varric — character growth from da2 -> veilguard
under the cut are the ppl who want to be @'d in my meta! lmk if u ever want to be added to this list btw~
varric is and has always been a man who wants people to live comfortable, happy lives. he knows it won't happen — "I fought my own brother, Daisy. Nobody said this was going to be happy story" — but that is what he wants. and as much as he tries to act as though he is ambivalent, that desire is what makes him take his crossbow and go out to fight. he is trying to protect people. to protect regular civilians. to protect mages. to protect templars. he's not going to choose sides, he is fundamentally a centrist in the mage-templar conflict: "I've got friends in the Circle and drinking buddies in the templars. All of them matter."
his desire to protect people, to not pronounce a "good" and "bad" side in conflicts, also manifests in his tendency to blame individuals rather than systems. he blames anders for turning the mage-templar tensions into a full-blown conflict. he blames meredith and anders for kirkwall. he blames bartrand and himself for the red lyrium
in dai, he is still quite the centrist. i haven't played the different versions, but i have seen people (sorry, can't remember who) say that his character changes depending on what hawke did in da2, whether they sided with the mages or the templars. that supports his characterization as a man defined by his loyalty more than his own, independent morals
cassandra found him after the events of da2 and questioned him. she threatened him, stabbed the book right in front of him — and he, frankly, did not know her at all and had no way of knowing how willing she was to follow through on her threats. she then took him with her to the conclave, only releasing him as her prisoner after the explosion at the temple of sacred ashes
but he stayed
varric had no real reason to trust cassandra. he is understandably wary of her throughout a large portion of the game. but also, varric has been — and continues to be! — deeply committed to kirkwall. that is his home. but he did not choose to return to it, instead staying in haven, then skyhold. he chose to go into battle once more. he makes light of it, but the fact is, he put himself at great risk in order to help fix the world, to seal the hole in the sky. and this prior to the inquisition realizing corypheus was at the temple. this, prior to the discovery of red lyrium — something he blames himself for — at the temple. he stayed by choice, willingly, in order to help
he avoids picking sides in conflicts, but he is deeply willing to put himself directly in harms way in order to protect people. it's an interesting dynamic! instead of being driven by a specific cause, he is driven by his desire for people to have the opportunity for a good life
then, we come to veilguard. after the events of trespasser, varric and harding went to track solas. there is more in The Missing, of course, but as usual i am not going to reference supplementary materials/canon here. but we know from veilguard's own canon that they tracked solas
the ritual begins
varric was friends with anders. and he continues to care about anders, even after everything that went down in kirkwall. and, yes, he's still angry at anders, too. but we see that he is willing to shoulder the blame for things as well, and i think he shoulders much of the blame for the mage-templar conflict igniting as it did. he is a spymaster. he bought protection for anders and for the clinic. i can't imagine there was never a point where he told himself that he should have known, that he should have been able to figure it out. that he played his cards wrong. that he pushed anders away when he shouldn't have, or reached out when he shouldn't have, or did something wrong
anders feels like something varric should've been able to stop
and, by extension, the destruction of so much of kirkwall feels like something varric should have been able to stop
and corypheus feels like something varric should've been able to stop, and keep stopped
and then, the red lyrium. as i said earlier, he blames himself for that. and it is interwoven into everything. meredith used the red lyrium. corypheus used it. the red templars used it. each red lyrium spur the inquisition sees is his fault, in his mind
we talk about solas being defined by his regrets, but i really think varric is, too. he just doesn't show it as much. he hides his regret under humor, under a seeming carelessness that defies his actions
varric will work to protect people. to try and give them a good quality of life while he's at it (thus him ending up as viscount of kirkwall!) and this is a huge part of why he pursues solas, of course. but it's not the only part of it
solas is varric's friend. and, what's more, he's a friend that varric refuses to let go of. he let go of anders, he let that friendship decay, and then he had to sit with that regret, that feeling that he could have stopped it. he refuses to make the same mistake with solas. he will try, he will not abandon solas once he stops being an easy friend, he will pursue his friend to the ends of thedas and, once there, he will reach out instead of attack
lace tries to convince him to attack, but he insists on talking to solas. even if rook says it's a bad idea, he will not be swayed. it is only when solas absolutely refuses to stop and varric can see the ritual being performed right in front of him that he truly attacks (grappling for the dagger vs. just threatening solas with bianca)
much later, rook is imprisoned in the same place that holds solas for most of the game, and there they encounter varric. whether a manifestation, a representation, a spirit taking varric's form for rook, or varric himself in some manner, i still think we can safely conclude that what this varric says is truthful to the real varric. and one of the things he tells rook is that confronting solas as he did was his choice, and that they can't take that from him
while likely a salve to rook — in time, if not in that moment — this is also so incredibly central to varric's growth over the course of this series. he has made countless choices. some of them have been the act of not choosing. but this? this was a choice, made deliberately, made consciously, made with a full awareness of the risk he was taking and a willingness to take that risk himself
he's right. rook does not get to take this from him. this is his choice. this is his final choice. and varric has always been a storyteller, and what better way to end a story than by the hero doing the right thing, taking a stand, trying his best?
this is one thing varric will not have to regret
