@woodcries liked for a starter!
Gentle fingers, unbound from their everyday wrappings brushed and weaved throughout her hair, as not much else except the fire crackling in the furnace and the weighted breaths of the loyal mabari hound could be heard in the manor's common room. It had started with Merrill realizing a bit too late how much her hair had grown out in the past few years, and while she hadn't minded it in the least, it did happen to get in the way from time to time. Surely she could've kept to simply tying it back, but it felt...dull. She did have a few special bands given to her by the Keeper of course, but even those didn't seem like enough. So she'd taken to asking around for ideas. Aveline had apologized for her lack of expertise, Isabela seemed to want to do too much, and Anders had claimed that it would be too dangerous for them to be around each other for too long a time, whether in public or private, he couldn't seem to decide what looked worse!
When she'd voiced her confusion to Varric over why their friends seemed so against something as small as doing hair, he'd simply laughed, and inquired as to why she hadn't considered Hawke, out of everyone!
Well...he made a good point, but Hawke usually came to her first when it came to these matters...
It never hurt to try though. So when she'd shown up at the manor with her small request, she was pleasantly surprised at the acceptance.
And here they were now, Merrill planted in front of the fire, and Hawke leaning over her and working at her hair with silent determination. She didn't think she'd take this so seriously!
"You seem like you've done this before, but I never see you braid your hair! What's your secret? Tying knots? Shoelaces? Oh! Have you ever braided Carver's hair before? That would be rather dashing!"