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Hawke had lost track of how many days they'd been down here. Nearly a week on the expedition, and then … it was impossible to know how long they had been trying to find their way out of the thaig. If she ever got her hands on Bartrand—

"If I ever get my hands on your brother," she said aloud to Varric.

"Get in line," he growled. His black anger after his brother had sealed them in the thaig and run off with the strange lyrium idol they had found was the strongest emotion she had ever seen in him, and it showed no sign of wearing off. Hawke wouldn't have wanted to be on the receiving end of it.

"What could have possessed him to do such a thing?"

"I believe 'possessed' is exactly the word you are looking for," Fenris put in.

"Come on, broody, Bartrand's a dwarf. We can't get possessed."

"And yet, here we are. For once, I agree with him." Anders nodded toward Fenris. The two men couldn't stand each other, placed as firmly as they could be on opposite sides of the mage debate, but they had come to a temporary truce as long as the four of them were locked in the Deep Roads together, which Hawke appreciated. "Something about that idol—it wasn't normal. It … called to me."

"And to me," Fenris agreed.

Varric sighed. "I hate to admit it, but it called to me, too. You, Hawke?"

Mystified, she shook her head. "Not a word. It looked like any other hunk of expensive metal to me. It was lyrium, right? Anders is a mage, Fenris is inlaid with the stuff, and Varric, isn't it true that dwarves have a certain amount of lyrium in their systems just from living underground with it?"

"Surface dwarf, born and bred, unlike my brother. But I suppose it could be residual."

"And would explain why you were less affected than Bartrand. And why I wasn't affected at all. No lyrium in these veins."

"Lucky you," Fenris muttered.

"Yes. I've always thought so," Hawke agreed. She'd never had any desire to share the burden of magehood with her father and her sister. She shifted the heavy sack on her shoulder. "At least we'll be rich—assuming we ever make it out of here."

"We did find enough gold to make Bartrand gnash his teeth down to the nubs. That's something to be glad of."

"We're going to make it," Anders assured Hawke, clapping a hand on her shoulder. "The map says there's another entrance just down the next tunnel."

Fenris glared at him. "That is what you said the last tunnel."

"Right. The next tunnel."

Mage and elf stared at each other until finally Fenris sighed and looked away. Anders, smiling in triumph, led the way. Hawke followed more slowly, matching her steps to Varric's. It was almost second nature to do so, now. It felt odd to walk with her old long stride on those occasions when he wasn't with her.

"So what now, Hawke?"

"You mean, after we walk through endless more 'next tunnels' on no food and very little water?"

"Exactly. After that."

"After that, I go home, I buy my mother her ancestral home back, I buy off enough Templars to form a protective phalanx around my sister every time she leaves the house, and then I kick back and …" She paused.

"And you have no idea what to do from there."

"No," she admitted. "I really don't. I've always been a fighter. Maybe I'll join Aveline's guards."

"She'd have you in the brig for insubordination before the ink was dry on your intake form."

Hawke smiled. "Good point. What about you, what will you do?"

"Besides hire every mercenary in the Free Marches to hunt down and kill my brother?" Varric tilted his head thoughtfully. "I've been thinking— No, it's probably ridiculous."

"What's ridiculous?"

"I've been thinking about writing a book."

"A book?"

"Yeah. Something … fun. An adventure tale."

"Not our adventures, I hope. I don't need to read about myself."

"It's sweet that you think you might read it. No, I was thinking of something more ... Well, I don't know. If I had a good idea, I'd have already started writing it."

"If it helps, I think you should. I've heard enough of your stories to think you'd write a good book."

Touched, he looked up at her, his brown eyes unusually soft in the dim torchlight. "Thanks, Hawke. And if—well, if you wanted to keep doing what we were doing before, picking up odd jobs around Kirkwall to have something to do … you know I'm with you."

It hadn't occurred to her that the end of the expedition might mean the end of them spending so much time together, and Hawke felt a moment's panic at the idea of of losing his companionship. "Maybe we'll find your book idea along the way."

"Now you're talking. Maybe I can write one about how we cut Bartrand's heart out and buried it under the floorboards of my room."

"Would you really want his heart that close to you?"

"Does he really have a heart?"

Ahead, they heard Anders shout.

"You think this is the next tunnel?"

"That, or he threw Fenris into a lava pit."

"I think we would have seen the sparks."

"Good point. Varric?" Hawke looked down at him.

"Yeah?"

"It's been worth it, all this. To have met you. I've—never had a better friend."

"Same here, Hawke. Now, let's get out of here and celebrate that sentiment with a whole lot of drinks, the way the Maker intended."

"Lead on."