Hinterlands," he said, pulling the stack of requisitions toward him and then frowning as his desk wobbled again. "What did you do to this damn thing while I was away?"
He bent down to examine the desk's legs.
Killeen made her escape.
Less certain than Cullen of the benefits Dorian might gain from extended exposure to Fel, she headed first for the library, passing Varric introducing Bianca to Cole in the Great Hall.
"Wants him, leaves him," she overheard Cole saying. "Is it true or just that he wants it to be?"
Killeen grinned to herself, taking the stairs two at a time. Varric's careful distance from Bianca in the office that morning had been obvious, the scrupulous avoidance of accidental contact of someone who wanted, more than anything, to touch that Killeen recognised from her own circumspect behaviour. Nice to see Varric on the receiving end of the monster he's created for once, she thought, almost tempted to linger to hear Bianca's response.
Upstairs in the library, Fel had Dorian backed up against a bookcase, looking slightly harried.
"It's possible, yes," he was saying to her, "but it's not a very nice thing to do, and it can have quite unpleasant consequences — that is, results — for the person involved."
"What can?" Killeen asked. "Fel, are you bothering Ser Pavus?"
"No, I'm just asking him questions."
"Such as?" Killeen asked suspiciously.
"If he could make someone do something with magic."
Killeen shot a look at Dorian, and he shrugged. "I assure you, lovely Lady Lieutenant, I didn't raise the topic."
"That would be a very bad idea," Killeen said firmly. "And very, very mean."
"Oh," Fel said thoughtfully, and then brightened: "How about turning them into a toad? Could you do that?"
"Messy," Dorian said. "Bits left over, you see."
"Also very, very mean," Killeen said, steering Fel toward the stairs with an apologetic glance over her shoulder at Dorian.
"What if they deserved it?" Fel asked, skipping ahead of Killeen down the staircase.
"Is someone being mean to you?" Killeen asked. "Someone you'd like to have Dorian make nicer?"
"No," Fel said, but Killeen thought she sounded evasive. "It's just a question."
Killeen made a mental note to pursue it later, a surprise attack having more chance of success. "Well, now you know," she said. "Come on. Armoury."
As they passed through the Great Hall again, Killeen saw that Cassandra had joined Varric and Cole.
She steered Fel in a wide berth around them, quite certain that anything private that Cole let slip about Cassandra would bring the Seeker's wrath down on any witnesses.
A/N: Yes, you only get the information about red lyrium being blighted lyrium at the end of the mission with Bianca, not the beginning. I played around with that, thus altering Varric's personal plot, to make my own plot work better.