My name is Varric Tethras, and I’m going to tell you a story.
I met a brash young lady and her grumpy younger brother some eleven years ago. They were refugees — the trademark Fereldan aroma only just beginning to fade out of their clothes. And the lady, she was… well, let’s just say that her glare could chip the Stone itself. Tough ain’t even the word anymore.
And me, I was, you know, sly and always playing it cool, you know me. I talked about Bianca a lot. Carver, he started calling Bianca my girlfriend. He wasn’t the first to do that. I took it in stride.
But his sister, she… she was a drinker, could hold her ale as good as Isabela can, so she was at the Hanged Man a lot. And we talked a lot, you know? She told me about Lothering, about how afraid she was to leave — oh, she wouldn’t let on normally, of course. Tough lass like that, she’d never tell you that sort of thing sober.
She told me about her sister, Bethany, and how it was for them growing up. Said Bethany got so she could smell templars. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that us Kirkwallers can smell Fereldans, too.
Point is, she was telling me stories. And I was listening. I was… just listening.
I’ve got two ears, you know. But even they don’t catch everything. When I started listening with all of me, when she started telling me stories with more than just her voice, that’s… that’s when…
Listen to me. She’s just a figure to you. An example, a legend, a Champion. You know what I’ve told, because I told what I had to tell. But I’m telling you now, I told the wrong story.
The story I told the Seeker, that wasn’t the story I would have told you.
I wanted the Seeker to know the truth of what happened in Kirkwall. Whether she hated or loved the Champion was not my concern.
That’s not the story I would have told you, and I’m sorry that’s the only one you’ve heard. Let me fix that.
My name is Varric Tethras, and I’m going to tell you a story about the woman I love.
