it's near midnight and they've been traveling for almost three days straight. lace feels like she's floating, her head barely attached to her shoulders, her mind only just making coherent thoughts. she's aware enough to help set up camp. they weren't close enough to a town to stay at an inn, so tents and rations again. tomorrow, though ...
varric has been regaling her and rook with a story from his days in kirkwall. she thinks it's a good one ( they're always good ones ) but she isn't really hearing it. she just laughs when rook laughs and hopes that's good enough.
the third time she falls asleep sitting up, varric looks at her kindly and tells her to go to sleep.
"y'sure?" she slurs, then nods before he can answer. "'kay. thanks. g'night, dad."
and without realizing what she's just said, she stumbles over to her tent, fumbles her way into her bedroll, and passes out.
Somehow, along the way, he’d become quite good at running on less fuel than he should. Kirkwall and her challenges had tested him like that. Then it had been the sky unzipping itself, strewn wide and ancient old magic pouring out onto the world. With all of that, he still had found other ways to strain his wallet and his brain, from Kirkwall to a cottage lost in the Vimmark foothills, he'd done enough to rest for now, surely? Alas, he's still tending to a wild fire, over a wild landscape, telling a wild story about another wild time.
Surely, he is animated enough, has flourish on the right words and ensures it’s a good one. Yet, there are yawns around his words, not due to the story, as every time he laughs at Harding she sits a little straighter, well until he laughs at her yawn and she doesn't react, and this is the third and last time she's lulled herself into quiet rest. “Harding.” She doesn't move, so again, “Harding…”
She doesn't stir and Rook laughs, also taking this as their cue to depart.
This time, Varric moves next to her, a hand on her shoulder as he speaks slowly and clearly, “Lace, go lay down. I'll take watch.” He expects a fight, but she answers lulling her head and speaking again before he can respond.
Dad.
He says nothing, just watches her go and he will likely tease her when the light spills over the horizon, something about he doesn't remember having this many children, something about how he's not that old, something that will not nettle a broken heart missing words that can never be heard again. He knows that yoke of life too well.
Dad.
He hadn't held much stock in that word, not until Sidri said something to him in the middle of Orlais. All of their best and worst ideas were in Orlais, after all. Those words didn't become a reality until much later, in a much more unusual way.
His hand comes to the chain around his neck. It is flipped over twice before pressed flat against his skin again, as if he is using it to keep his words pressed against his lungs.
Harding in Hightown - an old joke comes to mind, and he thinks back through the shared stories after. Her helping gather ram and showing them where to steal potatoes from, there's more of them - her joining them for cards, him checking in on her at the tavern, her being the one to find Sidri and Varric working tucked behind a tower of books and smiling, never to say anything more, her on his strike team - taking a shot and screaming when she makes it ( he also is elated he claps her on the shoulder and tells her then she could hit anything ).
It has nearly always been this way, so he laughs his hand coming to the back of his head and scratching it, unbelievable he thinks.
Oh well. What’s one more kid.
