[Anders looks down.]

I don't know if it will ever stop hurting. It's not just losing him. It's...

[He takes a slow breath. Trust. He can trust. His gaze meets hers again for a moment as he gathers up his courage.]

I've been powerless a majority of my life. And that was emphasized over and over. Taking Karl away was the, the ultimate demonstration of how they could take everything whenever they wanted, however they wanted. They took him from himself, and they took him from me, because they could. They didn't have to. They could have copied his handwriting and held him in the Chantry and I would have come. I was... I was powerless again, but because I was powerless, someone else suffered too.

[Which is a large part of why he'd been complicit with blowing up the Chantry. For years he'd tried every peaceful option, every radical one that didn't involve taking lives, and even had killed a few Templars, Alrik included. It had done nothing.]

He's an active reminder of everything that has ever hurt.

[And everything that Anders may never find again.]