Imprints in Stone [AU]

[Varric]

"That'll be fine. You can make lunch and clean up afterwards, do some laundry during or after or however she prefers. Carver, you can help me clean the rooms I haven't gotten to yet. Mostly just your basic scrubbing, at least to start. Figure an hour or so each day for a couple of weeks, should make us even." Not really, not by a long-shot (two untrained, under-age grunt workers giving twenty, thirty hours of work against a real glass window? Tch) but it'll be enough to drive the lesson home.

[Carver Amell]

"Yeah, okay," he says. "And nobody has to tell anyone's parents anything."

[Varric]

"...kid, don't become a merchant," Varric says with a sigh. "Alright, for today, you two can help me clean up the broken glass." Wait, kids. Should they be around...? "Well, you can hold the bin while I sweep and your sister..."

"Bethany."

"Bethany can stand back and look around to make sure we don't miss any."

[Carver Amell]

"Okay," says Carver, putting down the stick begrudgingly. Maybe this won't be so bad.

[Marian Hawke]

Bethany had warned Marian that they had something to do after school the next day or so, but Marian didn't trust her explanation -- and trusted Carver's insistence that they were just out playing in the woods even less. Boy is awful at lying, she thinks, with all the wisdom that being two-and-a-half years older than him can imbue. Knowing how badly Mother would likely take it -- whatever it was -- and not wanting to be in trouble for not knowing where her siblings were, Marian decided on the only reasonable course of action:

Namely, following them after class. 

When she saw them go into a house only a few blocks from home, she was torn. On the one hand, that was an adult who answered the door. Nobody in town would hurt them, exactly, but if they did they were likely to be bigger kids, not grown-ups. On the other hand, Mother had warned them about Stranger Danger. Nobody in town were strangers, really, but this guy was new, and she didn't know his name. Was that a stranger? But then, Teacher had said that Stranger Danger was some weird city thing, and this wasn't the city. But maybe this guy was from the city, and therefore a dangerous stranger?

Biting her lower lip, Marian tossed around possibilities until she was certain this guy was the entire reason they'd been warned as children. He was a dangerous monster, and he was probably a werewolf, and he was going to eat the twins, and it would be all her fault for letting them go over and get fattened up in a cage every day (was that witches or werewolves?) and--

She storms out from her hiding place across the street, banging firmly on the front door. 

[Varric]

"I'm not interested in whatever you're- small child. Why is there another small child?" Varric asks himself, Alydra and pretty much anyone willing to give a reasonable answer. "Why are you here?"

[Marian Hawke]

"You give back my siblings right now or I'll put a hex on you like you wouldn't believe," snarls Hawke, jabbing her finger against his chest. 

[Varric]

"You know, I probably wouldn't," Varric says wryly. "Believe it," he clarifies.

[Marian Hawke]

"Th-thats right you wouldn't!" 

Marian has no idea what to do with sarcasm. Threats, sure. Disbelief, that's par for the course. But sarcasm? What does that mean? She can tell he's not serious, but does he think this is a-- "This isn't a game!" she snaps. 

[Varric]

"No, that's a finger," he informs her, face not showing a hint of the broad grin he's got on the inside.

[Marian Hawke]

He can practically see the question mark float up above her head, like in old stone carvings about people being tricked. Then she shakes her head. "I mean it! You give them back Right! Now!"

[Varric]

He glances downward deliberately. "What you're poking me with. It's a finger. 'preciate it if you removed it, by the by. And maybe stop with the shouting. Only damn good thing about this rural little hell, easier to find some damn quiet," he finishes in muttered dwarven.

[Marian Hawke]

"This isn't hell, it's Golden Shores," she replies, in halting, badly-accented Dwarven. But she does lower her finger.

[Varric]

"How many taverns are nearby?" Varric counters. "And I can see a cow from my house. An actual cow. A live one."

[Marian Hawke]

"What's wrong with cows?" she argues. "It's not like they're...." And here her limited Dwarven fails her, and she has to switch back to Common: "Goats."