Chapter Text
The haunting begins in autumn.
This is a lie. A lie Varric tells himself to make it easier to pick up the pieces of his life and move onward alone. Well-intentioned, necessary, even, but a lie nonetheless.
The haunting begins on the battlements of Adamant Fortress when the Fade rift closes with the Inquisitor on one side and Hawke on the other.
He doesn’t cry. Later he will wonder if that should have been a sign.
Instead, he gets up the next morning, drags himself out of the tent, and spends the day embedding Bianca’s bolts as deep into the skulls of hyenas, quillbacks, and White Claw Raiders as he can manage. He ignores the Inquisitor’s tearful attempts to...he’s not even sure what. Apologize? This is no one’s fault but Varric’s. Comfort him? The only comfort he needs right now is time. Cassandra is even worse. Regretful, sympathetic and painfully awkward all at once. Vivienne, at least, has the sense to do nothing more than place a gentle hand on his shoulder one night around camp as he sits perched on a rock trying to eat a few mouthfuls of horrible stew and then leave him be.
Hawke haunts his nights here in the desert. The steady wind becomes her voice as he drifts into restless sleep. The sputter of sand grains against the side of his tent is her laugh, pealing high and bright through the bustle of the Hanged Man as Varric puts another round on his tab. In the dead of night, they’re back in Kirkwall. When he wakes, the world is quiet and the sand is just sand again. He wonders if this is what it’s like to dream.
Back at Skyhold, things are better and worse. Varric isn’t as busy here. The days stretch out before him, one aching minute after another, but he survives each and every one. Hawke was with him for so short a time here that it’s easier, somehow, to pretend that she’s still...somewhere.
He writes letters, first to their friends. Aveline, Merrill, Fenris, Isabela. To hell with Anders, he thinks, and Sebastian. They’ll find out in their own time. These letters are hard enough. Bethany is gone herself, so he’s spared that at least. Next comes Gamlen. He is, unexpectedly, perhaps the worst of the bunch. The last Amell, well and truly, after Carver and Bethany and Leandra and now Hawke herself have gone.
The whole time he writes, he can almost feel her there, just over his shoulder, picking at his bad spelling. He almost thinks she might be helping when he manages to get the right number of l’s in until (one) and the e’s in sincerely (two) on the first try. As the letters make their way into their envelopes, addressed and ready for the post, the feeling fades and he’s alone again with his guilt. He picks up the pen again a few weeks later, but no words come.
He’s sitting with Vivienne one evening up in her alcove, windows shut tight against the harsh Skyhold winter, sipping on a nice, if very tiny, glass of Orlesian liqueur when he finds the first three copies of Hard in Hightown.
“I know you said my books were all the rage a few seasons ago,” he says, “but three copies seems excessive.”
“Surely you can’t think those are mine, Varric dear. I’d never revisit an old trend so soon.”
He doesn’t believe her, of course, but it is odd that each of the copies has a slender red ribbon marking the page where Lady Marielle makes her first entrance. Over the next weeks, he finds more. In the cellars, the quartermaster’s office, under his bed, in the garden, each with the same ribbon marking the same page. It’s the kind of thing Hawke would do, were she here. She’d been so tickled by Lady Marielle, made such a fuss over her that Varric vowed never to base a character off her again. That was before The Tale of the Champion , though, before everything it felt like sometimes. Now, he vows it again.
Bianca’s letter, when it comes, fills him with the usual mixture of dread and anxiety, but less anticipation than he’s used to. When she follows it to Skyhold a few weeks later, they bicker and argue and flirt, but he doesn’t take her up to his small room overlooking the garden and fuck her senseless like he once might have. Hawke claimed half (most) of his bed for her own during her brief stay. One of his pillows still smells like her, and the thought of Bianca’s scent, smoky and metallic, as though the forge itself has worked its way under her skin and become a part of her, the thought of that supplanting Hawke’s lilac is a tragedy. More than that, he declines her offer to do the same.
More than that , he doesn’t tell her about Hawke. Someone at Skyhold must, he’s sure, because suddenly she’s gentler with him, softer, and he’s never come as close to hating her as this. Bianca’s never known what to do with him, with his more inconvenient emotions. Neither has he really, but now he knows that whatever it is, it’s not this. And, finally, after all these years, he doesn't think he’s going to give her the chance to figure it out anymore.
“It’s been fun, Varric,” she says as she leaves. “Take care of yourself.”
Neither of them say goodbye. They’ve never said a lot of things, but they both know them all the same. It’s a trend, Varric’s beginning to notice, with the important women in his life.
The rest of his time with the Inquisition passes in a blur of trees and mud and crossbow bolts. Finally, finally Corypheus is dead and the only regret Varric has is that there isn’t a body to give a good, swift kick upside the head. If he never sees another darkspawn again, it’ll be too soon. Ready as he is to get away from the soggy wasteland that is Fereldan, he’s not ready for Kirkwall without Hawke.
He takes the long way home from Skyhold, through Redcliffe to the port at Gwaren. The long way, he tells himself, as though there is any world where this is an alternate route to Kirkwall, rather than a chance to wallow, to haunt her back.
He expects Lothering to be a pile of ruins when he passes through, but he’s wrong. A small village has cropped up again. The farmland there will be blighted for decades to come, but it makes a decent enough trading post along the West Road that he supposes he shouldn’t be surprised. He spends a night in Dane’s Refuge and marvels at Hawke’s dedication to not one but two of the shittiest places he’s had the privilege of visiting. There’s a tattered copy of Hard in Hightown in the drawer of his nightstand and, when he opens it, the slim volume falls open to a familiar page. With little else to do, he reads through the end of the novel and drifts into an uneasy slumber.
Although the bed is decent enough and the wine is a fair sight better than the house vintage at the Hanged Man, he sleeps poorly. He can imagine Hawke here, young and gangly, running through the wheat fields, hunting rabbits in the woods. It’s surprisingly easy, lying on his straw-stuffed mattress, eyes closed, to imagine the simple life she might have led here, if not for the blight. If not for Kirkwall and Bartrand and the Arishok and Meredith and Anders and, perhaps most of all, if not for Varric himself. When he wakes the next morning, he lights five candles in the small, stone chantry. He picks a sprig of lilac from the chantry garden to press between the pages of the book he’s stolen from the inn before he saddles his horse and sets out towards the coast.
The trip back is longer than he expects. Weeks and weeks at sea with nothing to do but feel the waves lapping on the side of the ship and watch the narrow blur of green at the horizon that’s the coast. Varric can’t say he minds, though, since this time he doesn’t spend most of the day listening to Cassandra being seasick. He keeps to himself, mostly, writing snippets of shitty, shitty prose in his cabin and sleeping. The closer the ship gets to the Waking Sea, the more he sleeps and the less he writes.
Finally, the great black wall of Kirkwall looms out of the fog. The ship’s been slowing for a few hours, so Varric is on deck to hear the clanging of the chains as they prepare to sail between the Twins. His stomach twists. He can scarcely remember the last time the harbor was chained, but now the colossal links are cleaned of ocean grime and well-used. The winches that pull them down groan and clang, but they’re clearly oiled and maintained like Varric has never seen them before.
He’s been worried about being in Kirkwall without Hawke. He’s not coping well and he knows it, dreads what it will be like when every corner of the city reminds him of her. As the ship pulls into the harbor, though, he realizes there’s much more to worry about here than Hawke.
Kirkwall is in shambles.
He’s heard as much from Aveline, but seeing it is a different beast. The great harbor of the city is practically unrecognizable. Silt and debris muddy the waters. The locks around the gallows are cracked beyond repair, it seems. A huge swathe of cliffside has sloughed off, crashing down into the many quays that jut into the water. It’s hard to tell at first whether the damage is from the mages, the templars, or Sebastian’s fleet, but Varric’s not sure it matters, in the long run. It’ll take years and a mountain of coin to fix.
Somehow, the ship manages to dock near Darktown. The streets here are muck. Foul-smelling puddles linger in the corners and the air is dank and heavy. There’s bound to be an outbreak of plague this winter, if there isn’t one already. Parts owtown is largely intact, at least in terms of infrastructure, but most of the shops are boarded shut, the market stalls bare and a huge section has sunken beneath the surface of the water. At the center of it still sits the Hanged Man, though, largely untouched by the chaos around it. Varric takes a seat at the bar and Corff passes him an ale, as though it’s a normal day, as though he hasn’t spent the past year and a half holed up in the South, as though Hawke and Daisy and Rivaini and the rest of them will be coming in behind him any second now.
He downs the ale in a couple of gulps so large he swears he can feel them push their way down his throat, then orders a glass of Chasind Sack Mead and takes it to their old table by the fire. The mead is warm and viscous. Now he’s been to Lothering himself, he can see why Hawke favored it. A hint of honeyed apple, a touch of floral, a bitter undertone. Summertime in Ferelden.
Varric props his feet on the table and leans back in his chair. The fire at his back is warm, the mead is good and Hawke…. Hawke is dead.
“Shit,” he mutters to himself.
He nurses the mead until it’s gone. Norah brings him a second, sets it on the table along with a heavy bronze key.
“We had to change the locks,” she says, by way of explanation Varric presumes. “After those Starkhaven lugs worked their way past the gates.”
He nods. Norah hesitates a moment and Varric knows what’s coming next.
“I was sorry to hear about Hawke.” She rests a hand gently on Varric’s shoulder. He tries his best not to squirm under her touch. “The Guard Captain told us a few months back. Seems hard to believe, but it’s not been a good few years for anyone, I suppose. Always figured Corff would be cleaning up after the lot of you forever.”
“So did I,”
Mercifully, she leaves it at that. Something about being here, back in the Hanged Man where nothing has changed, but everything is so very different is suddenly too much for Varric. He takes the key and leaves the mead on the table.
His suite is untouched, even after all the long months away. Varric lights a fire in the grate and stands in front of it for a long while, watching the wood glow and char and break into ash. He watches until the rest of the room fades away, until all he sees is the smoke curling up the flue, until the smoke seems to turn from grey to white to green and until when he blinks, all he sees is raw, twisting rock and haze and sickly light that nothing living was ever meant to see.
Maker, he needs a drink.
Briefly, he thinks of the mead sitting downstairs, untouched on the table, but then he remembers it. The bottle of Finale he and Hawke dug up from the depths of Leandra’s wine cellar so many years ago. Well, the third bottle after they had dropped the first and promptly drained the second. They’d decided to save it for a special occasion, but nothing had ever seemed quite special enough. In retrospect, it seems stupid. He wishes they’d just drank the damn thing while they had the chance instead of letting it collect dust in the back of his closet.
Something threatens to bubble up inside of him, then, and Varric quickly slices through the foil on the bottle to stave it off. The cork is soft and pliable; his knife slides into it like butter. It pops gently as he pulls it out. The wine goes down just as smoothly.
He’s nearly two thirds of the way through the bottle when he hears it. A soft sound, like someone clearing their throat very politely, or tapping gently on his doorframe. He’s alone, though, and it must be the wee hours of the morning now. Surely no one is trying to come in. He sticks his head out of the doorway anyway, but it’s just as he suspected. Nothing.
“Drinking alone, Varric?”
He turns around. Hawke is sitting at his dining table.
Hawke is sitting at his dining table.
Except she isn’t. She can’t be and she isn’t because the last time Hawke was here, he couldn’t see the chair she was sitting on through her torso and she wasn’t tinged a murky green and most of all, most of all, Hawke is dead so whatever is sitting at his table right now? It’s not Hawke.
Not Hawke picks up the bottle and gives it a little shake.
“Barely even saved me any. What a shame.”
The thing is, it sounds like Hawke. If he squints enough that the green aura around her fades away, it looks like her, too. There’s clearly something in his mind that’s snapped. Ghosts don’t work this way and if this is some kind of...spirit? Demon? Hell if he knows. Either way, he should get Bianca and force this thing out of his room, but…
“Oh Varric,” Not Hawke says, getting to her feet and waving a hand in front of his face. She reaches for his lapel, but her fingers slip through the leather. They seem to sink into his chest for a moment before she pulls them back, but he feels nothing. Not Hawke sighs sadly, looking at her hand as she turns it over. “I shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose.”
She goes back to the table and twirls the bottle by its neck to read the label. “We really should have just opened it.”
“What are you, Hawke?”
“I’m starting to realize,” she continues, as though Varric hadn‘t spoken at all, “There are lots of things I should have done. Did it taste as good as I remember?”
“What?”
She smirks that Hawke-y smirk and Varric’s chest tightens.
“The wine,” she says.
Whatever this is, it’s as single minded as Hawke ever was. Varric shuts the door, lest any passers by see whatever is sitting at his table and sits beside her.
“What are you, Hawke,” he asks again.
“I thought you might be happy to see me. I’ve missed you, you know.”
“Hawke-“
Not Hawke’s brows pinch together in a look Varric knows all too well as supreme concentration. It’s the look she gets on her face when she’s drawing her bow or trying to bluff her way through a bad hand of wicked grace. He never thought he’d see it again.
She stretches a hand towards him across the table. Her fingers sink through his, just like they did before, but her frown deepens and then he can feel them brush over his knuckles. She takes his hand fully between hers and squeezes it and she feels so real, so solid now. Of course, Varric can see his palm through her, though, so she can’t be, but she seems more corporeal somehow.
She sighs again and he smells lilacs. “I’ve made a mess of things, haven’t I? There’s so much I should have said before… Things shouldn’t be so complicated, should they?”
“You’re the one who decided you were out of time.” Whatever this thing is, it doesn’t seem to be leaving. Varric might as well play along for now.
“There wasn’t another option. Someone had to-”
“Why you, Hawke? Why did it always have to be you?” It’s freeing, somehow, knowing that this isn’t real, that he can say the things he needs to without the unimaginable humiliation of having another person actually know how he feels once he’s done.
“It had to be someone.” Not Hawke slides out of her chair and leans against the table next to him. She pulls her fingers from his and hooks one in the deep vee of his collar. “Must we talk about this? It takes quite a lot of effort to be here and there’s so much else I’d rather do.”
Her fingers trail up his chest. Varric can feel them on his skin but their movement doesn’t rustle the hair there at all. They dip into the hollow between his collar bones, and he swallows.
Not Hawke is watching him, her eyes trained on his face as she traces his necklace. He can’t quite bear to meet her gaze, not when he can see behind the piercing blue of her eyes clear through to his bedroom.
“So many things I should have done,” she says again, quietly, almost more to herself than to him. She scoots closer. Her fingers thread around the back of his neck and her thigh brushes up against him. He closes his eyes. “Do you ever feel that way, Varric?”
Of course he does. It’s kept him up at night for months now, all that’s passed unsaid between them, all the feelings he’s kept tucked away for as long as he’s been aware of them. He’s not going to tell her that, though, not while-
And then he realizes. It all makes sense, now. The strange howling sounds at night in the Hissing Wastes, the unseen presence at Skyhold, and now this apparition. This isn’t Hawke. It’s some kind of desire demon, stalking him ever since he left the Fade. It’s been feeding on his memories, digging in his mind for snippets of Hawke. It’s been watching him, studying, and now it’s here to put all its knowledge to use.
“Enough,” he says. No matter how much he wants to see her again, he’s not going to let this happen. He stands up, knocking Not Hawke back into- through -the edge of the table. “Enough.”
Varric blinks and everything shifts.
Not Hawke is gone. Varric is alone in bed, sleep gathered at the corners of his eyes, sheets tangled around his waist. The fire is nothing but embers now and the room is cold enough that he can see his breath in the air. He wraps the blankets around his shoulders and crawls out of bed to add a couple of logs onto the grate.
His head is muddled, his heart still stuttering in his chest. He’s never seen a demon leave like that. If he didn’t know better, he’d think he might have dreamed the whole thing, but he’s a dwarf. He can’t have dreamed anything. Nevertheless, Not Hawke is gone and for the first time in months, he feels like a weight has been lifted.The grief is still there, but the oppressive weight of Hawke’s absence is gone.
He pauses for a moment at the window on his way back to bed. There’s an unfamiliar light outside, flickering where he’s used to there being darkness. A metal barrel with a fire inside sits in the middle of the back alley, several prone figures clustered around it for warmth while they sleep. Beyond it, where a row of shops should be is a pile of rubble.
Varric sighs. This isn’t the Kirkwall he knows. Hawke is gone and he can’t change that but this? He can fix this. He has to.
He crawls back into bed and falls into a restless sleep. When he wakes in the morning, he doesn’t notice that the bottle of wine has gone. He’ll find it, months later, full, at the back of his closet, sealed in a layer of delicate, Fade-green foil.
***
The years pass quickly, once Varric sets his mind to restoring Kirkwall. He has enough money saved up and from Bartrand’s estate to start work on clearing the harbor and enough sway in the Merchant’s Guild, thanks to the Inquisition, to launch a fundraising campaign the likes of which the city has never seen. The average Kirkwaller might have become destitute after the past four years, but there’s enough money still in Hightown to rebuild the city thrice over. It’s just a matter of convincing the nobles they should give it to him, and Varric’s always been convincing.
Once the harbor has been dredged, he starts on the docks. After the docks, he moves on to Darktown, then Lowtown, and on up the great staircase towards Hightown. Each building they repair, each new ship that docks, each new merchant who sets up shop in the Lowtown Bazaar eases the knot that’s been sitting in Varric’s chest since he pulled into port on that foggy afternoon.
Somewhere along the way, they make him Viscount for his troubles. He’s so busy he can scarcely find the time to be upset about it, at least until his restoration projects are completed and he suddenly finds himself looking forward to a future full of nothing but stuffy diplomatic meetings and formal dinners. It’s a different life than he’s ever imagined for himself and as he settles into Viscount’s Keep for his first night there, his thoughts turn to Hawke.
It isn’t that he hasn’t thought of her in the intervening years; she’s never been far from his mind since that first day outside the Merchants’ Guild. It’s just that he hasn’t had the energy to mourn both Kirkwall and Hawke. He’s lost both, but one he’s managed to resurrect from the grave. Kirkwall has taken his time, his money, and his attention and so Hawke has been pushed to the back of his mind. Now that the city is thriving again, though, she’s resurfacing.
Which brings us back to this: the haunting begins in Autumn.
All Souls’ Day is, by all accounts, beautiful. Clear skies, crisp fall air. Varric walks the few blocks to the Chantry from Viscount’s Keep. A few eager groups of citizens have begun their bonfires early, but they’re small and well contained. He nods to a few city guardsmen keeping watch. Flames in the streets of Kirkwall aren’t a distant enough memory for the sight to be a comfortable one, even on a holiday.
As far as holidays go, Kirkwall has developed a strange affinity for this one. In Val Royeaux, All Soul’s Day brings with it all the spectacle the Grand Cathedral can muster. In Nevarra City, they fold boats out of paper, float them down the Minanter from the Grand Necropolis, then light them all aflame. They say the spirits of the dead walk the streets, drawn from the Fade by the fires. The pageantry of it all, Varric’s heard, is unparalleled anywhere in Thedas. Kirkwall’s never been much for pomp and circumstance, and in the last years the day has been marked by an enthusiastic, almost compulsive sobriety. The Chantry is full for service in the morning but the streets clear soon after. There are too many dead to remember these days.
A gaggle of children are staging an immolation play near the Chantry board, but otherwise it seems Varric has beaten the crowd. Services won’t start for another hour yet, which suits him perfectly. He doesn’t know what he believes anymore, or what he ever believed, really, but he’s found solace in the quiet of the Chantry ever since the first new stones were laid. It’s quiet and somber, and it’s somewhere he doesn’t have to pretend. Even though he’s the Viscount, he’s not in charge in the Chantry.
He leaves his guards at the great bronzed doors and slips inside.
The Chantry is grey inside. Grey stone, grey morning light filtering through the pale stained glass windows, a gift from the Marquis of Serault. Dust motes float through the air and someone in one of the towers is singing the Chant. Varric nods to the Grand Cleric as he makes his way down one of the side aisles. She’s preparing for the morning, wearing somber deep grey robes for the occasion, in lieu of her normal red. He can’t say he knows her well, but they’ve gotten on well enough so far. She’s one of Leliana’s hand-picked appointments and he’s fully prepared to stand back and let her make whatever waves she will.
Of all the nooks and crannies his architects built into the new Chantry for ‘prayer and contemplation’, the loft is Varric’s favorite. It’s also one of the least popular, tucked at the back of the nave and up three full flights of stairs. He makes the climb quickly this morning. A few laysisters duck their heads and whisper their greetings as they shuffle out, leaving him alone to his business.
He goes to the window first and looks out on the streets of Hightown and at the harbor beyond. The city is starting to wake. People are bustling here and there, getting prepared for the day’s festivities. He likes getting the chance to stand back and observe again. He’s at the center of the action more than he would like these days. He misses the anonymity, or relative anonymity anyway, of sitting in a corner in the Hanged Man, letting Hawke and Isabela draw all the attention while he watches it all unfold. He stands there until the streets start to fill with people and he knows he’s running out of time to himself. It’s time to do what he’s come for.
There’s a jar of long, tapered matches on the table against the window, thoughtfully placed next to the rows of unlit votives. Varric strikes one then starts to light the candles. One each for his parents, one for Sunshine, one for Leandra. He hesitates, as he always does, and thinks of Bartrand, then decides against it. The match is growing short, now, as he holds it against the last wick and thinks of Hawke. The flame flares brightly for a moment as he pulls the match away then flickers out.
Varric lights it again. Again, the flame flickers and sputters out, a single line of smoke trailing up towards the ceiling. By now, the match is burnt down nearly to his fingertips, so he shakes it, lights another, and tries again.
The candle flares and dies.
He picks up the votive and shields it with his body, though he can’t feel a draft, but still he can’t get the wick to catch. It’s clearly been burnt before, but he can’t manage it for the life of him. He tries a different candle, but again, no sooner has he lit the wick than the flame dies as though someone has pinched it between unseen fingertips or blown it out.
The soft murmurs of a gathering crowd are beginning to rise up from the floors below and he knows he’s out of time.
“Sorry, Hawke,” he whispers, depositing the spent match ends into a small jar. “Maybe next time.”
***
A week later, Varric’s standing in the middle of a diplomatic reception when he notices it: a hint of Fereldan lilac wafting through the air.
It’s been years since he’s smelled it. Lilacs grow poorly in Kirkwall and, even if they didn’t, the Keep’s gardens are still a long way down the list of restoration projects that remain.
He notices it first as he swipes two flutes of sparkling wine off a server’s tray for the Marquis d’Archambon and his wife.
“My compliments on your perfume, Lady Ivaline,” he says, passing her the wine. “Lilacs, if I’m not mistaken?”
The Marquise laughs delicately and thumps him on the chest with her fan. “You must jest, my Lord. Lilacs haven’t been fashionable since the Rebellion. This season I am wearing nothing but the distilled essence of quillback. A very intensive procurement process, I’m told, but the musk it produces is truly without comparison.”
She proffers her wrist to him. Varric leans in and takes a gentle sniff, then tries his hardest to suppress the cough that rises instantly in his throat. “Lovely, your ladyship. Takes me right back to the Western Approach.”
“Oh yes,” the Marquis says. “All that Grey Warden business. I had nearly forgotten you were wrapped up in all that. You must have some fascinating stories, no?”
Varric groans inwardly. He should have kept his mouth shut. The Western Approach is the last place he wants to think about. “I’m sure you’ve read the book, My Lord. It’s all in there.”
“Yes, Tethras, but the real story must be so much more astonishing,” the Marquis replies. “Everyone knows those publishers exaggerate. We’ve all read your Tale of the Champion, after all, no? The spectacle of the written word is one thing, but the truth? Incomparable.”
Not sure whether to be flattered that the Marquis has read his books or offended at being called a lair in his own drawing room, Varric casts about for a distraction. Just in time, he spies Bran across the room, looking put out, as always. “What can I say. Every author has their little secrets. I’m afraid my seneschal needs a word, though. Perhaps after dinner? In the salon?”
Before the Marquis can respond, Varric slinks away. He picks up the scent again as he approaches Bran.
“Have you just snubbed the Marquis d’Archambon?”
“Would I do that, Bran?” The seneschal narrows his eyes. “Well, I didn’t. I’ll talk to him after dinner. He’ll be fine.”
Bran sighs. “Yes, well, we’ll see about that. Did you want something?”
Varric’s busy trying to figure out whether Bran smells like lilac or the scent is just lingering in the air. “What? No! You looked upset.”
Bran lifts an eyebrow.
“More than usual. Any problems?”
“If you must know, we’re breaking in some new help, which I’m starting to believe will never not be the most difficult part of this job, save dealing with the nobles who feel...snubbed.” He glares down at Varric.
“Good, good. New cologne, Bran?”
“No?”
Varric sighs. The scent is gone. “Just..just checking. Keep up the good work.”
Bran bustles off in a huff to go bother one of the serving girls. The rest of the night passes uneventfully and lilac-free, but Varric can’t shake the feeling that the scent is lingering just outside of his notice until he falls into bed.
***
Varric wishes he could put the incident behind him, or brush it off as a few too many glasses of wind or a trick of the nose twisting the Marquise’s quillback musk. When he wakes the next morning, that’s what he plans to do.
He rises late with a pounding headache. He slept poorly, drank too much with too little food the night before, and so he has to drag himself to the door, where his breakfast waits on a tray. He sets it on his table by the fire and lifts the cloche, expecting to be met with the scent of bacon and eggs. It’s there, rising with the steam, but along with it is the unmistakable scent of lilac.
The smell seems to follow him from then on. In the hallway, when he enters his office after a long lunch break, on his pillow when he gets into bed. He goes to sleep each night thinking of Hawke in a way he hasn’t let himself for years. Her smile, her laugh, her smell. Hell, he’s not even sure he thought of her like this when she was alive.
It’s starting to seep into his waking hours, too. He’s at the market one day, making his way to the Hanged Man when he sees a flash of dark hair, a red scar wound through it. He weaves his way through the crowd trying to follow the woman, thinking all the while that he shouldn't be, that it couldn’t possibly be Hawke, that he’s making a fool of herself, but he can’t stop until she slips around a corner and he loses track of her.
After a few weeks of this and he’s starting to think he’s gone mad.
It’s nearly midnight one Thursday and Varric’s tired of tossing and turning. His bedsheets are tangled around his legs, his mind is racing, and he can’t find a comfortable position to sleep in for the life of him. Sighing, he tosses off the sheets and pulls on his dressing gown. Maybe he’s hungry.
He makes his way down to the kitchens, hoping that Geltha will have something sweet fresh out of the oven. In tis early days at the Keep, he’d come down here nearly every night, uneasy and restless in his new home, so he knows his head cook is probably up kneading a batch of bread for breakfast. Sometimes, she even has these little Anderfels tartlets that he knows with certainty are the best thing he’s ever tasted in his life.
He pushes the door to the kitchens open and, as he hoped, Geltha is there, kneading, and the smell of freshly baked tarts makes him want to swoon.
“Master Tethras!” Geltha smiles warmly at him. “Trouble sleeping?”
“Guilty as charged,” Varric replies. “Are those tarts I smell?”
Geltha nods. “I’d get you some, but-” she shrugs and holds up her hands, caked with dough and flour. “The new girl will help you. Have a cup of milk.”
Varric pours himself a mug of milk from the icebox, then turns his attention towards the oven. The new girl stands in front of it, bending down to pull a fantastic smelling tray from the heat. She stands up, sets the tray onto a nearby counter, and smiles up at Varric.
His mug shatters on the floor.
“Hawke?”