"Your friends call you worse things?" That didn’t make any sense. Lavellan understood friendly teasing, and maybe even a little heckling in the spirit of competition, but something offensive? He turned the idea over in his head for a moment, considering. "You mean sarcasm," he decided, remembering quite vividly how he’d been forced to pick up on nuances like that very early on in the Inquisition. You didn’t get very far in a new place without knowing the language, after all.
As for the earlier conversation, Lavellan let the subject drop. It didn’t matter what he thought of Hawke’s choices in life. Too often, people made quick judgments about things they had no experience in. He tried not to fall into the same pattern.
Still. There was something that had been nagging at him for a while, a burning curiosity that wouldn’t be snuffed out. "Merrill lived in Kirkwall’s alienage for a little while." Lavellan seemed to realize this was a random thing to say without prompting, because his ears were just a tad red. "How did she settle in? Did it seem easy for her, with your friends there to help?"