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The Little Things
“And I swear to Maker, she just jumped out of the tear in the sky, landed on her feet, and beheaded a demon like it was nothing!” The soldier was unsteady on his feet and flushed in the face with victory and cheap vine, but that didn’t stop his enthusiastic recounting of the battle at Adamant Fortress. Varric who usually would be the first one to tell slightly enhanced stories of his friends, just shook his head in disgust.
“What’s with the long face?” Sera hoped on the empty spot next to Varric with tankard of ale in hand.
“You know Buttercup, there is so many stories out there about the illustrious lady Inquisitor and her noble deeds that it makes me sad.”
“You daft? If you don’t like the stories, why do you tell so many of them?” Sera stared at Varric incredulously.
“Because it needs to be done. Nobody would trust in the Inquisition without some legendary bedazzling of their leader. But now the stories took on whole new level. They put her up on the pedestal with Andraste and it feels like the actual person is fading away.” Varric stared at the wobbly soldier who started on another story. “And what’s worse is that she hates the worship and admiration, but she takes it anyway, and uses it to get shit done.” Varric had experience with putting deeds into words and making people into characters. He knew all too well how stories evolved – he could swear that The Tale of the Champion lived its own life by now – but the way it was with Adaar felt just wrong.
“Ah, you’re upset they don’t tell about the little things.” Sera nodded sagely and sipped on her ale.
“I’m almost afraid to ask, but what’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know – the little things. All these legendy stories are about her killing big bad shites, facing Coryphypus, and doing sparkly heroic things. But nobody tells of the time she spent three hours hiking through wilderness and wading in a pond full of leeches because the healers in Crossroads needed spindleweed. And at the time she didn’t know shite about the area, and had no idea that she was more likely to find the herby stuff close to running water.” Sera smiled fondly at the memory and finished her tankard. Varric chuckled at the mental picture of the lady Inquisitor splashing around with wet boots and armload of spindleweed.
“You know Buttercup, that reminds me of something. This was before you joined the good fight, and soon after she first tried to close the breach. There we were in Haven, everybody confused and angry, big green tear in the skies, hopes of all resting on the shoulders of the lone survivor of the Conclave. I was walking from to the smithy because Bianca needed some oiling and love, and I heard laughter. Mind me, it wasn’t a polite chuckle or a snort in reaction to a dirty joke, which you could expect in army camp. No, it was full on laugh with chortling and braying. When I found the source, I couldn’t believe my eyes – there she was, Herald of Andraste and fearsome Qunari mage, sliding on the lake, having ungodly amount of fun, and making a fool out of herself, because she knew there were a couple of children hidden in the trees, watching her, too afraid to approach but curious nevertheless.
“After a while the children grew bolder and went closer, and believe me, I will never forget the sight of Adaar making little colorful sparks with snap of her fingers, sitting on the ice, probably getting frost bites on her arse, so the children wouldn’t be afraid because she was too big standing up.” Varric waved at the barkeep for some ale for himself and another one for Sera.
“Yeah, sounds like her.” Sera nodded with a dreamy look in her eyes, imagining Adaar’s arse. “She turned out pretty decent even after all the shite the world threw at her, huh?” Sera happily accepted new tankard from the serving girl and lifted it up in toast “To Adaar, who was big before she was someone big!” and ended up chortling merrily at her own joke.
Both Sera and Varric looked up when someone tall and clad into fashionable robes stopped in front of their table.
“Sparkles! Come join us.” Called Varric, when he recognized who it was.
“What mischief are you two up now?” Asked Dorian in his smooth and accented voice as he dragged another chair to their table. “Making fun of our esteemed leader?”
“Fun of her? Perish the thought! We are just celebrating her victory over the beasts of fade with reminiscence of the little-known facts about our friend.” Said Sera in surprisingly good imitation of the uppity tone of Orlesian nobles, which was promptly shattered when she loudly belched.
Dorian looked at Varric for explanation. “Just talking about the side of her unknown to the masses.”
“Ah. So, like that one time we were camping in the Hissing Wastes and the camp got ambushed by red templars?” Asked Dorian innocently.
“What? Didn’t hear about that one.” Sera pushed her half-drunk tankard to Dorian and with a wave ordered a new one.
Dorian looked at the ale unenthusiastically and quickly swiped it for the fresh one that the serving girl just brought. “No? Well it was just Bull, Cole, me, and the Inquisitor so I’m not surprised it didn’t spread too far.”
Varric encouraged with a nod. “So, what happened?”
“Well, as I said, we were camping, readying ourselves to get through the worst heat of the day.” Dorian looked appropriately peeved by the indignity of hot day in the desert. “But then – WHAM – we were ambushed, red templars and Venatori everywhere. Adaar was already in her tent, so she comes charging out of it - staff in one hand, lyrium potion in the other, magic barrier already in place - and good thing she came when she did. They brought one of those Behemoths with them, and it was touch and go for a while there.
“But in the end we won, of course. So, we were standing there, catching our breath, taking stock of injuries, when we suddenly realized that Adaar was standing there just in her underclothes. Jumping from foot to foot because the sand was too hot for her bare feet, and with her shirt tangled in her horns like some sort of weird Orlesian hat, might I add.” Dorian continued with a little smirk and spark in his eye. “Of course, Bull rather enjoyed the view, and Cole didn’t understand what was so funny, but at that point the Inquisitor just wanted of the sand, so she just jumped into her tent, and we’ve never spoked of it again.” The end was met with appreciative chuckles from his companions.
“You are laughing with her, not at her. It makes you happy to know she can laugh. He wants for everybody to know that.” Upon hearing the voice out of nowhere Sera jumped and sloshed ale all over the table. Varric just waved his hand and said “Hey kid, pull up a chair.” with a glance at the spirit.
Cole sat down on a small stool shadowed by a wall, seemingly uninterested in the lively tavern around him.
Dorian ordered another round and swiveled around so he was facing the newcomer. “Say, Cole, you are always sneaking around and reading people, you must know some humanizing story about our lady Adaar?”
“Humanizing? But you like her the way she is, why would you want to make her human?” Cole was clearly confused.
“Nothing like that, Kid. We don’t want her changed, we are just telling stories about her that only her friends know. Little truths good enough for Adaar, but too mundane for the Inquisitor.” Varric pushed one of the fresh tankard to Cole, who took it slightly uncertainly.
Sera was unexpectedly calm in Coles presence. She was also swaying slightly in her chair after all the ale.
“The Inquisitor is Adaar, but Adaar doesn’t want the Inquisitor to be her. She makes the sky better, and the song calmer, but the eye with flames is heavy. Many friends and those who see her light are gone, they speak to her in night making her sad, making her…”
“Stop it. Not yours to tell.” Barked Sera effectively interrupting Cole before he could finish what he was saying. For once Cole seemed to understand his companions, and let them sit in silence for a moment. He lifted the hand with the tankard, touched the rim with his lips, and set it down on the table without drinking. Than he started to speak again. “Small girl with small horns trying to lift her father’s sword. Big man with big horns laughing and helping a little so her hands can hold the hilt. Child laughs and calls ‘mommy, look, I’m a warrior, like dad’. They play together and her father asks her, if she wants to slay dragons. She tells him she wants to be a dragon with big horns and wings.
“They are happy, they are family. Her parent’s parents didn’t know the word but she does. She has father and mother, she is loved, and she doesn’t fear her magic.” Cole finished with and looked at his companions, as if asking if that was all right.
“Well shite. Can you imagine her like a little girl prancing around with her father’s sword? Adorable little horns and shite? Too friggin’ precious.” Sera laughed and rested her head on her folded hands on the table.
Varric looked up when he heard the door to the tavern open and when he saw the Iron Bull coming in he called at him. “Tiny, come, join us!”
Bulls took one look at them and turned toward the bar to get another round for the whole table. Than he sat down next to mostly unconscious Sera. “Talking about the boss?” he asked.
“Yep. Got any stories?” Varric asked.
“A few.” Bull took a long drink of ale and looked around the table. “Hard not to, after all the time we spent prancing around.”
“Yes prancing! Tell us about the prancing with her!” Sera lifted her head excitedly.
“We already know too much about that, thanks to Cole.” Said Dorian, remembering the last talk between Bull and the spirit, he overheard. Apparently, the Qunari got creative when the party was camping in the wilderness, and Cole was curious why they went “cave-diving” without the rest of the party.
“Yeah, Dorian’s right. And it’s no fun talking about the bedroom stuff without her being here, getting all flustered. But there were some hijinks after we first met.” Bull looked around the table, as if asking whether he should continue. When he was encouraged by nods from his companions, he finished his tankard in one gulp and started talking.
“So, you know how it got kind of tense after I told her about the whole Ben-Hassrath thing. She accepted me and the Chargers into the Inquisition, of course, but she wasn’t happy about it. She was wary and tried to avoid me. But with me and the Chargers being quite costly, she had to take me on missions with her, especially after the talk Josephine had with her about appropriate use of Inquisition resources.” Bull paused for a minute as everyone imagined the full horror of Josephine’s “we are spending too much for little return” lecture. The sheer amount of sums, percentages, and fractions in it was simply terrifying.
Varric waved at the serving girl for a new round and Bull continued.
“The first few days we were hiking through Hinterlands she was keeping her distance, and generally tried to avoid anything that had to do with me.”
“Andraste’s Knickers! I remember that.” Interrupted Varric. “She wouldn’t even look at you.”
“Yep.” Replied Bull, with a fond smile.
“So how did she go from ignoring your existence to prancing?” Asked Dorian while swirling his ale in the tankard and splashing some on Serra who didn’t even rise her head.
“We got drunk.”
“Druuuuuuuunk…” Sera grunted into the table.
“Remember the old lady near Redcliff?” It was shortly after they established the first few camps in Hinterlands, before the Inquisition could sort out the problems with the rogue templars and mages. Adaar and her group found corpse of a little old lady, stoned to death by angry mob. Apparently, she had black cat and few warts which made her witch. Defenseless, old witch that couldn’t protect herself with magic, because she didn’t have any.
“Hard to forget.” Murmured Varric.
“Yeah. Adaar kept it together long enough for us to bury the body, but after that she took off alone into the forest. I went after her. It took me a while to find her and she managed to get her hands on some pretty strong booze, so when I got to her she was sloshed.”
“Ha… slooooooshed.” Serra merrily told the table.
“She was like ‘Ha, big, burly Qaunory... Qunniri…Bull. You…like redheads, right? I could be a redhead. Except I wanna keep my color. ‘S pretty. So…problem.’ At that point I decided I was too sober for that shit and joined her.
“I don’t remember all that much after that, except that we caught a ram and tried to make it breath fire. I think it happened. Called it a ramtaashi.” Bull finished with a sheepish shrug.
As the whole table laughed at the tale about their friend, Varric took quick look around the room. His companion didn’t notice the silence that spread around while they talked, but he was aware of the whole tavern listening to their tales. Most of the soldiers were now laughing along with the tales about Adaar. Some seemed to be remembering other times, when their Inquisitor behaved like one of them. And that was the way he wanted it. To remind everyone that what made Adaar a great leader was her humanity. Bull caught Varrik’s gaze across the table with a knowing smirk. They both realized the price it took on Adaar to be the Chosen one, and if telling silly stories in the tavern helped to lessen her load, so be it.