"That's. Weird. And if it were a healing power thing it would have been noticed already. So it's a lyrium blood thing. And weird, it is weird."

"I agree that it's weird," says Stalas. "Useful, though."

"Does it give you any more detail than direction and 'not injured or under stress'?"

"Distance, too. It's interesting, actually, having a real sense like this of how far it is to Orzammar... it's not telling me anything else about her personally, if that's what you mean."

"I'm assuming it's reciprocal," says Annie dryly.

...He snorts.

"That's a really strange effect for the blood thing to have. I haven't gotten any prior inklings of - of telepathy or of lyrium applications in communications."

"I mean, there's the Memories..."

"Those I don't know much about. Are they similar?"

"Not exactly. But they're more the same sort of thing than most other things you can use lyrium for. When a Shaper records a Memory, that's their literal memory going into the lyrium, to be re-experienced by everyone who consults that Memory thereafter."

"...Well, that's vaguely creepy but probably very useful."

"I've never thought of it as creepy. It's definitely useful, though, yeah."

"Maybe it's not as high-definition a process as I'm imagining but I'd feel very weird about leaving a memory in a rock to be checked out of the library. Can only dwarves consult them?"

"I haven't heard of anyone else doing so, but that could be because they can't, because they're not allowed, or because so few non-dwarves ever visit Orzammar that no one's tried."

"Who would be not-allowing me if they were going to do that?"

"The Shapers."

"Is that its own caste, or - what? I should probably get a complete list of castes at some point."

"Well, the one who'd probably be making the call is Lord Shaper Czibor, and he's a noble. The rest of them... I think they draw from multiple castes, actually, but being a Shaper is sort of a separate thing."

"Huh. Are there other separate things like that?"

"Besides the Shaperate and the Legion of the Dead... I can't think of any, but that doesn't mean there aren't, just that I'm not thinking of them."

Nod. "Well, maybe I'll go check out memories if the Lord Shaper doesn't mind, that's not the end from which I find the idea disturbing. Unless it has weird side effects."

"It does occur to me that dwarves relate to lyrium differently from most people, and you might want some other, more daring human to consult the Memories before you do."

"Seems reasonable," she acknowledges. "Since it's not urgent. Although humans are hard to come by down there."

"It's true."

"And it's elves I'm supposed to be hiring. Although I might wind up with a mix."