"Oooh, worst punishment, telling the wife. My...a friend, we threaten her with that."

Tana laughs. "Ri's just gonna ask what else people expected."

"Exactly what Merrill says." Anders wonders if missing them is appropriate if it's only been so long.

Tana squeezes his forearm briefly. "I miss Ri the minute I leave her," she whispers.

"Awww," Anders says, squeezing her arm right back.

"Hey, no moping at the dinner table, house rule."

"Says you," Mako mutters.

"We tried to have that for a rule, but any Wicked Grace night that didn't involve Hawke or Merrill meant one visiting the other."

"It's a little difficult to arbitrarily visit someone who's several hundred leagues away," Circe says, pushing her bowl away. "We do what we can."

"I'm not trying to insult my valiant rescuers, I swear. Hawke and Merrill lived within the same city bounds."

"Lucky them," Tana says. "Ri makes a living on the mainland, she's not one for being in a 'tin can under the water'."

"Under...the water?" Anders asks, suddenly feeling sick.

"Where did you think we came from?"

"I'm afraid being pierced didn't lead me to many logical pathways." 

Why would the dwarves ever create such a contraption?

"Ninety-six percent of the known world is flooded. And it's far easier to hide under the water than on top of it."

Anders swallows his panic, his fear, his terror at not knowing where he was. Breaking down in public was not endearing.

"Oh. Well. Going to be significantly harder to find home," he jokes.

"Hey, every time we've sunk so far has been on purpose, sharkbait."

"That joke wasn't funny the first time."

Anders doesn't mention that Kirkwall wasn't flooded, or that anywhere in Thedas was reachable by boat. He doesn't think about his spirit lodger suddenly disappearing. He falls back on his old escape: flirting.

"Oh, you're willing to sink your craft for me? Truly, I'm flattered."

She casts him a look, that tells him that he better be prepared for what he finds at the end of this road. "It's what she's designed to do. I think you should be more thankful that Tana tried to blow her up when she did."

"I said I was sorry."

"As long as theirs exit routes, I'll brace myself for explosions," Anders says good naturedly, winking at Tana.

"Follow Mak if things go wrong, he knows the quick ways out."

Mako shrugs. "Seemed sensible."

"You looked like a sensible kid, glad to know my instincts aren't wrong!" Anders says with a grin.