Surviving Circumstance

Chapter Four

     In a month and a half-fifty-two days, Raven had secretly been keeping track-a lot had changed and a part of her was growing weary. Ever since Leliana had given her a chance to display her talents things had been better; while she still ran reports from advisor to advisor, between Iron Bull, Cullen, and Christopher's final word on the matter, she was allowed to train virtually whenever she wanted, however she wanted. It relaxed her and kept her thoughts at bay. Christopher had started talking to her about plans for their expeditions and what he'd hoped to achieve. Raven wanted to help-she knew what was at stake-but how could she possibly explain that? They were just starting to trust her, but she was also starting to trust and care for them. Back home where this world was just a series of games, not only did she remember all the locations, rifts, monsters, quests, and battle strategies that one couldn't help but memorize over the amount of time she'd spent on them, but she had grown used to fast travel.

     "Ginger, is everything alright?" Varric asked, his voice breaking her thoughts. It was midday and they had been at the bar going over a few things. With gained trust came reward and she'd been given back her notebooks and pouch of pens earlier that morning. Christopher had also let it slip to Varric that she'd like to write so he'd met her at the Chantry entrance and practically dragged her away with him. Flissa gave her a smile as they seated themselves and promptly served her and Varric tea, leaving the kettle on the table for them.

     "Yeah, I'm just thinking." Raven moved to look at the page he was reading, "Are you done yet?" She asked and laughed a second later when she'd noticed the slight pink color on his cheeks. "Varric are you blushing?" Her tone was incredulous and Varric hushed her.

     "Not blushing, just intrigued." He covered it up by looking down at Raven's work again. On more than one occasion when they were outside of Haven, Ginger had been brought up in conversation. It was during their last stint in the Hinterlands and Val Royeaux that Christopher had mentioned that Ginger liked to write and even Seeker had mentioned that she was very good at it. They weren't wrong and, though he didn't understand what some things were, he kept it to himself.

     "I beg your indulgence Varric," She said to him with a coy smile, one that could easily melt any heart, "What has you so intrigued regarding my little drabbles?" Her voice had a lilt of humor to it and he had to chuckle, liking that she was becoming more relaxed around him. She didn't know it, but everyone else was liking it too, especially Christopher. Her humor was much more sarcastic than expected. He enjoyed seeing the way she interacted with people when she was on edge, but preferred the adorable, smiling girl sitting next to him already on her third cup of tea.

     With a content sigh Varric set one of the pages with her curvy scribbles onto the table and turned it so she could see. "Is it really possible to be taken in this position?" He asked in all seriousness and had to smile when she laughed, her eyes tearing.

     "Before I ended up here my friend had a rather adventurous sex life. She wasn't promiscuous by any means, it was all with her boyfriend, but yes, that's what she told me. Then she proceeded to tell me the mechanics of it. I never expected you could get those types of results with-" Varric shushed her with a laugh as Tiny entered the warm building and sat next to Raven.

     "What's got Varric turning red?" He asked, causing the small girl to bring her hand to her mouth and laugh into it as she turned a shade closer to her hair. Bull stared down at the girl in amusement and waited patiently for her to catch her breath.

     "I was telling him about my friend back home and-" Varric silenced her as he picked up the pages of Raven's writing and handed them to Bull. He couldn't have been that embarrassed, right? Raven mused and covered the dwarf's hand with her own. A moment of reading later, she looked up at Iron Bull as he laughed and slammed the paper to the table in a loud bang.