Codex text
What happened to Viscount Perrin Threnhold was a travesty. I served in the Keep, and my blood boils when I hear people call him a tyrant. He was a good man who tried his best to free Kirkwall from the control of those who use power for their own purposes. It's always been that way here, hasn't it? Long ago it was the Imperium. Then it was the Qunari, then the Orlesians, now the templars... when have we ever ruled ourselves? He tried to kick those templar bastards out and give us real freedom, and what did it get him?
Now the Chantry has chosen Lord Marlowe Dumar as his replacement. After weeks and weeks of arguing, after telling the nobility that they would be choosing their viscount, after everyone saying it was time to use a new title—why not "king"? Why keep using the name imposed by the Orlesians? And after all that, the Chantry chose him. I suppose I can see why—everyone thinks he has the spine of a jellyfish, and it does seem that way.
Truly, he has the templars on one side, the nobility on the other, and everyone expects him to solve all their problems—yet he has no power to actually accomplish it. He keeps the peace as best he can, and I think he does a good job even if no one else does. And he loves that sad little boy. I see the way young Saemus looks at his father, and I feel for him. Locked up in the Keep with no other children, watching his father be put down by every self-important windbag that walks into the great hall... it makes me miss the days of Perrin Threnhold, even if they were chaotic. We can only hope that one day Saemus gives this city the legacy it deserves.
—Excerpt from a letter by an unknown servant, found in the Gallows vaults 9:28 Dragon