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Idly dangling her feet above the yawning void, Rook wonders how far it goes. Does it continue for eternity? Was there a bottom? How would it feel to fall and not know the answer?
“You're making me nervous, kid,” Varric says from behind her. It sounds like he's sitting on the bottom step of the steep stairs she'd climbed down not too long ago.
“I'm not going to jump.”
“I'm not worried about you jumping,” his carefully casual tone makes her suspect that isn't the truth. “This place is falling apart, Rook. You don't want it to collapse underneath you.”
“It won't.”
“The view back here is much less terrifying,” he cajoles.
She laughs as she stands. “Alright, I get it.”
“What were you doing?”
“I threw the dagger off the edge. I was wondering what happened to it,” she says as she sits next to him. It's cramped on the step, but he makes room for her.
“It'll come back at some point,” he grumbles. “Things like that always do.”
“Well, Solas seems to be out of commission for who knows how long. Maybe I'll die before it becomes my problem again?”
“Good luck with that.”
They're silent for a moment, before she sighs. “Is he in uthenera or something?”
“He would if he could.”
“That's what I was afraid of.”
Varric chuckles. “Hoping you were done with him?”
“It would have been nice,” she admits. The stone step is cracked and a sharp edge digs into the back of her thigh. “Think I've had enough of him for the rest of my life.”
“I bet he feels the same.”
Rook pauses, biting her lip. “Am I crazy?”
He pulls back so he can look up at her. “Where'd that come from?”
“It feels like something is watching me. Everywhere I go. I hear things that aren't there. I don't even know if you're real.”
“I'm as real as anything is in this place,” he shrugs. “As for the rest… That's hard to say.”
“What do you mean?”
“Have you tried sleeping?”
“No. I'm not tired.”
He looks back out into the void. “Strange things happen when a person doesn't sleep. Did you know it can literally kill you?”
“From what you've said, sleeping with Solas around could kill me,” she grumbles. The view from the step might be less terrifying for Varric, but she’d rather risk falling just to have something to distract her.
“There's no actual proof he killed them, you know. Could just be propaganda.”
She laughs. “You don't believe that.”
“No, I don't,” he sighs. He tilts his head back and stares up into the sky. It doesn't look any different from anywhere else in the void, from what she can see, but the urge to check is always there.
“I'm really not tired, though,” she says after a moment. She wishes there were clouds or the sun or literally anything other than floating ruins surrounding them on all sides. “I don't know how long I've been here, but I haven't needed to do any of the usual bodily functions. I still eat and drink, because it feels weird if I don't, but the food never runs out or goes bad and my canteen is never empty.”
“Try not to think about it,” he advises. “It’ll just give you a headache.”
She smiles wryly. “I'm told I never think, so that shouldn't be a problem.”
The weight beside her is suddenly gone, and she sighs again. Varric appears and disappears with no rhyme or reason to her. He always leaves when she checks on Solas, but other times he just pops out of existence for reasons unknown.
“I hate this place,” she mutters. Something moves in the corner of her vision. She freezes and waits for it to happen again. A flicker of something happens on the opposite side, and she fights the urge to turn her head.
Heavy footsteps plod down the stairs, and still she stays in place. The hairs rise at the nape of her neck. It feels like someone is looming over her, but she knows it can't be. There's no one here besides her, Solas, and sometimes Varric. Solas is asleep and Varric wouldn't try to frighten her like this.
Steeling herself, Rook whirls around to find nothing, as expected. Panting, she stands up anyway and picks the closest path. It gently curves side to side like an artificial river she’d once seen at a magister’s dinner party. She and the other slaves had been sent out in the cold to wash already clean linens in the dirty water, just so the guests could see how savages cleaned their belongings down south.
The path ends in a platform with a collection of broken statues. The first one is Davrin. She screams with rage before yelling to no one. “This is ridiculous! Stop messing with me!”
Neve’s statue crumbles to the ground. It should mean nothing. It is just a statue. The real woman is already dead. But when Bellara's statue falls next to it, with a mighty crash, Rook begins to sob.
Crouching on her heels, rocking back and forth, she cries until her eyes burn and her nose is running. No one offers her a handkerchief this time around, and that makes her start crying all other again.
She misses them. All of them. It hits her — there on the ground, surrounded by broken statues — that she'd never said goodbye to any of them. She'd never had the chance. They'd died too quickly or too far from her. The only time she'd had to grieve was before the fight with Elgar'nan, in the cellar, where Solas had ruined her solitude but let her cry.
Standing abruptly, she walks over the rubble towards the next path. “Take me to Solas.”
She is led to the most intact ruin she's seen thus far. A building with three walls, of varying disrepair, and a partial roof. Standing at the opening, she lets her eyes adjust to the unaccustomed gloom before walking inside.
A corner table, a rickety chair, two tin cups, and a wooden plate on one side. A bed big enough for two is on the other side. The bedding is pulled back, seemingly welcoming her into its’ plush embrace.
“No,” she shakes her head. “I specifically said take me to Solas. I'm not going to sleep.”
Turning away, she finds there are no paths. She floats on an island in the void. The feeling of being observed, judged, found wanting presses on her like the weight of a leg iron dragging her down into the depths.
“I said no!”
The feeling persists, but there is no response.
“No!” She screams. “Take me to Solas!”
A chunk of the island disintegrates. Then another.
“Varric! Help!”
A large section collapses with a loud crack, and it feels like she can't breathe. She's drowning again. There's no water, but she can't breathe and-
Something warm envelopes her. Varric's voice whispers in her ear. “I've got you, kid. Go to sleep. I'll keep watch.”
“Watch what?” She sobs. “There's nothing here but I can FEEL it and-”
“You'll feel better after you sleep, I promise.”
She is tugged back into the gloomy room. The bed is sinister in its’ comfort. This place is not hers, she does not belong here, but she lets herself be tucked in. A press of lips to her forehead and she's gone.