Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

She has never seen so many shems before in her life. Not even in the village market before they left Alerion. They are everywhere. Shems in rags, shems in silk, shems with staffs for magic, shems with blades for fighting. Big scary shems, little baby shems, all dark skinned as the smelly shemlen men with their jokes about what was between her legs that found her asleep by the river. They made her nervous. They looked at her like she looked at the food they gave her. They looked at her like a horse they wanted to buy. They stripped her down and looked at her all over and touched her and laughed when she winced. They opened her mouth and checked her teeth. They put their too-big shemlen edhisen in her mouth, in her masa. They laughed. She bled like Mamae had bled, but not as much. She thought of Tamalin, who did not cry. If Tamalin could shed no tears, she could do the same. She was older. Crying was for babies. It hurt, it hurt, it hurt, but she didn't cry. She learned to find the Fade, to float there, to close her spirit's eyes and not be her and not see her and just exist where it didn't hurt so much. It got easier then. And they fed her. To fatten her up, they said.

"Nobody wants a fuckin' bag o' bones," the one in charge said. He wouldn't let them put their edhisen between her legs. He wouldn't let them beat her. "No marks, you shits," he told them. "Leave her whole. You break it, you fuckin' buy it."

The one in charge stands behind her now on the platform, holding the rope that ties to her hands and feet and neck. She is naked. She is often naked with them. Brown-skinned shems in clothing that is strange and leaves parts of their chests bare, clean shems with coins jingling in the pouches they carry. They look at all the naked elves on the stage. They grope arm muscles and slap haunches and pinch sides. Hair is held out when it is pretty -- hers is pretty, like unrefined silverite, the fast-talking man with the funny hair (they all have so much hair, the shems, all over) on his face tells everyone who stops to stare. There are women there too, shem women, but they frown at her and if they are with men, they drag them away.

"Prettiest knife-ear bitch you'll ever see," the one in charge tells a man who is alone, who has paused in front of her and makes her turn her head with a hand on her chin. His hands are soft. So soft. She has never felt such soft hands on anyone but Tama. Like baby hands. Hands that have never held a tool or strung a bow. "Sweet and pliant and pure as any Dalish cunt can be. She won't fight you, no serah, not a wit."

"Tried her, have you," the man asks without asking. The one in charge turns red. He is not in charge any longer.

"'Course not, serah. Have her inspected if you don't believe. She'll bleed for ya, that's a surety."

The man has dark eyes like how she feels inside now. Dark like her dreams. Dark skin, but like tree bark, not the pitch of his eyes. His hair too is dark dark dark. But he regards her thoughtfully, does not just look at her flat chest and her bare edhas like the others, does not just talk about her like she isn't there, even though she isn't there, not really, not anymore. She is a snail shell when the snail is dead. Empty and hollow and easy to break. Dirty on the inside. He does not just mention her purple-teal eyes, her silver hair, does not just grab at her body. He looks her in the eyes, not just at her eyes. It is strange to be seen. She has been practicing being invisible since Babae stopped moving. But he sees her. She doesn't like it but she wants it. Wants it like she wants food and air and shelter from the storms and wolves. 

"What are you called, child." It is not a question. It is a command. What is she called? Knife-ear bitch. Tight little cunt. Pretty Dalish slut. Heathen quim. Her eyes round because these are not what he wants to know, she thinks, and she wants to please him, wants him to like her so he will keep seeing her, but she was called something else once, if she could just remember. What was it? And how does she make her mouth work? She knows how to put things in it. Food. Shemlen cocks. Water. Air. But she can't remember how to make things come back out. Words. Sobs. Vomit. The hot white sticky mess they put in her when they grunted. Things went into her, but not out. Not anymore. "Your name, child. What is it."

"Speak, bitch!" The one in charge yanks at her hair. She does not make a sound, even though it feels like ripping skin.

"That won't be necessary," says the man. She thinks she loves him. He is kind and good and he sees her. He sighs and goes to move away, to look at the city elf woman down the line. He's leaving. He's leaving! Speak, stupid, worthless rabbit bitch! Speak or you will disappear forever!

"Lanaya!" Her mouth moves without her knowing what she's done. Her surprise is on her face like the vallaslin she one day would have worn. Her voice sounds wrong. Dry and croaking like a frog. But he stops. He turns to look at her again. He smiles.

"Lanaya. Good girl. Can you cook and clean, Lanaya?"

"Y-yes, hahren," she realizes slowly, and marvels still that she can make sounds at all. He laughs.

"We'll have to break you of that Elvish habit." He nods over her head at the man who holds the rope. "I'll take her. Clothe her. I'll have my man come round to collect her in half an hour."

Her heart soars. She will go with this man? With this man who is kind and good and sees her? She will be good for him, so good. She will do anything he wants and more. She will please him.

If only he always sees her.

~~~

They were always pounding on the door for her. No matter how many men and women she'd had that day, they were always sending more. It was good to be popular. She was beautiful for an elf and knew how to please. She had learned that young. She knew what the humans wanted when they came to her. She could read it in their faces and demeanors, whether they needed to bruise her and spit on her, whether they secretly craved when a knife-ear called them shemlen and rode them hard while shouting terrible things in Elvish. Truthfully, she barely remembered anything from her time with the Dalish. She made it up. They never knew. And they always came back. Always. She was popular. They were always pounding at her door. She didn't care. It put food in her children's mouths. It kept them from doing this. It kept the humans from knocking at their door.

Lanaya checked herself in the distressed mirror and tucked a stray strand of her infamous silver hair into her braids. She adjusted her breasts in her turquoise gown, chosen specifically to accent how she was curvier than most elves, the vivid color of her eyes. She pinched her cheeks to wake the color there and smoothed her hands down her hips. She wondered idly who it was they'd sent her this time, what they'd desire from her. She hoped it was a green young man so it would be over quickly. Fathers loved to give her their sons to turn into men.

It was not a young man. He was a handsome, broad-chested fellow in armor, clean-cut and already blushing. He...didn't want anything from her. He wasn't even looking at her. What the fuck did they send her? Maybe he meant to knock on Danyl's door down the hall; maybe he fancied men. Only one way to find out. She pressed herself against him, insinuating serpentine into his arms, grinding her thigh against the hard leather of his breeches. He jolted, eyes widening, and took a sharp step back. His skin was practically scarlet. But he was responsive, she could see that clearly. So he knocked on the right door after all.

"Don't be scared, shem," she purred, reaching for the laces of his pants to drag him into the room with her. "I don't bite. Unless you want me to."

He looked up then, flustered and panicked like a maiden. But when he actually saw her, actually took in her face, he suddenly froze. Simply stopped breathing entirely. Maybe he didn't want an elf? This was going to be work, she decided, but it would end quickly. He would come before she even got him out of his smalls.

"Maker's breath," he breathed, eyes large like he'd seen a ghost. He hesitated and asked uncertainly, "Lanaya Alerion?"

Now it was her turn to jerk backwards, crossing her arms protectively over her cleavage and scowling dangerously. "Who are you." No one used her clan name. No one knew her clan name.

"Commander Rutherford with the Inquisition," he stammered, still violently blushing. But now that he'd looked at her face, he couldn't seem to tear himself away. "You look just like her!"

Chapter Text

Leliana's message had been innocuous enough except for that one word: 'brothel'. Brothel. The last brothel Cullen had stepped foot in was the Blooming Rose in Kirkwall, and even then...

Cullen was a man who believed in discipline. Cullen was a man who believed in love. Cullen was not a man who purchased sex. Usually. But a man has needs and sometimes a warm washcloth in the bath and tightly closed eyes just wasn't enough. Cullen was a man who rarely succumbed to such baser instincts where emotions and trust were not also involved. He had been a Templar back when he thought it meant something. Templars -- good Templars -- did not rut like the City Guard. Templars were above such things. They were supposed to be, anyway. He wasn't a fool; he knew many Templars were no better than the bandits in the dark alleys of Lowtown, out for themselves and themselves alone. He had cracked his fair share of Templar skulls to rescue the pretty mages they'd cornered. But Cullen had always tried to be...what he thought a Templar ought to be. That had changed over the years. What he thought he ought to be before Uldred and after Uldred were two very different things. As were what he thought he ought to be before Meredith and after Meredith. Before Hal'lasean and after Hal'lasean. 

Because he was no longer a Templar, but he still held himself to a higher standard. Truthfully, the idea of anonymous sex had never appealed to him as it had to other men. And these days...Maker's breath, these days nothing stirred his loins at all but thoughts of Hal. 

Hal.

Hal lithe and graceful, sparring with him in the courtyard. Hal's smile that was just for him -- different from the ones she gave her Wolf or Dorian or anyone else. Hal's tipsy laugh over a bottle of good wine, firelight giving her back her vallaslin with shadows. Hal's bravado when dared to do something foolish by the men during Wicked Grace. Hal perched on his desk with her bare feet dangling. Hal's hand smoothing his close-cropped curls from his face not because they were in the way but because she wanted to touch him. Hal's warm body close enough to make him quiver. Hal's pointed ears peeking out through dark silver braids. Hal's hands on his chest. Hal's breath on his skin. Hal's lips on his lips. Hal's taste in his mouth.

Hal.

Maker help him, he was never going to get past this. So when Leliana's message was handed to him when he reached their northernmost outpost, his first thought was, of course, that he would rather be anywhere but a Minrathous whorehouse of all places. His second thought was of his sister listening to him talk about Hal for the three thousandth time since he had come to visit and telling him frankly that if he didn't "stick it in a pretty girl soon" she would hog-tie him and toss him in a Chantry cloister full of novices. She always did have a way with words, his sister.

Urgent: She needs a favor, the note had said, but she won't ask. Take a few men (leave the flags behind) and go to a brothel in Minrathous called The Gilded Dragon. There will be a woman there named Lanaya Alerion. Bring her and her children back with you at any cost. Protect them. - L

There had been a post script as well: Hope you're over her. Doubt you are. Stay safe, my friend.

So he and four other soldiers he handpicked for their silence and restraint had traveled by horseback into Tevinter with all their Inquisition gear traded in for the inconspicuous, mismatched pieces in the post's storage. By the time they arrived in Minrathous and found this Gilded Dragon (which, as it turned out, was the nicest brothel in the entire city), he had convinced himself that he would collect this Alerion woman and her children, and, while they were packing or saying their goodbyes or whatever it was they needed to do, he would...dabble. Oh, who he was he kidding. He was going to pay for sex. He wondered if they'd have an elven woman with silvery hair and eyes like tropical seas. He wondered if that made him as disgusting a man as he felt it did. But when he went into the Dragon and found himself surrounded by all manner of scantily clad men and women who kept trying to touch him or catch his attention, the only thing he managed to purchase was a stiff drink and the snickers of his soldiers at how flustered and pink he became. So he'd asked after a woman named Lanaya and told his men to stay alert, dammit, no matter what reached down their pants. The bartender had smiled at him knowingly, which only made him more uncomfortable, and pointed him up the stairs, gave him a room number, told him to knock and wait. 

Cullen didn't know what he'd been expecting. He'd been puzzling over the note the whole way to Minrathous and nothing made sense. What in Andraste's name would Hal need with some woman and her children in a brothel in Tevinter? He thought perhaps it was something to do with Dorian, though obviously not in the way it would mean with most men. Perhaps a source of some kind for Hal's future plans? In the end, it didn't matter. Because he'd knocked and stared at his boots determinedly, trying not to stay quite so red the whole time he was in the building, already decided that he would do his duty and get out of this blighted place before he made an even bigger fool of himself.

And then she answered the door. Hal'lasean had up until this point been the single most beautiful creature he had ever laid eyes on. This woman was...an artistic masterwork. Her hair was subtly lighter than Hal's, her skin a touch darker, both of which he thought must have come from a lifetime under the Tevinter sun. Her eyes too were a more vivid blue-green than Hal's, rimmed in coal under long, dark lashes. Hal's lips were fuller than this woman's, but only just...but what was it, what could the difference be that made this Lanaya so much more immediately arresting than the woman he loved? She was curvier, certainly. His Hal had the slender, muscular build of any Dalish hunter, but she was smaller, shorter. She had told him once it was the result of malnutrition as a child. That she was a runt. She'd laughed as she said it, but her mirth hadn't reached her eyes. So if Hal had been malnourished, this woman had been fed only the finest of Tevinter fare. Her breasts...Maker, her breasts! And her hips! They would have been proportionate on a human, but on an elf...

Stop staring, Cullen!

But what was it? Something about her reminded him of Hal'lasean at the Winter Palace, painted and pinned and polished in a way that she'd hated but that had made her, if possible, even more ravishing. Hal'lasean was not a woman to color her cheeks or lips or rim her eyes in coal. Her beauty was natural and simple, unassuming even when at its most striking. But this woman. This Lanaya. She knew she was beautiful. Knew the power it held over idiots like him. Knew how to accentuate her breast best features to please the eye and, Maker help him, the groin. She was so very comfortable in her sexuality, exuded it like perfume, dripped it like honey. 

Maker, but his trousers were tight.

Lanaya Alerion was what Hal'lasean Lavellan might have been if she'd been raised in luxury and told just how stunning she was every day of her life. Lanaya was what Hal'lasean could be in another five years, if she suddenly decided she cared about her looks. If she suddenly decided that Fen'Harel wasn't sating her and took whomever she pleased to bed whenever she pleased. But it was something else too. Something...guarded and ruthless in these teal eyes that didn't live in the open and compassionate teal eyes that belonged to the Inquisitor. 

Fuck, he never had stopped staring. She did not look pleased.

"Look just like whom?" she probed, arms still crossed over her chest. If she meant to cover herself, she was doing a poor job of it. If anything, her arms were just pushing her breasts together. He wanted to push her breasts together.

Andraste's ass, get it together, Cullen!

"The--" Wait. Maybe he shouldn't be saying this out in the hallway. If only he could get the blood flowing back into his brain instead of into his pants, he could think more clearly. "I'm sorry, but this is a conversation best had in private. Do you mind if we...?"

Her brows lifted slowly, her gaze sharp, like Hal'lasean facing down a noble who was reaching too far. They had to be related. Cousins, maybe? But Hal didn't know her biological family. Still, this woman had to be related to her. There was no other explanation. "Are you going to pay?" she demanded.

His arousal throbbed against his breeches. She looked right at it. Maker, she was looking right at it! "T-to talk?" he stuttered, his voice cracking like a teenaged boy's.

Lanaya smirked at him, leaning languid against the door frame. She knew. She knew exactly what she was doing to him, damn her. And he couldn't. He couldn't pay this woman to even touch him, not knowing she might be Hal's family. How was he supposed to get her back to Skyhold when just looking at her did this to him?! "My time is expensive, Commander. We can do whatever you want once that door is closed behind us. I guarantee complete confidentiality and unbridled enthusiasm for whatever you decide." Her lips pursed as she let those damnable teal eyes track a lazy path back down to his bulging trousers. "Even if all you desire is to talk." How did she make even that sound filthy? 

Cullen swallowed. Audibly. She was enjoying torturing him, he could tell. But probably not as much as she could tell he was enjoying it. His heart was pounding, his blood rushing in his ears and a much less comfortable place as he forced himself to look past her to a room draped in sheer silks, lit with aromatic candles, a tray of massage oils set by a bed that was all dark satins. Rumpled dark satins. 

Hal.

"Er, look, Lady Lanaya--" She snorted. Even that was somehow sexy. "I am prepared to pay you for your time, however much it costs, but...and this is nothing against you, you're...Maker, you're lovely, but if we go into your room, I'm going to need you to...not touch me." He was teased mercilessly at Skyhold for his blushing. He was fairly certain he had never in his life been quite this shade of crimson. "Please."

One brow quirked in bemused consideration. "As you wish," she purred, and it was jarring to think that Hal would have said 'ma nuvenin' instead. Jarring, but not enough to calm the heat in his cheeks or his pants. Cullen waited until Lanaya was completely across the room from him before he stepped inside, closing the door behind him and taking a moment with his back to her to collect himself and...adjust. 

"Now," said Lanaya coolly from the opposite side of the room. "Who is it I look like?"

He took in a breath to calm himself and turned to face her, which was a mistake. She had stretched herself out on the bed, all long, elegant lines that curved in places Cullen had forgotten a woman could have curves. His brow knit hard and he quickly dropped his gaze to his boots again. Boots were good. Boots didn't result in painfully constrained erections that would not go away. Boots were safe.

"H-" Hal. His Hal. He let out a slightly hysterical laugh and tried again. Hello there, boots. "Hal'lasean Lavellan."

"Never heard of her."

 He laughed again, scrubbing his hand over his face, and forced himself to look up. To face this temptress with Hal'lasean's coloring. Hal'lasean's features. Even the nose and brows were the same. "Well, my lady, she's heard of you. You're the entire reason I'm here right now, in" a brothel in "Tevinter. My orders are to do whatever I must to bring you and your children back with me to Skyhold."

That dangerous look was back. Lanaya sat up slowly, leaned forward over her legs on the bed so she could peel Cullen's skin from his bones with just her eyes. "How do you know about my children. How do you know my clan name. And who the fuck is Hal'lasean Lavellan?"

It was easier not to think about sex like this. With her angry and focused and saying the Inquisitor's name. This he could do. Cullen took a breath, steeled himself, squared his shoulders. "Hal'lasean Lavellan is the Inquisitor. I was given orders to come here, to Minrathous, to the Gilded Dragon, to collect you and your children at any cost." He hesitated and took a step forward, frowning his confusion. "Do you really not know who she is?"

"I know who the Inquisitor is," Lanaya scoffed. "What the fuck does this have to do with me or my children? Does the Inquisitor have a thing for Dalish whores?"

He flinched at the word, at her tone, and she was looking at him dismissively now. As if he knew nothing about life. That chafed worse than his quickly withering erection. "I don't know who you are to her or why she wants you," he admitted. He could practically feel his spine returning to him. "I've been on leave or I'm sure I'd have more to tell you. But if I had to guess, my lady--"

"Don't call me that," she snapped.

"If I had to guess," Cullen sighed, "I'd say you're related. Maker's breath, if I didn't know any better, I'd swear you were sisters!"

He'd said something wrong again. Lanaya Alerion's face turned brutally dark, her teal eyes flashing like a storm at sea. Her breasts heaved with the sudden shallowness of her breathing and it might have been enticing if Cullen hadn't started to worry for both of their safety. "What did you just say?" she hissed.

"...You could be sisters?" he repeated lamely. "I'm sorry if I've offended you, I--"

"This Inquisitor of yours," Lanaya interrupted. Her voice was a freshly sharpened blade, but her hands were shaking in her lap. "Tell me about her."

Chapter Text

It wasn't impossible that Tamalin had survived. After all, she had. And she'd left her little sister starving and vulnerable and silent with that clan's little herd of halla. Lanaya hadn't been sure they would keep her if they even found her, but she was sure in her own childish way that Tamalin would be dead before the week was out if they stayed together. She was still frequently grateful that her nine-year-old self had left her sister behind. Should Tama have survived long enough to be found with Lanaya by the slavers, it was unlikely they would have bothered to feed her. Likely they would have raped her to death. She wouldn't have been the first elven child to meet such a fate.

It had been a lifeline, the thought of Tamalin left behind with the halla. In the terrifying weeks that followed, she imagined with hopeful jealousy that her sister's death had been quiet and merciful. Or that maybe, just maybe, the clan had found her before she perished in the cold night and there was an older couple who had never had children or who had lost them, perhaps, to plague or an accident, and Lanaya had dreamed when she dared to dream at all, when her dreams were not darkness and demons and death, that this kind older couple took Tamalin in and raised her as their own. And even when Lanaya began to hate the people who'd birthed her, to hide her pointed ears behind elaborately styled hair that pleased her master, when she found herself referring with derision to knife-ears and rabbits, still part of her clung tightly to the image of Tama, her little hallabell, growing up among the hunters and the aravels, dancing as their parents had once danced, receiving her vallaslin, finding a mate, having a family. A family with eyes and hair like theirs, with ears like theirs. A family their mother would have been proud to see.

Not a family like the one she'd built with blood and cum and whip lashes. Not a family with round ears and dark Tevinter skin but still without their freedom, even full as they were of their master's noble blood. She loved her family. She was proud of what she'd made for herself in this civilized place, coming from savagery as she had. She had loved her master Amantius in a way that had never ceased to please him. He had seen her magic in her there on the platform when the slavers didn't, had gotten her for a steal, and though he told his cold Tevinter wife that he had purchased the elf Lanaya to be nothing more than a maid, she had become his shadow. He meant only to teach her the basics of her magic, but she was quick and powerful and eager to make him happy. So he became her tutor, her mentor. He used her blood and her magic to strengthen his own, and she was fiercely proud of her place by his side. By the time she hit puberty, she was valued above every other slave he owned. He frequently told his peers she was the best purchase he ever made. And when she blossomed hips and breasts and became an elven maid not even the Magisters could resist, he protected her. He loved her, he told her when she was thirteen and had begun to bleed. She was his now and forever. When he took her the first time, it was gentle and left her trembling and begging for more, and that had pleased him too.

His wife looked the other way until Lanaya became heavy with her master's child at fifteen. It was his first child, a fact which drove her mistress to bouts of fury. Amantius patiently let her take it out on Lanaya until the whippings and punishments and torture put his unborn child in danger, and then he stepped in firmly. His wife's revenges became more passive then, little things that her husband would not notice, like having rancid meat prepared for Lanaya's dinner or infesting her bedding with pubic lice. It was not difficult for Lanaya, with her elven lack of body hair, to remove their places to hide. Amantius had gone mad for it. He told her it reminded him of the first time he'd laid eyes on her, pretty Dalish babe that she was, and commanded that she never let it grow again. And Lanaya had always been eager to please him. 

When the child came, a son, she had sweetly, naively requested her master's permission to name him Amantius. But such things weren't done for bastards, he had explained, and let her instead name the boy Spurian Amantius. Her master was overjoyed with the gift she had given him. But not soon after, using Lanaya's blood to strengthen the ritual, his wife conceived as well. A boy they named Amantius Secundus. Spurian held a special place in his master's heart, as did his mother, but not as his son. Not truly. That, Amantius had told her when he first returned to her bed after growing tired of his frigid, inbred wife, was simply the way of things. She remained his favorite for the rest of his days. She bore him two more children -- twins, as her father had been -- and though he named them Catullus and Levana, she secretly called her daughter Tamalin. Lanaya had never once rebelled or complained in all her life as a slave, had genuinely loved the man who purchased her, who treated her with more kindness than anyone else she could recall after her mother died. But her daughter's name was like a compulsion, a sickness, some vile remnant of her primitive Dalish blood that surfaced years after she'd forgotten the Elvish words for 'daughter' or 'name' or 'love'. 

She made up for her small disobedience with everything she had to offer. She was the one who sat by her master's sickbed when he began to fail. She was the one who cleaned him and changed his clothes and sheets when he became incontinent. She wrote his last wishes and called for a lawyer to finalize his will. She held his hand as he passed, telling him of her love for him, reminding him of all the times he'd made her quiver, swearing to him his children would know of their father's goodness. 

She had not cried since she left Tamalin with the halla, not even as she delivered her babies, but she had wept then, over his corpse, until his wife had finally come to see with her own eyes that he was gone and promptly had her sent away. Her mistress appealed to the courts against her husband's last testament, which released Lanaya and all her progeny in perpetuity from service and settled them with a living allowance for the rest of his bastard children's days. The courts sided with the noblewoman, of course. She and her children were released from service, yes, but cast penniless and starving into the streets.

But Lanaya was still the prettiest knife-eared bitch Minrathous had ever seen. Had always been eager to please. It didn't take her long to find a way to put food in the mouths of her children. It didn't take her long at all to make a reputation for herself among the richest and pickiest clientele in Tevinter. No, they were always pounding on her door. They had been for the last eight years.

But never before had she opened the door to this. She had long since given up her past for lost, and good riddance. Tamalin was her daughter now, not her sister. Her sister was a strange fever dream she had once had, nothing more. The toddler she'd called "hallabell" was probably bare bones in the woods by now, like her parents. Like the sheltered Dalish girl Lanaya had been. And yet here was this man who stared at her with familiar desire, yes, but with such a startled recognition in his eyes, speaking of the Dalish Inquisitor and how they could be sisters.

Sisters. Andraste's short and curlies, was it even possible?

Lanaya already loathed herself for that long-dormant spark of the dangerous thing called hope that rekindled in her heart at just the thought.

"Ah," the blonde human was stammering, and she hated him for that too. For being so flustered, so attracted to her, like she hated every man who was not her master. "Well..."

"Spit it out or put it in," she snarled, and his mouth actually fell open. At another time, she might have found it endearing enough to keep tormenting this strapping doglord, but there were too many confusing, difficult things boiling like an active volcano in her head and heart and she had no patience for men of virtue. Not right now.

"I--" He frowned and scrubbed at his face and mumbled something to the Maker under his breath. Maybe if she took him in hand and released some of his tension he would finally speak. "She's...beautiful." Ah. Now they were getting somewhere. Not anywhere helpful, but somewhere. "Thinner than you, she was, ah, not well-fed as a child, so she's smaller than the average Dalish woman. She must be...twenty-six? Twenty-seven now?" Lanaya's heart stuttered, faltered and floundered like this Rutherford and his halting speech and his discomfort. "Her hair is straight and silver, like yours, but darker. Her skin is paler. Her eyes..." He breathed out in sharp amazement and shook his head. "I've known plenty of elves, my l--" He stopped, backpedalled. So at least this Mabari could learn new tricks. "I'd never seen eyes like hers. Not before and not since. Not until you."

Her heart had ceased to pump. Or perhaps she was so far removed from her body that Lanaya simply couldn't feel it anymore. A lifetime of beatings for the wrong expression at the wrong time had taught her neutrality in the face of turmoil. She gave nothing away, even as she was falling to pieces inside. Falling, falling, falling, like the hail and the rain and the lightning the day her sister had come into the world, just as violent, just as deadly. Falling. "They're a throwback," she heard herself saying in a voice so soft she could have used it to swaddle an infant, "from the nobility of the Dales." How did she know that? Where did that information come from? Was that something her father had told her once? Before he had chosen death over his daughters? "They only run through the Alerion line." How? How did she know? But wait. There was no way this Inquisitor was her sister. The name was wrong. Except...if that was true, if the teal eyes she inherited from her father, the same ones her sister had, the ones she'd given to her children, if they were only through Alerion... 

She narrowed her eyes with sudden ferocity at this Inquisition soldier. "She's from Lavellan?"

"She...was raised by Lavellan," he decided, and she watched him putting the pieces together as she was doing, watched him start to understand. "She was a foundling, though, as a child." Lanaya didn't fathom how she could still be alive if her heart had stopped beating, especially now that she forgot how to breathe. She worried distantly that everything had been a terrible, wonderful, awful dream, that she was still asleep by the river or passed out from pain in the slaver camp. She panicked that she was nine and bleeding and afraid. The urge to freeze, to be invisible, to hide in plain sight surged through her like her magic and blood. "She doesn't remember anything from before. They named her Hal'lasean because she wouldn't speak and they found her--"

"--with the halla," Lanaya finished. Some faraway part of her was grateful she was already sitting because she had a strong feeling she might have fainted otherwise.

"Yes," the man said with wonder, staring at her with something harder, something closer to comprehension. Then his face blanched and he was fumbling in his breeches and she thought, with a hard laugh, that now, after all this, now he wants to fuck?

But the Commander was pulling out a folded parchment, sealed in black wax. "I nearly forgot. This...this is for you." He crossed the room to her, his obvious concern for what he thought she must be going through overpowering his animal drives. He held out the paper to her like he might be offering a handkerchief to a simpering noblewoman. Her hand took it without her permission, her eyes read her name in pretty Orlesian calligraphy without her say so, her fingers were pulling apart the seal with its delicate nightingale imprint, tearing it from one side of the note, opening it.

Tamalin Alerion, it said, seeks her lost sister Lanaya.

Chapter Text

He stood at the end of her bed with his hands clasped behind him while she read Leliana's message to her. It was a message he desperately wished to open from the moment he got it, but that wasn't the kind of man Cullen Rutherford was. He was also not the kind of man to pry when a stranger who looked like the buxom version of the woman he was increasingly certain was the love of his life held secrets that he would eventually know anyway, once he returned home to Skyhold. No matter how curious he was here and now. No, he would not ask. So he stayed quiet and still, aware even now of this woman's extraordinary beauty, of the supple curve of her breasts to her waist to her hips beneath her silken gown, aware but beyond it, worried and serious and dutiful where before he had been flustered and throbbing and overwarm. 

Her face was completely unreadable, like Fen'Harel's but angrier, no doubt from the kind of life that forced a woman so stunning, a mother, a Dalish elf, to end up turning very expensive tricks in the heart of Tevinter. Even if she hadn't looked so much like his Hal, Cullen's heart would have ached for her. She was the kind of woman who had no need of saving, but who deserved it most of all. Deserved to be loved and treasured and made to feel she was more than just the admittedly tantalizing body she inhabited.

He only became aware that he was staring again when she looked up from the letter with a hardness in her eyes and the lines of her mouth that he had never before seen in Hal'lasean. Not even in her stony rages in Halamshiral or when choosing to sacrifice her troops to save civilians. Cullen grimaced slightly as he wondered what must have happened to put those lines on that face. He was fairly certain he would find the world a more hopeful place if he never found out.

"This would have gone more quickly if you'd just given me this from the beginning," she pointed out with threatening tension in her tone. Cullen straightened up under the cruelty of her gaze to compensate for his sudden and consuming feeling of inadequacy.

"My apologies, my l--" Bugger. He tried again: "I apologize. I..." Cullen's brow furrowed. "I'm afraid I don't actually know what it says. I hope it...clarifies things." Because he would certainly like some clarifications. He flushed and struggled between his need to know what in Andraste's name he was doing here of all places and his moral high ground. All he truly needed was to know this was what the Inquition required of him. Or at least was the new Divine required of him on the Inquisition's behalf. On Hal'lasean's behalf. "Would--" Maker, what a fool he felt in this strange den of iniquity! "As I said, I...I've come to Minrathous for you..." What was he supposed to call her if not 'my lady'? She was a mother, so not 'miss' but she most certainly was not a 'ma'am' either. "The Inquisition -- the Inquisitor -- wants me to bring you and your children with me back to Skyhold. You would be protected and cared for there. There are...other jobs, should you require one, but I imagine that if you are related to--"

"She's my sister."

It was so quiet he nearly missed it, and not gentle or thoughtful like when she'd mentioned the origin of her vivid eyes, but cold and regretful, bitter even. The Commander's mouth opened and closed uselessly for a moment as he tried to come to terms with the idea that Hal'lasean's sister -- her blighted gorgeous sister -- was a prostitute for Magisters. When had Hal found out? And he hadn't been there for her when she needed him. No, he'd been masturbating guiltily to her in his tent and trying to pretend his heart was healing. Stupid. Selfish. And of course she'd said nothing because she was too good and compassionate to trouble him with her worries when he'd made it clear he had his own. What a bloody fool he was. A bloody useless fool. "Maker..."

A fool and an idiot. And Lanaya knew it. He could see it in how she was staring at him, like he was inconvenient and irritating. Like he was a means to an end. It was quite a shift from the way she'd stared when she thought he was going to pay her to...

Focus, Cullen.

"As..." Andraste's ass! Her sister! "As Hal's sister, you and your children and anyone else you want to bring with us will have our full protection for as long as we are alive to provide it. You will always have a roof over your head and food to eat. You'll only work if you want, at...at any profession you wish. Your children will receive the finest of educations. Skyhold is home to some of the best scholars, fighters, mages, and healers in all of Thedas. If you come with us, you'll never want for anything ever again." He pressed his lips together because he couldn't make heads or tails of her reaction to what he was promising, if she had any reaction at all. "The Inquisition rewards its people based on merit. There are no social castes. I cannot guarantee you will never meet someone within our walls who judges you for the points of your ears, but I can guarantee they'll be in the minority. The Inquisitor herself is, obviously, an elf as well. As is her..." Chosen lover. The father of her child. "As is the man she loves. It is the single most accepting order in all of Thedas."

Lanaya's eyes had narrowed slowly at him while he spoke, not with anger but with a kind of cutting curiosity. She was trying to pull him apart, to see what his ulterior motives were. "You call her Hal?"

He blushed. "Ah, yes, we all do. Well, her friends do. When I say that I am Commander Rutherford with the Inquisition...what I mean is that I am the head of all Inquisition military forces."

Lanaya's brows shifted upward and she let out a disbelieving laugh. "And she's sent you on a fool's errand like this? To the very center of Tevinter? She must not like you much."

Cullen's face darkened before he could stop it, his expression stormy. "She would never have asked it of me. I'm here because I was not far away and because I imagine they didn't want anyone else to know you exist."

"They're a little late," scoffed the elven woman, stretching herself out on the bed again so that he couldn't help his gaze trailing the lines of her body. And she knew it. She knew exactly what she was doing to him. "Or didn't you notice you're in the best room in the finest brothel in Tevinter? Everyone in Minrathous knows I exist." She smirked, but it didn't reach her eyes. "You're not the first man to want to sweep me away from my wayward life, Commander, but most of them don't just come here to talk."

His whole upper body was red, he was sure of it, which was why it was so surprising there was any blood left over to invade his breeches. Lanaya was smug with her effect. But he was starting to understand the game now, starting to see how it was played. She only used her body when she wanted something from him and she thought it was what he wanted in return. She seduced like Hal fought, searching out weakness and want and exploiting it. But he knew from experience that the fastest way to win the field from Hal was to knock her off her impeccable balance. Usually with a direct hit. She had speed and agility and grace. He had brute strength. "I'm not going to fuck you, Lanaya Alerion." Her brows lifted a little more, barely even perceptible, but there was something in her eyes, something confused. That was how he knew it was working. "Your sister is my best friend. I care about her too much to pay you for a quick tumble. So whatever it is you're trying to get from me, all you need to do is ask. You'll find I respond best to openness and honesty." He softened then, offering the hint of an earnest smile. "I think you'll also find there's not much I'm not willing to give my best friend's sister."

"Except a quick tumble," Lanaya replied frankly, and though he blushed, he also laughed.

"Yes. Except that."

She fell silent then, studying him guardedly but without artifice, and since Cullen got the distinct impression that trust wasn't something that came naturally or easily to Lanaya, he met her appraisal unflinchingly. He stood before her and patiently let her judge him. It was her children's lives on the line here after all. "What if I don't want to pick up my entire life and drag my children to some Makerforsaken keep in the cold mountains?"

He nodded his understanding and favored her with another small smile. "That's your right," he assured her. "You'd be a guest, not a prisoner. We're not interested in forcing you to do anything you don't want." He kept his eyes gentle but his lips turned downward at the corners. "But you do look just like her. And she is the most powerful person in all of Thedas. It won't be long before some passing Orlesian noble stops in and puts two and two together. There are many who would like to tear her down for being an elf or have her influence for themselves. It won't matter if you don't care about her, if your children have never met her. You will be a target. They will be targets. A day will come when you're recognized and if you were ever safe here in Minrathous, you won't be any longer. But if you come with me, if you come to Skyhold, anyone seeking to harm you or your children will have to go through an army." His smile returned, but it wasn't kind. It was sharp as his sword. "An army I personally trained. The best and most dedicated army in existence. You have my word: I will keep you safe."

Lanaya's lips twisted in a sneer. "So I don't have a choice, do I. Not really."

"Not a good one, no," Cullen admitted apologetically. "I am sorry."

She nodded to herself, glanced around her room with a frown that deepened sourly with every passing moment. But eventually Lanaya set her steely, determined gaze on Cullen and he saw Hal'lasean so clearly that he couldn't help his smile. It didn't make her any happier. "When do we leave."

"As soon as you're ready."

Chapter Text

They jokingly and somewhat jealously called themselves the Gilded Magisterium because once, years before, the eldest bastard child still living in the rickety back rooms of the cathouse without actually working there had pointed out there was just as much noble Tevinter blood in the veins of the whoresons and daughters of the Gilded Dragon as in the Magisterium proper. Sometimes they called themselves the Dragon Circle too since the vast majority of their motley collection of illegitimate children were mages. A few lucky bastards -- literally lucky bastards -- had disappeared from their ranks over the years into the ornate carriages of their sires when a noble wife turned out to be barren or when a sickly heir died, leaving none behind. They were plucked from their simple, filthy existence and carried off to be presented for acknowledgement from the records keepers, never to see their mothers again. Some of them hoped for that day. Dreamed of it. For a father and his fortune and legitimacy. For the kind of magical training that only came from the magisters and the Circles available to them. Not the back alley tricks a kid could pick up from a Lyrium-addled junkie behind the brothel. Real magic. 

Spurian had never had such hopes. He knew no one was coming to take him away from all of this; had known it since the day Amantius' bowels released in his stench-ridden deathbed for the last time. He had been called in by his mother to kneel at his father's side so he could put a clammy hand on his face and feel the dark silver of his hair. Tama and Tully had come in the day before to say their goodbyes in their stilted toddler speak, but they hadn't understood what was happening. Not really. Spurian did. He had been only seven at the time, but he already knew how the world worked. He'd been pretending to sleep while his master climbed on top of his mother in the dark of their bedroom his entire life. He'd been a shadow in his father's formal dealings, without proof of existence or acknowledgment, without a last name. He'd grown up in dark corners in silence, watching affection and knowledge and birthrights given freely to his half-brother Secundus. Secundus, who was six months his junior, but who carried their father's last name and all the privileges that came from having the sheer dumb fortune to have come squalling from a noblewoman's twat. He envied Secundus the ease of his life even as he hated the little prick and his harpy mistress for how they treated his mother. For how they treated him. Like trash. Like something they'd stepped in on the streets. Worse than that. Disgust and indifference would have been a blessing. His mistress and her heir delighted in torturing his mother, in torturing him, even in torturing the little twins in their make-shift crib. He knew what it was to be hated at the same time he learned what it was to be loved. Because his mother did love him, dearly, fiercely, wholly. And he loved her. Even when she loved the man who did all this to her. Even when she spoke to the twins of his gentleness and kindness, of how he'd saved her from the slavers. As if he were not a slaver himself. As if filling a fifteen-year-old girl with a child were deserving of a fucking medal of honor.

Spurian had hated Amantius even as he lay dying before him, even with his too-soft, too-wet hand on his cheek, even as his rotting breath had formed words Spurian had always been desperate to hear: "You're a good boy, my son. Good like your mother. Would that you were my heir."

His mother had taken it to heart. She murmured it to him for years in the dark of the night when her work on some human cock was done and she came crawling into the one bed they all shared, exhausted and bruised and stinking of fancy cologne and sex. He'd hated it at the time, but he thought he understood it now. She'd never known anything else, his mother. She really believed that sick son of a bitch had loved her best and most, that if it hadn't been for society, for rules, for her inferior elven blood, he would have freed her, wed her, lived happily ever after with her by his side. His dying words had been all the proof of that she'd needed. And she'd repeated it to him because she needed to hear it herself, when she was sick inside with the semen of the Magisters who hated her, when all they could afford was yesterday's bread and cheese rinds. When Tully and Tama were up all night with colic and Spurian had to care for them even though he didn't know what he was doing while their mother was in the other room riding a merchant so fat it was a miracle from the Maker she could even find his little prick because it was the only way to afford the medicine to keep the twins "fucking quiet" as the man who ran the Gilded Dragon would yell when the customers were gone in the early morning.

So while the other wretched children of the other wretched whores whispered to each other about how their father was coming to get them, to take them away from all of this, or how they would soon start earning their keep here as well, unlike some cunts who thought they were too good for whoring, Spurian reminded himself that his father had given him a name that literally meant 'Amantius' bastard'. And when his mother tried again to call him Aman now that Secundus wasn't around to tell on them if he overheard, Spurian insisted balefully that the name 'bastard' was the only worthwhile thing his father had ever given him. The hurt in his mother's eyes was almost enough to make him regret it. Almost. But not enough. Spurian was a title as well as a name. He wore it as a suit of armor. It protected him from hope and foolish delusion. He could use it to shield Tully and Tama; he would take the abuse children like him were born to endure, take it because of his name, and leave none of it for them. To them he and his mother gave only good things. Love and shoes with hard soles and their own staffs for the magic lessons their mother patiently taught them every day as she had taught him. As her master had taught her. They were the only ones in the brothel who knew Circle magic. Spurian enjoyed that, actually. Enjoyed the idea that even though the Circles wouldn't accept a bastard boy with no last name, he knew all their magic anyway. That was a good revenge. Keeping the twins safe and happy, that was a great revenge. And one day when he could find a way to get them all out of this Makerforsaken shithole, that would be the best revenge of all.

"Oi, halfbreed," called a lazy human bastard about his age with pox-marked skin and a superiority complex from the window down the hall, "ain't that yer mum out there wif all them stinking doglords?" He laughed. "She gone do 'em all right there in the alley? Fuckin' horny knife-ear slut. Bet she does 'em for nuffin' too."

It wasn't until after Spurian was standing over the other boy's prone form with its broken nose and lost teeth, his knuckles raw from punching, that he bothered to look out the window to see for himself. It was his mother all right, arguing with her head close to some big blonde soldier's rounded ear, pointing up at the room he and the twins occupied at the back of the whorehouse. There were more of them, more doglords, and horses. So many horses. He wanted to open the window and shout down at her to make sure she was okay, but he knew better. Bastard sons who stood between their whore mothers and the men who wanted them only made things worse in the end. So instead of running to her side or demanding these men explain themselves, Spurian hurried to the bedroom where Tully and Tama were still finishing their lunch, giggling because Tully was holding a carrot to his breeches and pretending to be a Magister who particularly fancied their mother.

Spurian slapped the thing out of his hand. They gave him their undivided attention immediately, wide-eyed and shocked. He was never angry at them. Not at them. But he was now. Or...no, he wasn't angry at them, but at the life they lived, at the idea that this was something they'd laugh about over their sandwiches. He hated Tevinter and the Magisters and this fucking whorehouse. 

"That's not funny," he heard himself snapping at Tully, his finger in his brother's surprised face. "That's not fucking funny!"

The door crashed open behind them and they all whipped around to see what was coming, what bad thing was going to happen next. Spurian was already reaching for the nearest staff, ready to kill or maim or whatever it was he would need to do to protect his brother and sister. His mother. To protect them, he would do anything. Anything.

But in the doorway was his mother, expression blank, which meant something big was happening, something big and maybe bad. Something that meant he would need to listen carefully to what she said and keep the twins in line. And behind her, that burly blonde doglord, eyes rounded at the three children like maybe he'd seen a ghost. 

But maybe he'd just never seen halfbreed bastards before.

"Spurian," his mother said quietly, and they both stepped into the room, closing the door behind them. "Help the twins. Pack only what we cannot leave behind. We're leaving. Now." When he and his siblings gaped back, still and silent as life had taught them to be, she closed in on him and put a hand on his cheek, her eyes searching his for his understanding. This, she was telling him, was urgent. She needed his help. "Now, Spurian. We have to be gone before Geiger notices."

Right. Right. Spurian could do this. He was fifteen, nearly a man. Certainly the man of the family. He gave a terse nod and turned to Tama and Tully, who were clinging together and staring between their mother and the man behind her. But now that she knew she could count on Spurian, she was bustling about the room, gathering things up, clothes, shoes, coats, staves. They didn't have much, not even after eight years. Owning things had never really seemed...real. Or right. It wouldn't take them long to pack. 

"You heard her," he told the twins, and reached out to touch both of their cheeks as his mother had just touched his. "Only what we can't leave behind."

"Mother?" Tully asked uncertainly, just as Tama squeaked, "Spuri?"

"Listen to your brother," their mother said without turning from her task. "Do as he says." She hesitated and finally glanced over her shoulder to give the little ones an encouraging smile that didn't reach the teal eyes they all shared. "We're going to live in a castle. Would you like that?"

The twins practically salivated as they nodded their enthusiastic agreement. 

"Then you'd better get packing," added Spurian with a smile he didn't feel either. 

A castle? He frowned sharply at the doglord by the door, appraising him, the sword at his hip. If need be, he decided, he could take this human down. If need be, they could get away.

So Spurian helped pack.

Chapter Text

The two younger ones had never even sat astride a horse before. It was a baffling concept to Cullen, who had learned to ride even before he learned to walk. But then, when would these poor babes have ever had the opportunity? They lived so tightly concentrated among the markets and the rest of the Minrathous wretched that there'd be no need for even a pack mule, much less a place to keep one. Maker, just to stable the horses they'd brought with them for a few hours had been exorbitant. And the prices of the old nags they'd sold him when he realized they'd need more to get everyone and everything out of the city could have bankrupted all of Honnleath! But Leliana had told him 'at any cost' and even if she hadn't, he couldn't in good conscience leave Hal's sister and her children behind in this place simply because it was too expensive to stomach. 

So now they stood in the alley behind the Dragon, a semi-circle of unmarked Inquisition men with swords and bows, all of them former Templars, regal and straight-backed on their warhorses. And in the middle, two sway-backed nags and two gentler mares and Cullen standing alone at the reins while Lanaya and her dour eldest son tried to convince the nine-year-olds that the horses wouldn't bite. The little boy was showing signs of curiosity but the girl was having none of it. She was hiding bodily behind her mother's legs, peeking round-eyed out at the towering quadrupeds like they were archdemons. The horses were getting restless and overhead a dozen prostitutes and dirty children were hanging out the windows, laughing and shouting crass, awful things at Lanaya and her children for the audacity of leaving. For the audacity of trying for something better. 

There was a crowd gathering on the street now too, and if they had any hope of getting out of town before this Geiger fellow caught on that his most popular attraction was skipping out on him, they'd have to move quickly. Cullen twisted around to hand off the reins of the new horses and clicked his tongue for his faithful Herald -- Hal's idea of a blasphemous joke because "the horse is just as much Herald of Andraste as I am". He was a massive stallion, Herry, given to him by Hal as a thank you for all he'd done for her and the Inquisition after his favorite mount had gone down screaming in the Arbor Wilds, piked through the chest with Red Lyrium in a last-ditch charge. Before Hal and the others in the Temple had turned things around as she always seemed to do. Herald was a gorgeous specimen, seventeen hands high, broad-shouldered and proud, an Anderfel Courser, russet and cream patched, with a white mane and tail he kept knotted for the road and battle. He was a formidable steed, vicious in a fight, never spooked, but also surprisingly sweet-natured, and, more than that...expertly trained with a menagerie of tricks and commands by their Master of Horse with Hal at his side. For some time, Cullen had dismissed the majority of them as a waste of time, though he'd laughed and clapped when Hal'd demonstrated. Today he understood. Today he was grateful.

"Kneel, Herald," he instructed, and the warhorse did just that, lowering his front half with his forelegs tucked beneath him. "Good man." He produced an apple from his pack and carved a piece with his dagger, offering it out flat-hand to be lipped up by the horse. Cheers rose up from the children and whores above them.

He didn't do more than glance at Lanaya's children, a casual checking in to make sure they were watching. Four sets of bright turquoise eyes were locked on Herald. So far so good. When the horse had finished his treat, Cullen pretended to notice Spurian as if on accident. "Son," he called, as though he hadn't been carefully memorizing what this little family had named one another as they packed. "Your name is Spurian?"

The young man was studying him with the same shrewd survival instincts Lanaya had shown as well. His eyes were narrowed, his lips pursed. Spurian knew what Cullen was doing. He decided, apparently, to help. "Aye, serah."

Cullen smiled, just a little, so as not to scare the kid away. He carved another piece of apple and held it out. "Care to give it a try?"

The teen hesitated and finally stepped forward, taking the apple with fingers careful not to so much as graze his own. Eyes full of suspicion. So Cullen was slow and careful when he bent down to whisper a command in a very human ear.

"Be firm," he murmured. The boy stood stiff and wary beside him. "Say 'Herald, rest'." Hal had been particularly proud of that one.

"Herald," commanded Spurian, frowning almost comically with concentration, "rest."

The courser dutifully dropped his haunches onto the disgusting ground of the back alley, curled up as if to sleep, closed his eyes, and -- the part that never failed to make the Inquisitor laugh -- huffed with each exhale like he was snoring. Even Spurian, who looked as though he'd never found any reason to smile in his short life, lit up in surprise. He even let out a little laugh before he remembered himself. Above them the brothel residents cheered again.

"Excellent, Your Worship," Cullen told Herald, and then nudged Spurian. "You can feed him the apple now. Mind you keep your fingers flat." Had Spurian been alone, he would have jokingly suggested the horse would bite them clean off with the apple, but as they were trying to coax his siblings to ride, he left that bit out. He watched thoughtfully as Spurian knelt by the horse and held his hand as Cullen had. Watched as he let out a boyish gasp when soft horse lips fumbled against his palm. This time when Cullen smiled, he made no attempt to temper it. "You're a natural horseman," he praised. The boy scowled as though the Commander were trying to trick him into something and quickly found his feet again.

But it worked. The younger brother was suddenly tugging at Cullen's sleeve. "Me next, serah! Me next!"

"Only if you tell me your name," the Commander bargained overseriously.

"Catullus Iustor!" cried the boy enthusiastically. "But everybody calls me Tully!"

"Well, Tully," Cullen laughed, carving out another piece of fruit and pressing it into the boy's hand, "I'm Cullen. And this is Herald. You're going to give him a command, and, if he does it correctly, then you'll hold out your hand very, very flat and still and let him have the apple. Can you do that?"

"Yes, serah!"

Cullen peeked at Tully's sister, who was slowly creeping closer with each new trick, and then refocused on the boy with the apple. "Tell him to count to five."

"Count--" he started, then tried again. "Herald, count to five!"

The painted warhorse sat up and clomped one massive hoof on the dirt street. 

"One!" shouted Tully and their audience overhead. "Two! Three! Four! Five!" The whores and their bastards went wild. Tully leaned excitedly forward before he realized how very close he was to such a large face, but Spurian was there like a calm shadow beside him before Cullen could even think to move, helping him hold out his treat.

"Excellent, Your Worship," said Spurian. Smart boy.

The shouting and the show was drawing more attention with every moment. If he was going to get these kids on the horses and go, it would need to be fast. Luckily there was a small hand in his, and Cullen's heart shuddered warmly when he looked down to find the girl's big aqua eyes peering up at his. "I'm Tama," she whispered shyly. He smiled so hard it actually ached. 

"Hello, Tama," he greeted softly because she seemed the type of child for whom there should only ever be soft things. "Did you know Herald gives the best kisses?" Her eyes grew even larger as she shook her head. "Would you like Herald to give you a kiss?" Her whole face might have been those striking teal eyes as she gave a hesitant nod. "Let's see what we can do about that, shall we?" He led her ever-so-gently toward the stallion and knelt before her in the shit and the filth so that she would get close enough to Herald's mouth for the trick. 

"Herald," he murmured, and touched the girl's brown baby cheek with one indicating finger. "Give us a kiss." The horse leaned forward, sniffed curiously at Tama's dark silver hair, and then pushed his wiggly lips against her face. She let out a high-pitched squeal and began to giggle so hard that she hiccuped. Cullen surreptitciously fed Herald the rest of the apple while she laughed. "Atta boy."

That's how it was Cullen ended up riding one of the old nags out of Minrathous while Lanaya and Tully took a mare together and Spurian held his sister before him on the Commander's finest mount.

It was not a dignified exit, but at least they made it out.

Chapter Text

"Fuck! Bull! Fuck, I'm--" Dorian's vision swam and pulsed as the Qunari drove into him with something just short of abandon. Bull lived up to his name in size, it was something they laughed about, that he was hung like an Iron Bull, but it meant they had to be careful, meant that if Dorian was bottoming, as he usually was, that Bull always had to hold back just a little, had to be aware of how much of his length Dorian could take before it stopped hurting so good and started hurting so bad, and Dorian was human, he was built softer, smaller, he wasn't meant to take the kind of punishment the Qunari were. Bull was always holding back somehow, except in love. Bull was never shy about his feelings. Bull held back in sex. Dorian held back in love. 

But at the moment, the only thing Dorian was holding was his own mussed hair, gripping at it for lack of anything better to do with his hands because he had been furiously stroking himself until Bull had taken over, until Bull had shoved his small human hands away and taken his shaft in a Qun hand like the hand of the fucking Maker himself, it was so big. It used to make Dorian insecure, used to make him worry about the size of his cock because how could anything be big enough for the tonnage of purebred Qunari muscle that was The Iron Bull? But Bull didn't care, Bull didn't mind, Bull was emphatically enthusiastic about his appreciation for Dorian's body, for Dorian's erections, for Dorian's tight ass. For Dorian's sensitive heart. And now Bull was pumping into him at a frantic pace and using the same oil that was moving him so well inside the Tevinter mage to lubricate his big Qun palm on Dorian's completely average human cock -- "There's nothing average about you," Bull always insisted when he said that -- and Dorian wouldn't be able to hold out much longer, couldn't breathe, couldn't see, couldn't even fucking think, which was a blessing, which was all he really wanted, all he'd wanted since the moment he'd read Leliana's note over Hal's shoulder.

"Bull! Fasta vass, Bull, I'm coming, I'm coming!" 

His Qunari rumbled a laugh and shifted his hips and then Dorian really was coming, coming with a sound that ripped from his throat like a keen because fuck, that was exactly the spot, that was exactly...

Dorian's mind went blank. Gloriously, perfectly blank. He knew only the excruciating pleasure of his release, the feral warmth that speared through him, the hot wet sticky relief that went everywhere, just everywhere, on Bull's hand, on Bull's cheek, on Dorian's stomach, and Bull's satisfied string of Qunari curses as Dorian clenched around him and he collapsed on top of the mage, still laughing but breathless, triumphant, high on adrenaline and sex, and while Dorian was floating pleasantly in his slow coming down, Bull's mouth was on his neck, his breath heated and familiar.

"Better now, my asala?"

The mage stiffened beneath the man still inside him, but not the welcome kind of stiffening. And Bull felt it. He let out an irritated sigh against Dorian's skin as he disentangled their bodies and dropped so hard on the other side of Dorian on the mattress that the bed shook. This was good because it meant Bull was less likely to notice how Dorian shook too.

"I'm not asking you to say it back," Bull grumbled, splaying out on the twisted covers. "But you can at least try not to wince every fucking time I say it."

"Sorry," Dorian mumbled miserably, and rolled onto his side to give his back to his lover. He pulled his knees up toward his chest and hugged the nearest pillow with both arms. He was sure he looked like a petulant child, but he didn't give a druffalo's dick what he looked like. How could he care about something so selfish and shallow when Hal'lasean's sister, her sister, was at this very moment probably underneath some disgustingly fat blood mage like an overfed tick pretending she was feeling anything but revulsion as he grunted and thrusted and...

Dorian felt decidedly ill.

Bull dragged him backwards without asking, using that impossible Qunari strength to pull him across the bed until his back was against muscled chest, and held him there, clasped him tightly with strong arms around his stomach. "If you can't talk to me," the other man rumbled, his voice felt more than heard, "why don't you talk to the Boss? Whatever it is, she'll help. She always does." Dorian was shaking his head over and over before Bull even finished what he was saying. "You have to talk to somebody, Dorian. You've been drunk all day every day for a week now, which is fine but you've got that little boy depending on you and then every night you come sniffing for sex -- not that I'm complaining about that -- but when I wake up in the morning, you're gone. So you're going to talk to somebody, even if I have to throw you over my shoulder and carry you up to her tower myself."

"Not her," Dorian breathed out sharply, his voice humiliatingly thick. It wasn't like Bull had never seen him cry -- he had been an absolute wreck when they'd lost Hal for two weeks -- but that didn't make it feel less ridiculous and foolish. And vulnerable. Maker, it always felt too, too, too vulnerable. "I'll talk if I have to, but I can't talk to her." He clenched his eyes shut to keep them dry. "Not about this."

Bull was quiet for a moment and then his chin hooked over the top of Dorian's head. "Varric then?" he suggested. "You could talk to her Wolf if you need, but you'd have to do that through the Fade, I guess." He paused again and Dorian could practically hear him preparing his pointed final option: "Or, since you're right here, and I'm right here, you could talk to me. I've been told I'm a pretty good listener."

"I don't know where to begin." He felt himself shrinking even more into himself just at that whispered confession, but there was Bull behind him, around him, enveloping him with strength and safety and warmth, keeping him present despite his best efforts to escape.

"I've also been told the beginning is usually a good place for that."

Dorian was too mired in self-loathing to smile or even roll his eyes. The beginning. What was the beginning? "I used to go to a whorehouse in Minrathous." Well. That would have to do. "We all did. A place called the Gilded Dragon. Best pay-to-play in all of Tevinter. It was..." He laughed, but it wasn't out of amusement. "It was a clean, classy establishment. That's why we went. All the nobles. It's just where you went. They were..." He thought he might throw up, but he swallowed it down as punishment, tasting the sharp bile and refusing to let it out. He deserved to suffer. "...discreet. Some of the rooms have hidden passageways so that if...if you're like me, if you're looking for something with a cock but you can't be seen going after it, you can go in a door to a woman's room and slip through to the man in the next." He swallowed again, this time to bury the lump in his throat. "His name was Danyl. The man I used to go see. Halfblooded fellow, some..." Maker, how did he never notice that the things he said, the things he did were so...disgusting, so heinous? All this time worrying about lusting after men, he should have been worrying about lusting after... "Some bastard son of a Magister and his elven slave." Dorian thought for sure he was going to vomit this time, but instead there were tears on his cheeks and Bull's arms tightening around him. Hot, shameful tears like the cum still stuck to his stomach. "Fasta vass, Bull, I think I knew Hal's--" His back shuddered with a tightly withheld sob. "But of course I didn't pay attention, did I, not to someone beneath me, certainly not to a woman, so I wouldn't remember, would I, when I met the Inquisitor and she looked just like some freed whore in the cathouse where I used to--" The sob finally escaped, an agonized sound that was fraternal twin to the one he'd made as he came. "I am...I am a monster!" And now he truly was weeping, his face contorted even though he knew he was an unattractive cryer because fuck it, fuck it, fuck it all, what did it matter, and so he let out his sounds too, his gasps and low-voiced wails, and Bull's hand, still oiled from their coitus, was moving soothingly down his arm over and over. "I'm a monster and a coward! What am I doing, waiting until my father dies to free the slaves! The slaves, Bull! I-- I own-- even now, even now, I own--" He was no longer capable of making intelligible words. There was just his unmanful bawling and Bull's lips against his hair.

"Shhhhh," coaxed his lover. "Shhh, shhh, shhhh. You're not a monster or a coward. Couldn't be. I'm incapable of loving monsters and cowards. All Qunari are." That only made Dorian weep more loudly. Bull laughed fondly as he stroked and petted and caressed. "You know what you're feeling right now? Hm? This is what it feels like to break away. We've all done it. Boss with her tattoos and that school she's building, Commander and his Templars, Cassandra and her Seekers. First comes the discomfort, then the horror, then the self-hatred...that one lasts for a while. And then one day you come out the other side and you think, screw it, here I am, a Tal Vashoth, but I've got my people and I've got my purpose, so it's not so bad. Not really. You're still you." He kissed Dorian's ear and then his rumpled hair and when he next spoke his voice was gentler, almost sweet. "The Magisterium, they're the monsters and the cowards. You just had the bad luck to be born among them." He hesitated and sat up in the bed, rolling Dorian onto his back so that they could see each other's faces. Or at least so they would, if Dorian were to open his eyes. "Look at me. Dorian. Look at me."

He was still sobbing messily as he forced himself to acquiesce, his face trembling with his disgust for himself so that his mustache twitched. He was sure he looked ridiculous. He kept telling himself he didn't care. He shouldn't care. And then Bull's mouth was on his and he didn't care, not in that moment. It was just their lips and their tongues and Bull's taste, Maker, Bull's perfect taste, like whiskey and fire and something he never could figure out, something distinctly Qunari, he thought, but that didn't matter either, it was Bull, it was just Bull, and Dorian couldn't get enough. Never could.

When the other man finally broke the kiss, it was to hover just above Dorian, making all three of their eyes meet no matter how badly Dorian wanted to disappear. "You can wince all you want, Dorian Pavus, you beautiful idiot, because I'm going to say this until you believe it and it doesn't matter if you say it back because I know you feel it, even if you can't tell me yet. Dorian. Dorian. I love you. I love you. You're a good man with a good heart and I love you. You still feel shitty, you wanna do something about it, fine, you fix it, and I'll help you fix it, we'll all help you fix it, but don't you ever, don't ever think you're not good. Because you are. I wouldn't love you if you weren't." His eye narrowed. "You got me?"

He wasn't sure how he made himself nod. He couldn't breathe, didn't really want to breathe, but somehow he was nodding, tiny, embarrassing gestures that were so stupidly, stupidly vulnerable. But it made Bull smile. He did love that smile. Well, not love, not love love, but he...that is, Bull...that is to say...well, what he meant was...

"You got me," Bull assured him, and kissed him again until he couldn't remember what he was upset about in the first place.

Chapter Text

"Vhenan."

She'd been drugged. Hal'lasean had requested more tea from the kitchen, the tea she'd been drinking all week that kept her awake, and someone -- she suspected Merrill, since it would likely have been a mage and Dorian could barely look her in the eye lately -- had slipped something else into it. She had only closed her eyes for a moment at her desk, but now he was standing in front of her with such feeling in his expression, such sympathy and worry for her, which was precisely what she had been trying to avoid. Well, no. Not avoid. Put off.

"You've been avoiding me."

Okay, yes, maybe avoiding.

Hal'lasean couldn't even muster the energy to pretend she was angry. "You had me drugged?"

He showed her his palms, his hands by his sides but turned towards her, in a gesture of contrition. "Ir abelas, ma lath. It was this or returning to you bodily. I have been so worried. I have accomplished nothing of value in days." His brow knit and he reached for her. It was a dream and he was Fen'Harel, so she was suddenly drawn to him, the desk gone, her chair gone, just their two bodies in her chambers. But it was her dream and she had his magic in her, so she tossed up a barrier in the Fade before he could wrap her in his arms. His face twisted with his shock and hurt. "Are you angry with me?"

Hal'lasean felt her expression shift for the first time since she'd entered her dream, neutrality morphing into apology. "No," she sighed quietly. "Of course not." His blue eyes were full of questions and she hugged her arms over her stomach to protect herself and, apparently, their unborn child from them. "I'm just tired, ma Fen." The apology became emotional exhaustion and then he was gathering her in his arms anyway, holding her as her room changed around her, kissing her forehead needfully as her dream turned into their dream and she was standing in the bathhouse on the Exalted Plains as it must have once been, luxurious and steamy and deliciously hot, but without another soul present. Hal was shaking her head even before their surroundings settled. "Please don't," she whispered, but being held by him didn't hurt as much as she'd expected, so even as she protested, she was curling closer like a flower to the sun. "I don't want to feel anymore this week. Okay? I don't..."

The dream changed again and now they were standing on the banks of the Enavuris under starlight, and still they were alone. "Ma nuvenin, vhenan'ara. But you must at least let me take care of you." He pulled her away from him enough to search her face with the endless depths of eyes that had once held such hidden mysteries, but which now were all openness and love. "Please, Hal'lasean. I cannot work for worrying."

It was concern for him and not herself that found Hal's lips on his, that finally unfurled her arms from her own body to seek out his as their tongues tangled with slow mourning. They comforted each other in that way for some time, but eventually he pulled her down onto a patch of soft grass until she was cross-legged in front of him and he was smoothing her hair from her face with an intensity of affection only the Dread Wolf could provide. "I'm okay," she assured him with an attempt at a self-effacing smile. "I've just been crying a lot and I didn't..." She let out a hollow laugh. "I didn't want you to feel guilty or..."

His smile was bittersweet as he cupped her cheek and traced his thumb over the bones of her face. "Is the child ours?" he asked without accusation.

"Of course."

Fen'Harel leaned forward to brush a kiss on her lips. "Then we share in all things where the child is involved. Joys and sorrows. And as you are my heart, your cares are mine."

Hal's gaze dropped to her lap but he tilted her chin up with his fingers beneath her jaw so that she had to meet his eyes. "You've been talking to Merrill?" she asked with no more sound than the rhythmic lapping of the water on the shore before them. 

"I did not have to," he admitted, his smile turning fond and even a touch amused. "You have barely slept at all during the night since you were meant to have your examination."

"But you had her drug me," she pointed out frankly, and it was so absurd that Hal very nearly found herself sharing his melancholy mirth. 

"Actually," and he laughed, his eyes twinkling, "she refused on the grounds of familial loyalty and, I imagine, because she still does not trust me. No, it was our steadfast Seeker who obliged, though it took some doing as her connection to the Fade is delicate."

"Cassandra?" she gasped, and then because she could so clearly imagine the Seeker's serious face as she laced the tea, Hal actually let out a sound not entirely unlike a laugh. She was rewarded by the light and gratitude in Fen'Harel's eyes. He closed the distance between them to touch their foreheads together, to nuzzle his nose to her cheek, and she leaned into the contact, relaxing just enough to experience relief without giving into the adder's nest of emotions that lurked just below her surface. 

"I thought," Fen'Harel murmured, "you might seek counsel from the silanavhen. They span millennia and many of them know me as 'harellan'." Their shared power stuttered with his pained heart. "It is possible the youngest of them may have at least been aware of mortal women carrying Elvhen children. I have scoured the Dales, dreamt all over Halamshiral, even attempted the tumultuous Fade in the Arlathan Forest, but I have encountered nothing that might aid us. Until I can locate the remaining sentinels, I believe the silanavhen may be our best potential source."

It made sense. It was an unpleasant thought because she was not immortal, not even truly a mage, and the fact that she of all The People had drunk from the Vir'Abelasan was so offensive even the high priestess Mereni Fen'Harel had introduced her to months prior viewed Hal with a certain amount of condescension and disdain. It was one thing to receive that kind of disgusted dismissal from the shemlen nobility; it was quite another to find it in the eyes and faces of the very Elvhen she had been raised to hold in such esteem.

"They are nothing," her love promised her when she didn't respond. Hal hadn't even realized that her face had fallen quite so severely, that she was visibly anxious at just the thought of going back into the Temple of Mythal that now was a permanent piece of her mind. "They are not spirits or people anymore, vhenan; they are only memory. You are the worthy recipient of the Well and all its knowledge. They are yours to command." His hand was in her hair, tucking it behind her ear so his fingertips could trace the pink point that told the elven world she was with child. She closed her eyes at the touch, relishing it, letting it take her thoughts from immortal children and immortal voices and concentrate them only on immortal lovers. If only for just a moment.

The moment was gone too soon.

"I already spoke to them," Hal admitted. Had they been awake, he might not have even made out her words, they were so soft, but they were in the Fade, where meaning and feelings were often heard whether or not a person wished them to be. He pulled back to look at her, his brow tucking low over his eyes like castle-forged steel, and it was then that the tears came again as they had been all week, in spurts and starts, when she least expected them. Her cheeks warmed unpleasantly and the only thing left for her to do was to tilt her head and shrug her shoulders and give a helpless, miserable smile that was really more of a grimace. 

"Ma halla," he exhaled thickly, and pressed his lips to hers in gentle supplication. Then because the tears were few, he kissed each of them from her skin as they fell. "Tell me, if you can."

"It wasn't anything we didn't already guess for ourselves," she sighed, and there were more tears, so there were more kisses. "They knew stories of complications when an Elvhen coupled with a shemlen, but for elves, it was always...a diminishing. Each new generation lived a shorter life, so each new pregnancy was..." Hal started laughing, only slightly hysterically, and closed her eyes. It was easier than seeing his face. "It wasn't a problem," she confessed, "because the pregnancies became shorter and shorter until they were nine months as all mortal pregnancies are now. This..." Her shoulders sank, so he gathered her into his lap, guided her head to his shoulder, wrapped her body in his strong Elvhen arms. Her fists found his tunic, then lowered until one of them gripped hard at the wolf jaw, letting the teeth sink into her palm. "You and I. There's no precedent for this. We're two sides of a spectrum that was never meant to..." But she couldn't say it. 

"No," he said, because he could, his voice firm with his lips against her forehead. "Banal nadas. We have time, Hal'la. There is time yet." 

But neither of them were willing to admit to what would have to happen when they ran out of that time. They both thought it, both knew the other thought it, but couldn't bring themselves to so much as hint at it. At the reality they may one day face should it become apparent that the child within Hal'lasean would require days or weeks of labor to be brought into the world, a burden her mortal body might not be capable of bearing. It could break her and they both knew it. Both feared it. It could break her body even as she birthed new life, leaving Fen'Harel alone with her plans and their infant, bereft of his mortal heart long before she should have passed into the Beyond. But Fen'Harel had been very clear to Hal he would rather have her and only her for the length of her short life than to lose her early because she worried he might forget her without a child by his side.

One day when the time ran out, they might need to decide between her life or the life of the child within her. 

"Women have always done this," she whispered to convince them both, and he nodded his agreement. "Even a mortal pregnancy wouldn't be a guarantee that everything would be okay. My...my mother was proof enough of that."

Fen'Harel crushed her to him as though he were trying to take her into himself, to shelter her there in his immortal form. And though it was desperately sweet, it also brought to mind an image of Fen'Harel, pregnant with their child, offering up his body to save hers, if he could. Hal found herself laughing, and he was so startled that he leaned back to stare at her, his brows climbing his forehead with baffled worry. 

"I'm sorry," she laughed, her cheeks still wet from her tears, "I'm sorry, I just...I imagined you pregnant. With your little frilly cakes and your ridiculous--" His tongue was in her mouth and Hal forget what it was she was going to say, perfectly content instead to find her back on the grass beneath her and her Wolf between her legs.

Chapter Text

They were laughing as they fucked, both of them, in between their cries and gasps. Laughing because Hal'lasean spent the whole of their lovemaking teasing Fen'Harel about what he would be like pregnant, which meant he spent the whole of their lovemaking trying every Elvhen god-like trick he had ever learned to steal the breath from her lungs and make her to forget to talk. But it was good to see her smile without tears in her eyes, to hear her amusement after a week of worry, and he truthfully did not mind that it was directed at him, even in the midst of their pleasure. The young Wolf would have hated it. He would have been affronted. But the young Wolf had never been in love. The young Wolf knew nothing of the joy and privilege of taking Hal'lasean to bed. So they laughed together, even while she had one foot on his chest, one on his shoulder, even while he gripped her hips to help hold her up, even as he battered into her like an enemy force at her castle gates. She did frequently forget to speak, often became completely incapable of making sounds at all, but just as they were nearing their ends, she clasped her hand on his while the other grasped at his bent knee, and told him very seriously that she might enjoy it if he were to grow breasts.

"So help me, woman-mine," he snarled in Elvhen, leaning his weight forward and delighting in how her laughing cut off abruptly in favor of an unguarded groan, "if you do not cease your prattling, I will turn you around and fill your mouth with my cock!"

"Dread Wolf," she laughed in the trade tongue, and he growled in amused frustration, "shut up and make me come already!"

"You will pay..." Fen'Harel angled himself again, using one arm to hold them both up and thrusting so fiercely into the heat of her that she slid backwards on the grass. "You will pay for this, haurasha."

Her eyes flashed in that way that made the Wolf inside him rabid with the thrill of the hunt. "Make me."

So he did. With her feet on his shoulders, no longer laughing because she was calling out his name, and then again, mere moments later, with his throaty threat of more. "Nu'da'din'sal'mah, vhenan." She did not know what it meant; her Elvhen came beautifully and naturally to her tongue, but it was not a language learned in months or even years. Elvhen was a language one spent one's entire immortal life exploring and experiencing. Still, when he flipped her onto her knees and mounted her from behind, she understood well enough. And when he groped with one hand at her breasts -- big enough now with her changing body to finally have some swing to them -- while the other worked magic on the swollen nub of her clitoris, driving inside her at just the right angle to make her thighs give out beneath her, she forgot to laugh, forgot to talk. Forgot everything but his name and fenedhis and please and prey sounds to feed the Wolf.

When she laughed again, collapsed on the grass in a pile of limbs and sweat, it was a low, satisfied giggle, as though she were particularly pleased with herself. He would have taken her again if she had continued, but instead she twisted beneath him to allow her to study his features as they caught their breath, the smallest of intoxicated smiles on her wet lips. Hal'la drew her index finger down the bridge of his long nose, lovingly tracing the bumps he had always disliked in his reflection until she seemed so taken with them. He closed his eyes and sank into the feel of her touch, the scent of their sex and sweat, both altered with her pregnancy. She hummed lightly, a Dalish tune he had not heard before. Fen'Harel smiled, a slow, stuporous thing, and the fingers that had dusted his nose moved to his lips. He offered their tips a kiss.

"I'm sorry," she murmured halfway through the melody of her song, and he opened his eyes to give her a questioning look. "For avoiding you." She winced and shook her head. "Not you, never you, but...when I'm with you, I feel everything so deeply." All at once she was exhausted again, as weary as when she had first fallen asleep. "It was cruel of me to stay away. I didn't mean to worry you."

His lips found hers in silent acceptance and forgiveness. They fell into a companionable quiet then, touching each other's faces and bodies, following collarbones and muscle curves like roads on a map. It wasn't until his fingertips found the hill of her belly he loved so desperately that he interrupted their vigil. "Hal'la," he realized out loud, "you said Mythal gave you a gift."

"Mm?" was her only response.

He favored her with a kiss and clarified. "When you told me Mythal had visited you while you were unconscious, you mentioned she gave us each a gift. You were mine, you said." 

"Mm."

Fen'Harel moved his palm thoughtfully over the soft skin of his lover's stomach. "What was your gift?"

"Oh," Hal'lasean laughed. "I don't know. She didn't say." Just as he opened his mouth to voice his incredulity, she explained. "She didn't have much time, remember. Most of what she said was about you. Who you were, who you had been, what you meant to do." She smiled sweetly. "What I meant to you. The things I was supposed to tell you from her."

His brow pulled low over his eyes as he puzzled through what any of that might mean, what Mythal might be planning, even now, from the Beyond. "She told you she was giving you a gift, but not what it was?"

His heart smiled haplessly, blushing a pale pink. "You may be used to facing down the All-Mother in her spirit form, but I'm not. I asked her just before she left and she said I'd know in a few years. I wasn't going to push." Those violet-touched-turquoise eyes of hers narrowed shrewdly at him. "You think Mythal's gift to me has something to do with our child. Would she have that kind of power? She's gone, isn't she? How could she...?"

Truthfully, Fen'Harel had no idea. There was much he had believed about Mythal, and in the last several months the woman had proved an astounding portion of it incorrect. But he did not have the Dalish excuse of time and oppression and lost history. He could blame only himself for not seeing his old friend's machinations. He had begun to wonder with increasing anxiety how much of what had happened before, in Elvhenan, had been quietly, indirectly, expertly orchestrated by the one The People called the Mother-Protector. He was so skilled at the Game because he had never trusted anyone beyond himself, but he was noticing with disturbing frequency now that perhaps he was not quite so adept at reading others as he once had thought. "I do not know," he admitted earnestly. "There are things about Mythal's magic I find myself unable to comprehend." He never would have admitted it to anyone else, but this was Hal'lasean, and the more truth he told her, the easier it became to keep telling it. These days it hardly occurred to him to weave falsehoods to protect himself from her or her from him. They were stronger together, no matter how weak that made him feel. Mythal had seen to that. "It is possible she even had some hand in the conception." 

Fen'Harel meant it seriously, but his heart waggled her brows and grinned. "Don't you think we would have noticed if someone else had been involved?"

If he were a mortal or a commoner, he might have rolled his eyes, but it was not done in the courts of Arlathan. Instead, he purred, "Ma sa'lath, when I have you naked in my arms, I notice little else." That pleased her so much that her grin faded into a satisfied smile and she slipped her tongue into his mouth to reward him. When the kiss ended, he let his expression turn solemn, the corners of his eyes wrinkling with concern. "I do not wish to raise our hopes, ma'lan. But she is the All-Mother, the Mother-Protector for a reason. Sylaise may have kept the hearth, may have taught The People how best to birth their children, but first she learned those things from Mythal. I merely mean to...suggest that it is...probable her gift to you will become clear by the time our child is born. But we must be wary and cautious." He could not bear to imagine Hal'lasean disappointed, especially in this. Could not bear to imagine what her disappointment might mean for her life or for the life of their unborn babe. 

"Well," sighed Hal'la, a spark of mischief in her teal eyes, "if Mythal's gift is between our child and a pony, I suppose I choose our child."

His lips quirked upward. "Do not be so quick to decide. You have yet to see the pony."

Chapter Text

Commander Cullen Rutherford of her sister's Inquisition was a man who made absolutely no sense. That was all there was to it. She had been watching him for a week now and she understood him less than when he first knocked at her door. It was fascinating and absurd, but mostly it was irritating. Lanaya was always irritated with him.

It irritated her how he never could stop nearly calling her 'my lady'. He didn't seem to know what else to say and she offered him no alternatives, so day after day, he fumbled through speaking to her with at least one stammered apology when the inappropriate title slipped out. It was a foreign thing. Vints never forgot who was noble and who was not. Only the purest Imperial bloodlines bore women who could be ladies, and to allow someone to call you otherwise could get a lesser creature thrown in prison. The fact that he couldn't seem to get it through his thick Fereldan skull made him look foolish and slow and it irritated her that she and her children were stuck in the wilderness with an idiot doglord.

It irritated her that he wouldn't tell her what they were doing out in the middle of nowhere, west of Weisshaupt, away from the fucking Imperial Highway they should at that very moment be taking to Cumberland so they could buy passage on a ship across the Waking Sea. Only an idiot doglord would turn west of all directions when he was trying to get them to the Frostbacks from Minrathous. It was a complete wonder the man was even still alive, if he couldn't navigate a simple map, and Lanaya was beginning to think it was some horrible joke that he was responsible for her sister's troops. Rationally, she knew there must just be something he wasn't telling her, some side errand they were running, because if he was in fact in charge of the soldiers (as the other soldiers all seemed to agree he was) of such a successful military force, he had to be good at something. It irritated her that he wouldn't just tell her what the fuck they were doing in the Makerforsaken Anderfels. It irritated her that they weren't taking a route that made sense to her. It terrified her that maybe she'd made the wrong choice, that these men had never had any intention of taking them to the Inquisition headquarters, that maybe her sister -- this Hal'lasean Lavellan -- was in fact worried for her legacy and planned to have them all executed and buried anonymously in the forest so that no one would ever guess the Dalish Herald of Andraste was related to a Tevene whore with bastard human children. It irritated her endlessly that she was terrified.

It irritated Lanaya that they were camped with five men who no doubt all had coin in their pockets, who must all have cocks in their breeches, and that not a single one of them so much as groped her or leered at her or even grabbed themselves and winked at her when the Commander wasn't looking. She was certain he must have threatened his men with bodily harm to treat her like the noblewoman he kept trying to call her. She saw the way he flinched when she named herself a whore back in the whorehouse. As if it offended his delicate sensibilities, as if he had never in his life paid for, as he had put it, 'a quick tumble'. He was a man, wasn't he? Of course he had. They couldn't help themselves. But he was one of those insufferable men of honor who tried to pretend they were above it all, who had probably never had to do anything vile or unpleasant besides run something through with a blade in his entire idiot doglord existence. Honor was worth less than shit when you were starving in the streets. Honor was for the middle class who could afford to feed themselves but couldn't afford to bribe their way to a good reputation.

It irritated her that she was not wearing makeup or revealing clothing for the first time in eight years, that the Wardens at Weisshaupt had dressed them in plain, conservative clothing more fitted to the mountains they should be headed to than to any kind of life in Tevinter. She hadn't worn so many covering layers of clothing since before the slavers had found her, since the cold of early winter in the Free Marches, and something about the sensation of being so hidden made her nauseated all the time. That irritated her too. It irritated her that the trappings of Minrathous she had worked so hard to make her own were no longer available to her. Oh, she still had her fine clothes, the dresses that best represented her product to the paying masses, but this forest was no place for those things. And that was irritating. It wasn't right to not be on display, and she couldn't help but worry in the back of her mind that maybe that was why the men weren't seeking her out when she went to bathe or at night when the children were asleep. She had never not been pretty enough. Not until Commander Rutherford and his blighted Inquisition. It irritated her. It hurt her. And that irritated her too. It irritated her that her children actually seemed to prefer these southern clothes, this country air, the trees and the animals and the stars overhead. She wasn't irritated at them, of course; they couldn't know how much better life was in the city, in Tevinter. They had nothing with which to compare it. It was novel to them and novel to children was often preferable. No, she blamed her sister for being Inquisitor, Commander Rutherford for coming to get her. She was irritated at him.

There were myriad smaller things as well that made her snap and snarl at him.

Like how even after she made Spurian ride one of the nags the second day out from Minrathous because it was clear Tamalin had grown accustomed to the horses, the Commander was perfectly content, or so it seemed, to let her daughter ride Herald with him. For the entire week they'd been traveling together, Tamalin sat perched before him on his saddle, and he didn't touch her except as was necessary to keep her on the horse or to make her smile or laugh. Tamalin was a pretty child. A beautiful child. She had all the exotic qualities of Lanaya's elven blood without the ears, with tanned Tevinter skin that sharply contrasted her bright eyes and silver hair. There had been offers for Tamalin, flattering and exorbitant offers for her from the moment she was freed. It wouldn't have been strange or unheard of for a whore in the Dragon to sell a pretty child or put him or her to work alongside them. But Lanaya couldn't part with her children, with any of them, and always found herself sick to her stomach, reluctant to the point of shaking at just the thought of one of them joining the menu in the brothel. And now her daughter was the age she had been when the slavers had first stripped her naked by the river in the Marches. Tamalin was the same age Lanaya had been when men stopped being able to keep their hands off of her. So of course she had expected to spend much of the trip holding Tama close to her, keeping hawk-like eyes on the men as they interacted. She and Spurian both had glared at the blonde doglord on his patchwork warhorse for days, waiting for his hands to go lower or higher, to slip under clothing in search of soft baby skin. But he hadn't. Not once. What was more, she was talking to the son of a bitch, actually chatting with him as she only ever did with her mother and brothers. She was still shy around the soldiers, but whatever spell this Commander wove with her, she was constantly asking questions and receiving patient answers. He was always pointing things out to her delight and amazement. He was always getting her to laugh. He was always smiling at her. It didn't make any sense. It was infuriating and confusing. 

Like how at night as they made camp, the Commander told her children stories around the fire, stories of the magister-god Corypheus and the hole in the sky. Even Spurian would get lost in the tales, wide-eyed and gape-jawed, demanding with his siblings to know what happened next. How he never referred to Hal'lasean Lavellan as "the Inquisitor" but always as "your aunt". She could see the hero-worship already forming in three sets of teal eyes, but when she tried to suggest stories that didn't involve the Inquisition, her babies complained, and she didn't have the heart to insist. Even when she felt like she might be losing them to some Dalish bitch they'd never met.

"When we get to Aunt Hal..." was the beginning of many a question, had been for days, and each time Lanaya interrupted before Rutherford could answer. "Don't call her that. She's the Inquisitor."

"But she's your sister!" Spurian had dared to argue at first.

"Was," Lanaya had corrected darkly. "Was my sister. Once." 

"I'm sure she wouldn't mind...," the Commander had assured her with a smile.

But Lanaya was always irritated with him. Always. "I mind, Commander Rutherford!" she'd snapped. "These are my children and I mind!"

His brow had knit with confusion and something else, something darker that she couldn't quite make out, but he had bowed his head and removed himself from the conversation. "As you say, my l-- ah. As you say." Idiot doglord.

And there was more, of course. He had been teaching Spurian to spar with whittled limbs instead of swords when they stopped to rest for the night, as though her son, with his magister's blood, had any need of sharp sticks for fighting. He had his magic. All her children had their magic. And yet they still gathered 'round to ooh and ahh over the ornate lions and mabaris and flaming eyes carved into the length of his weapon.

"Did Aunt Hal-- did the Inquisitor give you that too?" Tully had demanded.

"She had it made for me after the defeat of Corypheus," the man had agreed. "She's always improving on our weapons and armor for us when she's at Skyhold." He winked and smiled and Lanaya hated him for it. "I'm sure if you ask her nicely when we get there, she'll be willing to have the Arcanist design you a powerful new staff and robes to go with it."

"And a sword?" Tully gasped.

The Commander had laughed. "If you ask nicely."

Then there'd been the night of the storm in which the tent she and her children shared had sprung a leak and had them all soaked to the bone. He had come to check on them during the commotion and immediately offered her his cloak and then his tent. 

Ah, she had thought, so he was waiting for an excuse.

But he hadn't meant for her to join him in his tent as she'd thought. No, the idiot doglord ushered her children and then Lanaya into his tent while he took his things and slept in their leaking one. 

The man made absolutely no sense.

And Lanaya hated him for it.

Chapter Text

Cullen had never in his life met a woman quite like Lanaya Alerion. He supposed he could say the same about most of the women in his life these days; the Inquisition was full of extraordinary people, but, oh, the women! Hal was, of course, the most obvious example. But he felt similarly about Cassandra, Leliana, Josephine, Vivienne, that Morrigan woman, Harding, even Sera. Maybe especially Sera, though he was often glad there were no other women like Sera. Maker, what a disaster that would be. But there was always something about each of those other women that Cullen understood intrinsically. Hal most of all. 

He spent most of the week with Lanaya Alerion positive he would absolutely never understand her. 

No, that wasn't strictly true. He understood some things. He understood that she loved her children more than herself. He understood that her life must have been difficult and terrible because of course she couldn't be much more than thirty and yet Spurian had declared himself fifteen. He understood that she really, really didn't like him. That she was growing not to like Hal without ever having met the woman she'd become. But he supposed he understood that too. He couldn't imagine what it must feel like to end up in a brothel in Minrathous and find out your little sister, who didn't even remember you until a few weeks ago, was somehow running the entirety of Thedas. But he would have thought she'd be happier, elated even, to be rid of that life. To be out of Minrathous, out of Tevinter, away from a lifetime of brutality and pain. He certainly didn't expect her to be grateful to him, but perhaps to Hal, or...oh, he didn't know, maybe just not so blighted angry about having to leave in the first place!

Cullen may not have been much use at flirting, but he had always prided himself that he could talk to just about anyone, man or woman. He was not shy; one couldn't be as a Knight-Captain, certainly not as the Commander of the Inquisition. Bashful, maybe, but not shy. He seemed to be having great luck with the children -- even serious Spurian, who Cullen was sure must have felt the burden of his entire family on his shoulders from the moment he was born -- who were opening up to him like the wild blue roses on the side of the Imperial Highway with each passing day. They were sweet-natured kids, each smart in their own way, and as was the way with children, desperate to heal from whatever life had thrown at them. But every time he felt he was making progress with one of them -- with severe Spurian or enthusiastic Tully or painfully fearful Tamalin -- there was Lanaya, watching him with disapproval, constantly waiting for him to do something wrong so she could swoop in and browbeat him into apologizing, even when he had no idea what it was he had done.

"We don't get to be around men," Tully had volunteered once when they had stopped to relieve themselves and they were waiting for the girls to return from around a copse of trees. "Not ever. Only the ones who work at the Dragon." So either Lanaya didn't take lovers, hadn't ever taken a lover, or she was obsessively careful about bringing those lovers around her children. "But Danyl doesn't know anything about swords and horses and things. He only knows flowers and perfumes and clothes, so he's not even really a man."

"Catullus," Cullen had chastised him, frowning sternly but with his voice gentle, "what makes a man isn't what he knows or what he likes. A man is a man because of the strength and compassion in his heart. Because he does what is right even when it's hard or hurts."

Spurian had stared at him with a stony, unreadable expression, but of course that had also been when Lanaya appeared with Tamalin holding her hand, glowering at him like a hurricane over tropical seas. 

What in the bloody Void have I done this time?

But he was beginning to understand a little more as he talked to the children. Just that day, Spurian had been riding beside Herald, asking questions about where they were going, which roads they would take, how long it would be until they reached Skyhold -- questions, Cullen had no doubt, had come from his mother -- when Tamalin had piped up.

"Is Skyhold really a castle like Mother said? We used to have a castle, my father's castle, only I don't remember it. He died when we were very little and we came to live in the Dragon."

Just at the mention of his father, Spurian's face had darkened dangerously. There was violence in that boy, lurking, just waiting to be let out, and Cullen hadn't missed the scrapes on his swollen knuckles that first day they'd ridden out of Minrathous. "Amantius didn't own a castle, Tamalin, it was a manse. And we didn't have it, we lived in it. That was not our home. Not that shithole or the Dragon. They were just places we had to live for a while and don't you ever forget it." Spurian had ridden off then, leaving the girl stricken. She was silent for most of the rest of the day no matter how Cullen coaxed and teased.

So now as the men were setting up the tents and preparing dinner, Cullen found Spurian at the edge of the clearing they were claiming, using the pocket knife Cullen had given him to cut notches out of a tree. Not because it was useful or made something beautiful, but because it was a release for the destruction Spurian carried within him. Cullen reached out to rest his hand on the lad's narrow shoulder and Spurian immediately jerked away, spun around, glared at him like a cornered animal.

Right, Cullen reminded himself, you can only touch Tama and Tully.

Spurian would take more time. A lot more time. But he was a good boy, a strong boy, who loved his mother and his siblings, who tried to protect them, and he deserved to have a man around who could help him heal. So Cullen vowed to himself that he would do his best to provide that. Starting now.

"What'd that tree ever do to you?" he asked lightly, offering a half-smile. Spurian returned his efforts with a scornful frown. Cullen sighed. "Come help me check the camp perimeter, son."

"I'm not your son," spat Spurian. "I'm no man's son."

The Commander held up his hands in capitulation. "I didn't mean anything by it, Spurian. It just seemed friendlier than calling you 'kid' or 'boy'." Spurian rolled his eyes and Cullen gestured toward the trees beyond the sight and hearing of his mother. "Come on. Let's go for a walk." 

It didn't slip past Spurian's notice that Cullen had glanced behind him to check for Lanaya and to make sure the men were doing their work. Nothing ever slipped past Spurian's notice, it seemed. But it was that one look that apparently led him to decide he was going to join Cullen for the walk, and he put his pocket knife away and adjusted his staff on his back as he followed the Commander into the trees. Only when they could no longer see the soldiers building the fire and feeding the horses, when the sound of stakes being driven into the ground for the tents was their one sign they were not truly alone, only then did Cullen lower himself onto a downed tree and stretch out his legs, sore from weeks now of riding all day every day. "Have a seat."

The boy was dubious and wary, so it took him some time before he complied, and even then he chose the part of the log farthest from the Commander but closest to camp. In case, Cullen supposed, he felt threatened and needed to go grab his family and run. Smart, smart boy.

"This isn't checking the camp perimeter," Spurian noted bluntly.

Cullen laughed. "No. No, it isn't. I just wanted to talk to you about something."

"So you lied."

Cullen's heart flopped pitifully in his chest. Any other fifteen-year-old would have understood, would have taken it in due course that the Commander was giving him a worthy excuse for their absence. But not Spurian. Not a child who had grown up in a Minrathous whorehouse. Who had barely, if ever, been around a man who wasn't just there to bed his mother or take something from him. Cullen wondered not for the first time if Hal knew exactly what she was getting herself into with her sister, with her niece and nephews.

"I..." Cullen was going to defend himself, to explain that it hadn't been a lie, not really, but it was. It was a lie. And his pride was not more important than this boy's feelings. So he coached his face into an expression of contrition, which wasn't hard, because he was sorry. He was so sorry for Spurian and his siblings and his mother. Sorry for the messes they were inside. Sorry for the lives they'd lived. Sorry for how hard this must be. "I did. I lied. I'm sorry for that, truly. I should have simply told you why I wanted to bring you out here. You're nearly a man, you deserve directness." He waited and watched and only when Spurian made no move to protest or seem unconvinced did he continue. "I wanted to talk to you about what you said to Tamalin today."

Spurian, to his credit, turned the kind of copper Dorian always went when he was embarrassed or ashamed. It was the first time Cullen had ever seen the boy blush. "I didn't mean to be cross with her," he mumbled, and Cullen's chest warmed. "But she has to learn."

"Learn what?" Cullen prompted.

The boy scowled, but not at Cullen. He was scowling at the world, at what it had done to him and the people he loved. "That no matter what Mother says, Amantius wasn't our father. Not really. He didn't love us, he owned us. Owned her. He didn't love her! She's beautiful and she always has been and he's a man, so he took her and that's why the twins and I are here, but he's not our father, that was not our home, not his fucking mansion with his stupid wife and his stupid heir and not the Gilded Dragon!" By the time he got it out, he was practically shouting, his fists clenched, his jaw tight, his teal eyes like veilfire, they were so volatile. 

So that was it. That was what Cullen wasn't seeing. These weren't just the bastard children of a Tevinter prostitute by any man who paid her, nor were they the bastard children of a kept woman in love whose hard times put her in a brothel. These children, these poor actual bastards, were that common Imperial story about a magister with a pretty elven slave who thought nothing of sticking his dick in his property, even if that property was a little girl. Cullen closed his eyes against the horror of it, against the sudden swell of bile in his throat, against the white hot rage inside him where the Lyrium used to be. He breathed through it, calmed himself, made sure that when he opened his eyes to look at the boy again, Spurian wouldn't see a reflection of his own violence, but a man who conquered his righteous fury. Who let it sweep through him and beyond him. When honey-brown eyes met teal again, Cullen was aware that Spurian was studying him closely. Good. Let him see. Let him understand what being a man was.

Thank the Maker I didn't bed her, came a voice in the back of his mind, and that made him momentarily ill again too.

"She's nine, Spurian," Cullen said gently after a time, after he was sure he could use his voice without cursing all of Tevinter and the Maker too. "She's nine and she doesn't have to grow up as fast as you did. There's time enough for her to learn those truths." He took a breath and gave Spurian a sad but earnest smile. "I've been watching you with the twins, lad. You're an excellent big brother. One of the best I've ever seen. And they think you hung the moon. So you've got to be careful how you talk to them 'cause they'll take it to heart, the things you say. Children listen better than you might think."

He scowled again, Spurian did, because that was how Spurian thought about things. What part of the rabbit he wanted for dinner, whether or not he needed to wear his coat, something Cullen had said innocuously thirty minutes before. Cullen was learning that Spurian's scowls were his way of keeping himself invulnerable when he was uncertain. So it was good to see him scowling now. "Where we're going," the boy ventured, "this Skyhold of yours. Is it safe there? Not just safe from the outside, but is it really safe inside?"

Cullen's smile slipped into something pitying, but he shoved it aside quickly before Spurian could catch on. "It's the safest place in all Thedas, Spurian. If I had children, it's where I'd raise them. I promise you that as long as you and your mother and the twins live within Skyhold's walls, no one will ever do you harm again. And if they do, they will answer to me."

Spurian scowled and Cullen tried not to smile, but it turned out not to be such a difficult thing to avoid because as soon as he began to lose the fight, Lanaya stepped out of the trees behind her son, looking for all the world like she was about to murder the Commander with just her hate. 

"Spurian," she snapped, but it was calm. Dangerously calm. "Go back to camp. Now."

Never can win, Cullen thought darkly. Never can bloody win.

Chapter Text

"How dare you!" Lanaya roared at him like a furious mother dragon. And Cullen? Well, Cullen just sat on his tree and gaped, flabbergasted, astounded by the sudden attack. "How fucking dare you take my son without my permission! Without telling me!"

Oh, Maker. Of course. Of course he did. And for once, Cullen absolutely understood what he had done wrong, why she was livid. And it was only then that he happened to catch a glance beneath her ire to the pure maternal terror underneath. He blushed his shame, holding out both his palms to the raging elf in surrender, to calm her, to soothe her fears. Because she also had her staff in her hand, though she hadn't used it yet, and was gesticulating with it as she fumed. He had brought former Templars with him, Templars who had not yet foregone their Lyrium as he had done, but they were at camp. And he was suddenly here in the woods alone with her, a mage scared and angry beyond reason with him -- and rightfully so -- with only a sharp sword to protect him should she start slinging magic. It wasn't that he regretted getting the stuff out of his system all those months ago, not in that moment and not ever. It was just that he regretted the situation, regretted the damage he had inadvertently done, regretted keenly that his only means of subduing her if she really did attack him were his fists. His strength.

Cullen was not a man who ever used physical force against a woman if he could help it. Not unless he was on the battle field. Not since his days in the Fereldan Circle. And even then...

"I'm sorry," he assured her earnestly, his face an open book of his remorse. "I'm so sorry. You're right, of course you're right, it was stupid and careless of me. I didn't think--"

"No!" she snarled. "No, you didn't think! You never think, you stupid self-righteous doglord prick!"

Well. That was...personal. Cullen cringed, resisting the urge to take his feet and defend himself, defend his honor. That would only make this worse. So he stayed put, kept his hands up where she could see he meant her no harm. "Please, my lady--"

"Fasta vass, there you go again!" Lanaya cried, letting out a breath of hysterical laughter. "Which part of what I am do you not get, Commander! I was a slave and then I was a whore -- yes, that's it, blush, you with your honor and your virtue, but I was a whore -- and now I am nothing, thanks to you and your blighted Inquisitor! But I have never and will never be a lady, no matter what hidden plans the two of you have for me and my children, so stop fucking trying to make me a fucking lady!"

Cullen was aware that his jaw was hanging nearly to his chin, but couldn't seem to remember how to close it again. "I--" What could he possibly say to that? To any of that? How could she think that she was nothing? How could she imagine they were conspiring to use her in some way, some-- But what slave wouldn't think that? She had only been used, she had only...

"Don't!"

His eyes went wide as a spark of lightning skittered across the tree limbs overhead. Her voice had been shrilled with panic, with rage, and she'd slammed the butt of her staff on the forest floor. The birds that had been flitting in the branches above them took wing. 

"You don't get to look at me like that!"

His mouth worked, but nothing came out for some time. "Like...like what?!"

"You don't get to look at me with your fucking spotless Fereldan pity!"

Was he looking at her with pity? He hadn't even noticed, hadn't noticed anything except her pink-cheeked fury and the fear in her eyes. Maker, all that fear. All he wanted was to make it go away for her, to hold her to him and pet her hair and tell her it was okay, it would be okay, he and Hal were going to protect her now. 

Hal.

"Please," he murmured, his voice dropping with his gaze, "Lanaya, I'm not going to hurt you or your children. Maker, I would never hurt any child, much less Hal's niece and nephews!"

"Enough!" Lanaya barked, clutching white-knuckled to her staff. Behind her two of his men appeared, lifting their brows at him in concern. He gave a subtle shake of his head and they faded back into the trees. Lanaya, who like her son seemed to notice everything, was too agitated to notice that. Which was probably for the best. "Don't you ever, ever take one of my children from me! Not ever again!"

"I didn't--" Cullen was the one giving the hysterical laugh now, looking up at the trees overhead as though Andraste or the Maker might have left him some sign, some hint of what the hell he was supposed to do or say to make this woman happy for once! Or at least to keep her from electrocuting him to death! "I didn't take your child, Lanaya!" His voice was rising, as was his irritation, but he couldn't seem to rein it in. This blighted, infuriating woman! "I asked Spurian to walk with me so I could speak to him about something he told his sister earlier, that's it, that's all that happened! We were going to come right back!"

She made a strangled noise in her throat and twisted where she stood, looking for something to break or throw most likely, but instead she whipped back around to point an accusing finger at the Commander. "I don't know you! I don't know anything about you! You could have been doing anything to him!"

"I mean your family no harm!" Cullen insisted, his voice cracking with stress, aware that his supplicating hands had begun to flail with his frustration. 

Lanaya leveled a deadly stare at him, took one very aggressive step in his direction, and pointed this time with her staff. "You are a man," she hissed, and he recognized the cutting menace in her quiet. It was one he knew well from watching Hal, though it had never been directed at him. If he had his way, it never would be again. "You cannot fucking help yourself."

His mouth fell open. Again. The blood drained from his face and pooled stagnant and cold in his chest. Is that what she thought of him? Of all men? He drove his fingers into his curls, but there was no making his mouth close, no making sounds, much less words. Cullen Rutherford was completely speechless. Horrified. And speechless.

What was there to say to something like that? What would Hal say? She'd apologize, he thought, apologize that Lanaya had been hurt, ask if there was some way she could prove her good will. He tried to make his mouth say those things, but nothing came out. It just hung there. In shock.

But she wasn't done. She was taking another step forward, eyes narrowed in calculation, lips twisted in a sneer. Her staff bumped against his chest, but he was too stunned to even brush it away. "You're going to tell me what your game is." His eyes rounded, his brows lifted with his confusion, so she stabbed him more forcefully with the stave, the sharp corners of its design pressing painfully into his unarmored skin. "Your game, doglord! You're going to tell me what my sister wants with my children, why she needs them to love her. Is she barren? Is that why? She needs an heir and she suddenly remembered her sister the whore, who has three? Or is she worried we'll tarnish her reputation with the Chantry? Is that it? She needs us quiet or respectable and definitely under her control? Why are you wooing my children?!" Cullen felt like he might be choking on his tongue. This was a nightmare. There was no way this was real. No one thought like this. No one could possibly think...

And then she was straddling him.

It had been such a quick thing, so unexpected; she had glanced at him and his lap and the camp behind them. He could see her mulling over something, puzzling something out, and then a decision, whatever it was. All at once her staff was against the end of the fallen tree and she was climbing on top of him before he could even think to stop her, before he was even aware of what was happening, her movements leonine and purposeful, as if she had done this same thing countless times before. She probably had. Lanaya settled herself on his lap, her legs on either side of his hips, reached expertly down the front of his breeches and wrapped her fingers around his flaccid penis. 

Cullen gasped so hard he started coughing, but instead of leaping up, instead of pushing her off of him and shouting at her to stop, he went very, very still. Impossibly still. All he could see with his own stupefied gaze were her lips, the same shape as Hal's, those bright teal eyes, like Hal's, that silver hair falling in her face like Hal's, the angry rise and fall of her breasts, her ample breasts, inside a tunic Hal might have worn, and then he was coming alive in her palm, all the blood that had been heavy in his chest rushing for his groin, for her fingers around him, burning hot and blessedly cool at the same time. Part of him recognized that there must be magic in her touch, actual magic, but the reasonable, analytical part of his brain was being pummeled by the majority of his brain, the bigger part that had been living on fantasies and glimpses for over two years now, the part that knew even as he punished himself with his hand again and again in his bed at night, at his desk in his office, in the Makerforsaken War Room after they'd all left, that it wasn't enough, it couldn't be enough, it would never be enough because he had to have her, had to taste her, had to hear her whimper her discomfort the first time he took possession of her narrow elven loins with a throbbing shemlen cock that would be too much at first, but that would send her into ecstasies when she relaxed around him, when she breathed and then he was moving inside her, the part that would never be sated until she cried his name as he had heard her cry for her apostate in the rotunda late at night. That was the part that pulsed and shifted against Lanaya's touch. That had him trembling with the effort of restraining himself from lifting his hips, from grinding himself into her. Because as much as he wanted this, wanted her, wanted to be touched, wanted to close his eyes and pretend that it was Hal being so bold, Hal...

Hal.

As much as his body wanted it, that reasonable part of his mind was throwing everything it had into finally making his stupid doglord mouth work. "Wh-what are you doing." It was not a question. Not really. But it was a panicked whisper. She squeezed and he groaned and then his face was pink with shame. "Lanaya..."

"This is what you want, isn't it," she purred, and it was also not a question. "Mm? This is what you really want. Just the two of us, alone in the woods, my pussy wet and willing on your big...human...cock."

Cullen made a sound in his throat, but even he wasn't sure if it was assent or denial. "Please," the rational part of him whimpered. "This is..."

"You can have it," she murmured, and then her tongue was on his ear and Cullen made that sound again. "You can have whatever you want. However you want." Her hand tightened on what was now a full, pulsing erection and the Commander couldn't bite back his gasp of pleasure. "I'll be yours and only yours. All I ask is that you leave my children out of your plans."

Children? She wanted to talk about--

Fuck! Wake up, Cullen, you imbecile!

He stood so abruptly that she fell to the ground before him, but he was much too busy stumbling backwards over the tree trunk to put space between them and adjusting his arousal in his breeches to not strain quite so painfully against his laces and blushing, blushing, endlessly blushing, he was too flustered and panicked and horrified to be chivalrous for once in his life. So she sat on the ground and cursed him in Tevene, her face a twisted mask of rage.

"I'M NOT AFTER YOUR BLOODY CHILDREN!" Cullen shouted. His voice broke like a teenage boy's and his hands found his knees because he couldn't bear to stand up straight, couldn't quite catch his breath, couldn't believe he was in this ridiculous scenario in the first place. "ANDRASTE'S TITS, WOMAN! HAL JUST WANTS YOU SAFE! I JUST WANT YOU SAFE! AND I'M SORRY YOUR LIFE'S SHOWN YOU NOTHING BUT PAIN AND FEAR, BUT NOT EVERYONE IS OUT TO HURT YOU! NOT EVERYTHING IS ABOUT...ABOUT SEX!" He straightened up sharply, pacing with the tree between them, barely even capable of walking because of the inconveniently throbbing need between his legs. "ANDRASTE ON THE FIERY STAKE!" he snarled now at himself, at the situation, at the forest itself. "SHIT! FUCK!"

Lanaya had gotten to her feet during his tirade, had snatched up her staff and for a moment looked like she might actually use it on him. But instead she just screamed, "GO FUCK YOURSELF!" And then she took off into the woods, presumably back toward camp, and left him standing there in agony, aching and ashamed.

"I HAVE BEEN!" Cullen roared after her before he could stop himself. "FOR TWO BLOODY YEARS!"

That reasonable part of his brain could already tell he was going to regret yelling that quite so loudly once he calmed down.

Chapter Text

The whole of their camp was aware Lanaya and the Commander had been fighting. She wasn't sure how much they'd heard clearly, nor was she sure she wanted to know. All she knew for certain was that she needed to be somewhere private, somewhere she could stew and think and cool off, but the anxiety in her chest since she'd noticed Spurian and the Commander missing wouldn't leave her be. Her eldest was a skilled mage, but he was still a boy in many ways and he wouldn't be able to protect his siblings against four well-trained, fully-grown male soldiers. Soldiers who knew she'd been shouting at their Commander. Who might finally have decided they valued their cocks over their jobs. And if the blonde doglord returned to camp before she did, who knew what he might give them permission to do.

So even though a tiny part of her was starting to doubt after everything that the Commander of her sister's forces was a man like all the others she'd ever known, even though there was a spark of something within her when she thought of him talking to Spurian about the twins, something that she hadn't known in eight years that she might, at some point in the future -- if there was a future -- call trust, she still returned quickly to the camp and found her children already sitting inside their tent like scared kittens when a storm rattles the crates in the alley. 

She could already see that Spurian was furious with her, but there was no time for that. With the tent flap closed, she steepled her fingers in front of her lips as Amantius used to do, her brow furrowed with deep creases while she tried to decide their next move. They were already packed; if need be, they could cast a sleep spell and steal two horses in the night, though they would likely have to make off without the tents. But they could take the bedrolls, grab some of the supplies, the food, the potions. They could get away before the men chose to reveal their true natures as all men eventually did. 

But where would they go? They couldn't return to the Dragon. Geiger would never let them come back, or would punish her for leaving in the first place. None of the other brothels would take her now, knowing she'd left once before, knowing Geiger's infamous revenges. No whorehouse in Minrathous would be open to her, possibly not even anywhere else in Tevinter. They could take the Imperial Highway to Nevarra or Orlais; she did not doubt she could find good work in Val Royeaux or Halamshiral, where her ears would attract men desperate to demean her while they fucked. But even Cumberland was some ways away, and traveling openly on the Highway with two young children and no muscle...

"Mother." She glanced up to find Spurian studying her with narrowed eyes. He knew. He had always been a smart boy. "May I speak to you in private."

"Mother!" Tamalin chimed in, no longer able to keep her thoughts to herself now that she saw it was okay to speak. "Why are you angry at Cullen?"

Lanaya hesitated, unable to find the words to explain the turmoil inside her to a sweet nine-year-old. "It's complicated," she decided.

"Did he hurt you?" Tully demanded seriously.

"Cullen wouldn't hurt Mother!" Tamalin gasped. She was a patient, forgiving child, their Tama, rarely cross, never angry. But she was glaring righteously at Tully now. "Cullen isn't like the men in Minrathous! He's nice and kind and good!"

"Don't be stupid," Tully snarled back, "don't be a baby! What about all the foreigners who hurt her!"

"That's enough," Lanaya murmured, her cheeks heating. It was torture to hear her children talk like this, about what went on in the Dragon, with such certainty. They were too young for this, they were too young to know--

They're older than you were, pretty knife-ear bitch. The head slaver's voice hadn't slipped unbidden into her thoughts in years, but it resurfaced now, cold and crass and leering. She shuddered and sucked in a breath, trying to ignore the sudden claustrophobia of the tent, the suddenly too-noisy children.

"You're stupid!" retorted Tamalin, more fierce than any of them had ever seen her. "You're the baby! You are, if you think Cullen would hurt Mother!"

"Enough!" Lanaya snapped. Panic gripped her, demanded she flee the confines of their little sanctuary, the needs and squabbling of her babies. Her babies who had gone silent and still and were staring at her with hurt in their eyes.

She was a terrible mother. Her own mother would have been so disappointed. Lanaya almost laughed at the thought. Her mother would have been disappointed in much more than that.

"Mother," Spurian hissed. "A word."

She didn't want to hear it. Whatever Spurian had to say, whatever judgments he wanted to throw at her, Lanaya hadn't the strength or the patience. But she did desperately need out of that tent. She was already on her knees, making for the flaps, when she and her eldest both turned around at the same time to point at the twins. 

"Stay here." It was a sharp command, their voices aligned in unison. And part of Lanaya noted that that too probably meant she wasn't a good mother. Not to the twins, but especially not to Spurian. Spurian, who had been nearly a man grown all his life, weighed down by the responsibilities of being a bastard son, of having a whore mother, of caring for two little children when he was only a child himself.

The men sat around the fire, cooking a few coneys on spits, and though they glanced up as the elf and her son left the tent, they said nothing, tried nothing. And the Commander still had not returned. 

Spurian led the way into the twilight clearing, giving enough distance from both the twins and the soldiers to hide their words but keeping them always in sight of their tent, of the precious lives inside it. He was already staring at her grimly when she gave him her full attention. 

"We're not leaving." It wasn't a question, but a statement of fact.

"We have no idea what will happen--" she began in protest, but he was already speaking over her worries.

"Nothing will happen and you know it."

Her brows lifted in surprise. Lanaya considered her child in the gloaming, the peach fuzz of his coming beard, the intensity of his turquoise eyes, the stubborn set of his jaw. "I know no such thing."

"We wouldn't have anywhere to go anyway," he reasoned, more childishly this time, and she breathed a little more easily in relief. He was not yet a grown man. He wouldn't leave her yet.

"If anything happens--"

"Nothing is going to happen, Mother!" Spurian snapped in exasperation. "Tama's right! Cullen's not going to hurt you or Tully or Tamalin or me! He's just not!"

Tears pricked at her eyes and she forced them away, her lips twisting hard even as she reached to touch her son's cheek. He closed his eyes and leaned into her palm and for a moment he was seven and not fifteen, woken with nightmares and needing her to hold him. "You're still young, my darling," she whispered. "You don't know how men like these can be."

When he opened his eyes again, they were wet and pained. But Spurian hadn't cried since before his father passed. Lanaya's own tears threatened again. "Mother," he sighed, his voice thick and breaking with the remains of puberty, "I love you. I would do anything for you. But you are ruining this for us."

Lanaya took a step back in shock, unable to catch her breath, a sensation not unlike being kicked in the stomach. A sensation she knew all too well. "Spurian," she murmured, failing to keep her hurt from her voice.

But her son was relentless. He had always had to be. "I don't want to hurt you, Mother," and now there were tears spilling down his cheeks, unbidden and boyish. "If you want to leave, I won't stop you. But this is the best thing that has ever happened to us. So you can leave. I'll miss you every day. But the twins and I will be continuing on to Skyhold with Cullen."

Lanaya stood statue-still as she once had done when surrounded by slavers, knowing that to move was to draw attention, and that with attention came pain and blood and lewd, cruel laughter. Her baby boy's chin quivered, but he shoved his hands roughly over his face to dry his tears, and leaned forward to plant a kiss on her cheek.

"I'm sorry," he whimpered. "I love you. I love you, Mother. Please stay."

Then he left her behind at the edge of the camp and made his way to sit at the campfire with the soldiers.

"Tama!" Lanaya heard him call into the tent. "Tully! Come eat!"

Chapter Text

It was dark when the Commander finally found the motivation to return to camp. He had never been far; always close enough to hear the clang of angry steel should they fall prey to bandits or worse. But, Maker, the thought of facing his men, the children, of facing her after all that...

He was a lecherous, filthy coward. That's all there was to it. After everything Lanaya had been through in her life, to let her touch him like that, to be so willing to sink himself into her and forget for just a moment that Hal had chosen Fen'Harel, made love to Fen'Harel, made a child with Fen'Harel. To pretend for only a few messy minutes that she was his, soft and svelte and supple in his arms, writhing beneath him, watching him bury himself in her with those Alerion eyes full of want and wanton love. As though it could ever be right to fuck the one sister and imagine it was the other. As though it were not reprehensible to take advantage of Lanaya's confusion and fear and lifetime of oversexualization.

He had splashed fully dressed into the nearby stream, clear and cold and rushing around him, calming his throbbing flesh, reminding him of reality and the man he tried to be. Maker, how he longed for Lyrium in that moment. 

So he nearly drowned himself to wake his sex-soaked mind and stubbornly refused to even jerk off, no matter how restless and frustrated it made him. Good. Let it hurt. He deserved it.

And then he'd been fool enough to shout at her. He had never since that first War Room at Haven been grateful for Hal's absence, but he was now. What would she think of him, knowing how he'd treated her tortured sister?

It was no wonder she chose the Elvhen god. No bloody wonder. What a fool he was.

"Cullen!"

He looked up from his thoughts as he stumbled weary and humiliated back to camp to find Spurian waiting for him at the edge of the clearing, his serious face even more severe by the firelight. And what was worse, the boy's cheeks were damp. It was pitifully clear that he'd been crying and then tried unsuccessfully to erase the evidence. Cullen's heart clenched. Something was wrong. Something must be wrong. He was by the boy's side in a few long steps, reaching with both hands to hold Spurian by the shoulders, stooping slightly so he could look him in the eyes. Teal eyes like his mother's. Like Hal's.

"What's wrong," he demanded as gently as he could with his system on high alert, "what's happened. Is everyone all right? Is your mother...?"

"Everything's fine," Spurian assured him, and for once he didn't flinch away from Cullen's touch. He did, however, slowly, deliberately pull away. He leveled the Commander with as dangerous a look as a gangly teenager could. "I just wanted to make something clear." Cullen lifted his brows and waited for the boy to speak. "If you hurt them, any of them, in any way, I will kill you." Cullen's mouth fell open in surprise, just a little, but still he said nothing. "Maybe you don't think I have it in me, but by the Maker, I will do it. Okay?"

Okay? Cullen blinked stupidly. "...Okay." But something occurred to him, something that pricked sadly at the back of his mind. He did his best not to look at Spurian with his 'spotless Fereldan pity'. "And what of you, Spurian? What if someone hurts you?"

The boy's eyes flashed as he had seen Hal's do countless times just before she proved how fatal one small woman could be. "Let them try."

Cullen's jaw clenched with all the things he didn't say in that moment, about what a brave, admirable lad Spurian was, about how he should not have to be so old so young, about all the boyish things he should be enjoying instead of threatening powerful men with death. His jaw clenched with wanting to wrap his arms around Spurian until he admitted to being a scared child and began to weep, with wanting to pin him to his chest until there was no more crying within him. But maybe there would be time for that one day. Or for someone to give Spurian those things, even if it wouldn't be him.

He would speak to Hal about it, he decided, have her request those things of Fen'Harel, who was as good as Spurian's uncle now.

But for now Cullen watched yet another descendent of the Dalish House of Alerion walk away from him.

He sighed and was about to drag his sorry hide to his tent when the boy turned over his shoulder, settling Cullen with a less dangerous but still furious glare. "And don't you ever raise your voice to my mother like that again."

~~~

She would stay. Of course she would stay. She couldn't leave her children behind, never could bear to part with them. They were all she had. All she was. Without them, she truly was nothing. They were her life, her one happiness, her home. Where they were, she would be too.

That's just how it was.

But it hurt. Oh, Maker, how it burned inside her, tore her to pieces, left her bleeding and near tears with her mouth always a little open like she might throw up or cry out at any moment. She was torn between her humiliation, her failure, her fear, torn between her agony at hearing those things from her son's mouth and pride for Spurian, for the man he was becoming, a man like his--

No, she realized with nausea, not like his father. Not like his father at all.

Spurian would be a new kind of man. A good man, if such a thing could exist. He would never hurt those in his care, those weaker than him. He would protect them with everything he was. Spurian hated slavery, hated slavers, hated the Magisterium and the Magisters, hated Tevinter, Minrathous, the Gilded Dragon. Spurian hated everything her life had been, everything their lives had been. For some time, Lanaya had assumed that it was just what young men did, pushed away what their parents gave them, hated the things that tied them down or held them back. The other women in the Dragon, the older women with their grown sons often told her about the rebelliousness of boys when they were learning to be men. 

But she was beginning to wonder if that's what it was with Spurian. He never had been like the other children at the Dragon. Never wanted any part of that life. Refused to allow the twins to partake, just as she had refused to let him work when her cunt could pay the bills well enough, refused to let any of them do the things she needed to do to put food on the table and clothes on their backs. She was the mother. She had spent her whole life on her back with her legs open wide. She didn't remember much about the woman who birthed her these days, but she remembered that. Remembered that when bad things happened, her mother did what she had to do and left the girls to play. That was what it was to be a mother. That was what she tried to be for her children. Even if she was shit at it. Even if she failed them time and time again.

So tonight especially, as the fire burned down to embers and Cullen still hadn't returned, she sat where Spurian had left her, her back to a tree, and thought. She thought about Amantius and his kindness, how he had taken her four times that first night and let her lie in bed the next day as a reward for being so pleasing, so tight and willing and enthusiastic. How she had heard the older women whispering in corners, though, that he'd wanted her to stay in bed because she could barely walk when he was finished with her, because her thirteen-year-old hips had still been too small, too slim, and she was elven. He was a grown shemlen man with all the size that entailed. His supposed kindness, they'd said to each other with clicking tongues and shaking heads, was to keep the gossip at bay, to keep his wife from seeing what he'd stuck it in this time.

"Poor babby," the women had said to each other. They brought her elfroot salve and a bitter tea and washed her in a basin of warm water. It was the only kindness they had ever shown her. It was also the last. They had bastards of their own, by Amantius' father or his brothers or his uncles or their former masters or other slaves. Their sympathy lasted only as long as her master's discretion. The moment he began to lord their relationship through the house, she became an ingrate, an upstart, competition. And then when two years later she had borne Amantius a strong, healthy son, well. She had earned all the animosity of being the mistress with only a wife's bedroom duties and a baby when she was still a child herself to show for it.

Lanaya thought about Spurian, whose hatred she was suddenly beginning to worry was on her behalf. That perhaps he hated because she would not. Could not. Was it possible that his fury at the life they lived was because she never dreamed of more? She had had the love of her master and three beautiful children by him. And her freedom. Their freedom. That was more than most slaves ever had. Who was she to reach for more? Certainly not for herself. She only knew she didn't want her children to do what she did. She had never really stopped to wonder what she did want for them. Wanting was for the upper castes. It was not for freed slaves and high-priced whores. It was a thing for the little Dalish girls, happy and fat with their parents, before the Arlathvhen. Before Lanaya showed magical potential and no other clan could take her. Before the little family set off on their own in search of something better.

Fuck me, Lanaya realized with a sickening lurching feeling in her gut. Is that why?

She made a point early on not to think about the Dalish. Not to think about her life before. It was too confusing, too painful. Their father didn't want them, their abandoned them, even after he had promised her they would stay together. That little Alerion family had wanted more, had asked for more, to stay together, to find a home that would take Lanaya in. They went searching for it. And they paid with their lives. With worse than their lives.

Because that was what happened when you asked for more.

You died. Slowly. Or your children starved and went on alone. And then one day slavers would find your children asleep by the river and brutalize them for weeks before they ever saw Minrathous, before they met a man like Amantius, a man who saw them. Really saw them. If they found a kind master at all.

Well, fuck that. She was not her father. Lanaya loved her children too much to let them go, even if she worried it would get them hurt. So she would stay. Because she loved them. Because her father had not loved her more than he hurt.

She didn't see the Commander approach until he was five feet away, backlit by the last of the fire, no sword at his hip. He shifted uncertainly from one foot to the other. 

"Lanaya..." He swallowed. She could see the shift of his throat in the dark. One of the few perks of being an elf. "I--" He sighed. "Do you mind if I...may I sit?"

Chapter Text

Cullen stood for a few minutes, waiting for permission that never came, but then neither did a denial, a refusal, a rejection. It gave him time to consider the woman curled up against the tree before him, and for all the times he'd noticed her resemblance to Hal, this was the moment that really drove it home. Sisters. How many times had he found Hal hiding out in Skyhold's less frequented areas after a particularly rough decision or bad news or especially when Solas had broken her heart or left her behind? How many times had he approached her in the night with her back to a tree or a wall or a chair, her knees bent and her hands in her lap, her gaze unfocused with the heaviness of her thoughts? How many times, when she had sat by his bedside through the worst of his symptoms, through his delirium, when permission to join her no longer seemed to be required, how many times had they sat together in battered silence or spoken of their worries to one another?

For a moment, when he first settled down against the other side of the same trunk, his legs crossed and his eyes searching the stars overhead, he considered telling her how much she looked like Hal just now. Quiet and pensive and hiding until she trusted herself to be the person the Inquisiton needed her to be. But then he remembered her growing resentment for her sister, and instead, he let out a long, exhausted sigh. He dropped his head back against the bark, his curls still damp from the river, and tried to decide just how he should approach this. 

He kept thinking that she was a wild animal, that he would need to treat her as such, cautious and careful and with a slow approach. Then he would think, no, she's a woman, treat her with the respect she deserves, you oaf. Did your mother and sisters teach you nothing? But sitting with her beneath the stars with the weight of said and unsaid things between them, he felt a kinship that he knew must be some sort of referred friendship because of Hal, because of how much she reminded him of her sister. Still, could it hurt to try to speak to her as a friend? As -- dare he even think it? -- family? Because that's what Hal was to him, even if he could never have her. She was his family. His clan, as she would have named it. And if this woman were family of his family, well...

"I'm sorry I yelled," he murmured, but Lanaya made no show that she'd even heard. He would continue regardless. "I'm sorry I made you fear for your son. I'm sorry I dropped you. I'm sorry I didn't help you up." That about covered it, right? He sucked in a breath. "I'm sorry I didn't stop you sooner. Maker, I should have stopped you sooner." Now he closed his eyes tightly, his throat constricting around his humiliated words. "I was..." Wild with lust. Pretending you were your sister. Exactly the kind of man you think I am. "Surprised." Even knowing her elven vision was keen in the dark, Cullen was grateful for the night, for how it at least made him feel as though no one could see him blush. She wasn't looking at him anyway.

What else could he say? What else was there to say? How did he make this better? Could he make it better? Perhaps he should just grovel at her feet and then not say another word to her until Fen'Harel came to take them through the Eluvians. 

The Eluvians! Of course!

"We won't be taking the Imperial Highway."

Now, finally, she looked up. Glanced sideways at him, her expression drawn and unreadable in the shadows. 

"The Inquisition has...other ways. We don't use them often. Truthfully, I don't even really know how they work. It's an ancient Elvhen magic, or so I've been told. A bunch of big mirrors that have to be activated just so and then you step through to a place that isn't really a place. A sort of in-between place that isn't the Fade or this world." It sounded so absurd that he gave a little self-deprecating laugh. "I don't know, I'm no mage. We turned west at Weisshaupt because there's one half a day's ride from here. The plan is to head there tomorrow, make camp, and then wait. Hal..." He sighed, pushed his fingers through his hair. "Hal's, er, lover, I suppose, is meant to come retrieve us. From there, it's another half day's journey to Skyhold. Maker willing, we'll have you and your children safe within the keep by the end of the week. I didn't tell you because..." He laughed again, a strained thing. "Well, I suppose I still shouldn't be telling you. It's not something we want all Thedas to know. But you've been worried about your children and I should have told you sooner. I am sorry for that." He hesitated and added softly, "And however you feel about Hal, whatever happened between you all those years ago, I know her. Finding you means something to her. She'd want me to trust you. You are, after all, her sister. So that's...that's where we're going. That's why we're not taking the road." He waited for her to say something or make some kind of sign that she appreciated the information or at least understood, but instead she was staring at him with narrowed eyes like Spurian often did, trying to see beneath his skin and into his mind, he supposed. But at least it seemed the animosity had simmered for now. He should keep talking. "I left Skyhold a few months ago to visit my family and I haven't been back. I don't know why Hal's memory suddenly returned or if perhaps someone else told her who she was...maybe she received a report about someone who looked like her and investigated. I don't know. I do know that family is very important to her because Lavellan raised her, but out of a sense of duty rather than any particular love for her. She felt her lack of true family sorely. And I know for a fact because I know her: whatever her reasons for bringing you and your children to Skyhold, she has no more devious motives than your safety and wanting you in her life. You don't have to take my word for it, though. You'll see for yourself soon enough."

Cullen stole a careful glance around the little bit of trunk that separated them, lifting his brows even as he squinted into the dark. He could read absolutely nothing about her thoughts. It was almost like seeing the adult daughter of Hal and Fen'Harel. Her mother's face, her father's mask. His heart squeezed painfully, like someone had filled the chambers with broken glass and then stomped on it with Qunari boots. Cullen quickly looked away and focused on the stars overhead, swallowing the lump in his throat.

Maker, will it always be like this?

"She can't have done all those things you said in the stories." Lanaya's words were so quiet he almost didn't register them at first. There was no edge to her voice; it was lined in wariness. "She may be the Inquisitor and the Inquisition may have sealed the Breach, but the Inquisitor isn't even a mage. Everyone knows that."

"Hal's not a mage," Cullen agreed. "But the same energy that made the Breach and destroyed the Conclave marked her that day. She can use that, a bit like having a rune in her hand." He steeled himself and looked at Lanaya again, thinking sister as a mantra in case his heart forgot. "I told your children a simplified version of things. It was much worse than all that. It was an infuriating amount of politics. But everything I told them was true. She did all that and more. She'll say we all did it and that's fair, but you ask anyone in Skyhold when you get there. Your sister is the only reason we did what needed to be done and lived to tell the tale."

Lanaya frowned irritably while he spoke, a look he was beginning to think was just the natural neutral of her visage. He imagined she didn't have anyone to tell her her face would freeze like that. She didn't say another word for a long time, turning her ponderous scowl to the tent that held her children and the stars above. A shadow passed across her features then. Cullen wouldn't have noticed -- darkness on darkness in darkness -- except that a shift in her posture accompanied it. She wrapped her arms around her knees to hold them to her chest and rounded her shoulders toward her ears protectively. In that moment, she looked like her daughter Tamalin, scared and uncertain. She looked like Hal with a battle on the horizon. With her hands about to be red with the blood of Inquisition soldiers. 

Cullen had given up on her speaking and had decided it was enough to simply sit together and think when she murmured, "What's she like? Your Hal? Not the Inquisitor but the girl?" She paused. "Woman now, I suppose."

His breath hitched. Cullen was not a man who played the Game, but he knew people well enough to know that the question was a difficult one for Lanaya to ask. He carefully avoided turning to see her again so that she could feel her reluctant vulnerability in some semblance of privacy. And he took his time, searching the sky for the words he needed. He wanted to get this right. "She's..." Perfect. Maddening. Not mine. Pregnant. "Grounded. She fights like a dance, daggers, fists, arrows. She's funny. Very sarcastic. Clever. But she's also kind. She never kills unless she must and she always regrets it keenly." He smirked a little. "Well, except perhaps Corypheus. She felt perfectly fine about that one." What else? He wouldn't say that her smile lit up her whole face or that he spent his days in his office jumping up from his seat each time someone came in in the hopes it would be her. He didn't say her scent was vanilla and camping. That when she was feeling the weight of her title and wanted to pretend she was okay, she gave a half-smile that moved across her lips like melting ice. He didn't mention that she never sat across from him in his tower, but only ever perched on the edge of his desk with her bare feet on his chair. Even when he was sitting in it. Especially when he was sitting in it. He wouldn't say how many nights she left her apostate-warmed bed to sleep by his fire so she could be there when he woke, sweating and thrashing and screaming, so she could hold him to her and smooth his hot forehead with a cool cloth and hold his shaking hand. One day he would need to remember to thank Fen'Harel for being a big enough man to not have a fit about those times. But perhaps gods didn't have to worry about things like jealousy and insecurity. Maybe that was a mortal curse. "She worries about everyone, all the time. She can't stand when the people she loves are in pain. It makes her an irreplaceable friend. It makes people want to be loyal to her, but she's just as loyal in return. Oh, and she's stubborn." He barked a laugh. "Andraste's ass, is she stubborn! She drinks -- well, not at the moment, but before -- with the biggest of her men, which doesn't always go well for her. She plays a mean Wicked Grace. Rides like she fights. She feels all injustice personally." He grinned. "She never can pass up a dirty joke."

He wasn't sure at what point Lanaya had shifted away from the tree and twisted to study him while he talked, but he noticed it the moment the glow of thinking about Hal faded enough to remind him he should be paying attention. There was something in her gaze he hadn't seen directed at him before, something like recognition, maybe even understanding. He blushed and his fate was sealed.

"How long?" she wondered.

He cleared his throat. "Pardon?"

She laughed knowingly and leaned against the tree again, crossing her arms over her chest like she had figured him out and no longer needed to work so hard to see beneath the man he presented to the world. "How long have you been in love with my sister?"

Chapter Text

He had long since given up any pretense of ignorance when it came to being in love with Hal. No one ever believed him when he stammered he had no idea what they meant. It was one of those things most of the Inquisition knew, though the bard had so far -- thank the Maker -- avoided writing a song about it. Only Sera ever blurted it out in public. Well, Sera and Cole. The others were kinder about it. Even his lieutenants watched what they said about her when he was around. But at some point he just started responding to the quiet question with a blush and a sigh. 

"Since the night she sacrificed herself to Corypheus so we could lead everyone to safety." He said it softly, guiltily, his heart thumping crookedly against his ribs. Just thinking about that night, about the uncertainty of her fate made it hard to breathe. "Since she walked nearly dead through snow so deep in places it was over her head. Since she collapsed in my arms and I carried her to the camp." It seemed Hal was always collapsing in his arms. "Holding her," he decided thoughtfully. "I'd never seen her so vulnerable. That's when I knew. The moment I held her." But that's not what she asked. "Two years."

Neither of them spoke for a while and he didn't dare look at Lanaya for fear of what he might find on a face so like the one he loved. What would a woman like that think of a devotion as pathetic as his? It wasn't one-sided. It wasn't unrequited. But it would never happen. Not now. 

"She's with someone else." It wasn't a question. 

Cullen let out a blast of breath that sounded a bit like a laugh. A mutant, deformed laugh. "Of course."

"That's why you left."

He turned quickly to search Lanaya's face for some hint of how she was suddenly so able to pull him into digestible pieces. It was as if she had spent the week trying and failing to ascend the impassable walls of his fortress, but she had finally found a toehold and now he was conquered. She gave a lazy shrug and he recognized the confident woman from the brothel. Lanaya hadn't been so at ease since they left Minrathous. And she was staring at him like she knew all his secrets. Even the ones he didn't know he had.

"Don't look so surprised," she advised. "This is what I do, remember? I'm paid to know what men don't even know they want themselves." Her smirk was slow and almost vicious. It reminded him of the Winter Palace. The faces of nobles who thought they'd won an especially difficult victory. It was the expression Josie had worn when he was down to just his smalls and she knew she had the better hand. They had all seen him nude that night. Tonight he felt naked. "So. I look just like her?"

There was no helping the heat that crawled all the way up his scalp, turning his skin an unmistakeable red. No, he almost said, you're more beautiful. More womanly. But instead he looked away, frowned at his boots. Safe ol' boots. 

"Is that what you want?" Her voice was suddenly plush velvet over rough satin. The rustle of gowns in dark corners. Cullen closed his eyes and concentrated on his breathing. His lungs. Not the wildfire catching between his legs. "I can give you that. What does she call you?" His lungs were on fire now too. "Rutherford? Commander?" He could hear the decision in her tone: "Cullen." Cullen sucked in a sharp breath. He was a statue again, unmoving, his mind heavy as his breeches tightened. "What would she do? She'd be bold, wouldn't she?"

"Stop," he whispered.

"Bold but sweet." Maybe she hadn't heard him.

"Please. Stop."

"Why? It's obviously what you want." It wasn't even combative or cruel. It was just confused. Maybe even hurt. "Is it because you love her?"

Cullen pressed the heels of his palms into the sockets of his eyes. Pressed. Pushed. "That's part of it," he admitted, and he couldn't tell if his throat was strained with sexual frustration or frustrated tears. Both, likely.

"What's the rest?"

He let out all the air he held in one long, shaky line. He would look at her. He had to look at her. No matter how much it hurt. Isn't that what he told Tully made a man? Strength. Compassion. Heart. What's right. Even when it's hard. Even when it hurts. Even when you're so hard it hurts. So Cullen dragged his hands down his face and opened his eyes. He breathed as a marching soldier, counting inhales and exhales for stamina through pain. He moved off the tree entirely and turned himself to face her, his cheeks crimson but his brown eyes sincere, open, honest. 

Lanaya flinched. His heart hurt for both of them.

"Why are you doing this?" he asked her needfully. "Why do you keep doing this? I told you, Hal's my best friend. I'm not going to fuck you, Lanaya. It's not you. It's not. You're..." Cullen didn't manage to stop his eyes sweeping her body or the renewed blush that followed. "You're beautiful," he enthused. "Truly, you're...it's unfair, really. Just how..." Her brows were lifted at his stammering. Focus. He needed to focus. No, not on her lips. No, not her breasts. Her eyes. Teal eyes. Alerion eyes. Eyes full of jagged edges and hidden wounds. Hal's eyes were all clear depth, like a grotto, worn from currents, bottomless and gradual but full of life. Lanaya's eyes were like Lyrium. They even shifted and pulsed like Lyrium did. He had never noticed before. Focus. "You don't even like me, Lanaya. Why are you doing this? If there's something you want or need, just tell me. You don't have to fuck me to get it."

The Lyrium of her eyes pulsed and she reached for him, reached for his thigh, her expression a vaguery of lust, a general sketch of what want looked like. Or what a man might think want looked like on a woman. Like a Desire demon that couldn't quite make out the features on the face he ached for most. "I want you, Cullen."

He really thought he might burst into tears. 

And that's when it clicked: Lanaya was just like him.

Lanaya was an addict. An addict who believed she was doing what was necessary. An addict who was made this way against her will, when she didn't know any better. By people who wanted to control her. And she was going through withdrawals. Maker, how was he just now getting it?

He gave her a smile that was empathetic, not pitying. And he scooted back so she couldn't touch him. "You don't have to do this, Lanaya. You and your children are safe with me. You don't owe me anything. You don't have to bribe me into protecting your family. I do that willingly. Because you're Hal's sister, because it's my duty, and because it's what's right. You will never have to take a man to bed again unless it's what you want."

Her brow was furrowing, and while she looked disgusted, she didn't recoil. She did, however, shrink slowly back, protecting herself with the trunk of the tree and her arms around her knees. He wanted to hold her. But he knew he could no more touch her than he could touch a syringe of Lyrium. She sneered, but he didn't think it was directed at him. Not really. "Leave me alone."

He gave a small bow of his head and climbed to his feet, towering over her once he stood. "Ma nuvenin," he murmured. It slipped out. Elvish had a tendency to do that these days. "Lethallan." But that bit was on purpose. 

Lanaya shrank away like she'd been hit, turned her back to him and to the camp, curled up in a protective ball. She leaned against the tree and went statue-still as he had done only minutes before. 

"It gets better," Cullen promised her, and then finally headed back to his tent.

Chapter Text

It was too early to be this cold. Actually, it should never be this cold. If someone had told Varric two years ago he'd be living voluntarily in a place that made his cock into a tiny shriveled icecicle a good five months out of twelve, he would have asked for a large mug of whatever they'd been drinking. And yet here he was. Spending another winter in Skyhold. Which was funny because he had thought the same thing every summer in Kirkwall. Maybe, he mused, dwarves lived underground because it was temperate. Or at least out of the wind. 

He pulled his bearskin coat more tightly around him and bent his head to save his face from the worst of the snapping gusts that could easily blow an unsuspecting elf into the sky never to be seen again. Varric wasn't worried for himself; dwarves were dense. That is, they had density, not that they were...

No, they were also just dense.

Still, he was short enough that the crenelated ramparts blocked most of the snow-scented blasts, which was about the only reason he convinced himself to come up here in this foul weather. 

The other reason was Hal.

"I'm not gonna comfort you when the tips of your ears break off and everybody starts calling you 'shemlen'," he called out to her. She stood facing the gates, the forest beyond, the one road that led to Skyhold. The road that led to the Eluvian. Her hair was a tangled, wind-whipped mess of loose silver silk, leaving the points of her already pregnant-pink elven ears exposed. They never could get her to wear hats or helmets. Something about the pressure on her ears making it hard to fight. Giving her headaches. Sera always dismissed it as elfy nonsense. Varric sometimes thought it must just make Hal feel like a caged animal. The savage Dalish Inquisitor trained to walk and talk and do their dances, isn't she charming? Isn't that what she'd said once? He really should have written that whole conversation down.

At least the rest of her was appropriately bundled. Except her feet. She wore those funny elven wrappings -- albeit thick ones -- and her toes were always digging into the dirt. Wiggling in the grass. Feeling the rough texture of stone. Like she was reminding herself where she was and what she was doing at all times. Like she was trying to put down roots. Like she was tasting the world with her feet. He didn't think anybody else noticed it, but he did. Every time she wasn't wearing proper boots, he checked her toes.

Varric wondered if that was how a man developed a foot fetish. He'd have to ask Bull.

But her toes were curled up as much as they could be now to keep them warm,  her toenails blue with cold. Blighted stubborn woman. If it wasn't already taken, he might start calling her Iron Bull.

"Hal, the guards will tell you when they come!" he tried again, louder and grumpier. He could actually feel his testicles ascending. Soon he'd have the voice of a child. "Andraste's pointy nipples, Hal, if you make me walk out there in the wind and get you...!" Something something threatening something. "I'm too cold to think of anything, but rest assured I'll come up with something at some point! And it'll be something you really won't like!"

She turned over her shoulder and smiled at him, looking bright, young, amused, gracefully majestic. Varric quietly memorized it, sealing it away for later as he did for all the heroes he encountered. For when they inevitably fell or died or broke. For when their stories needed telling. This was an important piece of Hal'lasean Lavellan, the writer in him knew: looking forward from the top of her castle, waiting for whatever was coming so she could face it head on, but always a little wild. Always laughing through the pain. One day he would write her like this, as she was in this very moment. One day. Hopefully when they were all very old and everything was peace and happiness. Not bloody likely, but hopefully.

"Come inside, Rosie," and he held out his hand. "I wanna talk to you."

That would be in there too. But maybe not how she scoffed at him and tossed her head. "Rosie?!" But she took his hand and let him lead her back inside, glancing one more time at the empty ribbon of road to the gates.

"Just testing it out," Varric laughed, and they huddled in the top floor of the mage tower, where the heat from the fireplace two floors down rose gloriously to them and the wind couldn't reach them. "Never could figure out what to call you or Hawke. Nothing ever seemed to fit."

Hal's brows lifted skeptically as she dropped into a chair, blowing into her cupped and gloved hands and rubbing them together. "And you thought 'Rosie'?"

"Yeah!" Varric sat next to her, pulling off his gloves to flex his fingers and tuck them under his arms. "I have this whole elven women and flowers theme going. I've been trying to fit you with one for two blighted years but nothing feels right. But I keep thinking, you know, Dalish rose. Beautiful, thorny, surprising hardy."

"Maybe I'm not a flower," she suggested with a smirk.

"That's what you like to think." He enjoyed the way her brows shot up in surprise and challenge. "Oh, I'm onto you. Rough-and-tumble Hal, that's what you'd have us believe, but any time Chuckles does your hair all fancy, you keep it for days."

"I'm just too lazy to take it down."

Varric snorted. "And how do you explain the way you sweep around Skyhold like a queen when it's up, hm? You hold your head higher, stick your chest out. All your movements are like an Orlesian dance." She blushed and looked horrified at the same time, which was a fun combination. He grinned. "Somebody likes to pretend they're the prettiest princess in Arlathan, am I right? You're just as girly as Ruffles, only the gowns that would send you swooning don't exist anymore."

"This is what you wanted to talk to me about?" she wondered. She tried to pretend she wasn't amused, but she was. She always was, somewhere inside. It was just a matter of finding where it was hiding.

As his body warmed, Varric pulled off his coat and unwound his scarf, but since they weren't settling in here, there was no point in really stripping out of his outdoor gear. That was the problem with castles. So much courtyard between you and everyone else. Or you and the tavern. Varric really missed living above a bar, but Sera got to that room first. "I wanted to talk to you about..." He closed his eyes for a moment and concentrated on slowing his breathing. Then he made himself meet her gaze with as much seriousness as he ever could manage. "About siblings."

She blushed again, then turned pale, her brows climbing her forehead in uncomfortable surprise. He smiled his preemptive apology.

"I know. You don't want to talk about it. You've said. But in less than a day, that sister of yours is gonna be here and I just..." Varric grimaced at the tightness in his chest. "I want you to be prepared. 'Cause you didn't grow up with siblings. I mean, you had the clan, I'm not saying you act like an only child, just...it's different with siblings. Trust me on this." He waited and watched her wind-burned face for her reaction.

All she did was sigh in resignation and drop her head on his shoulder. He leaned his head against hers and smiled to himself despite the topic. "Siblings." A rough start. "Are never what you want them to be, sometimes what you need them to be, and always what you wish they weren't." Better! He should write that down.

Chapter Text

"Now I know you know this," Varric continued, more like he was telling a story than giving advice. It was easier to pretend Bartrand was just another story. Easier than admitting that not even Bianca had hurt like Bartrand's betrayal had. "Because you've made yourself a helluva family here." He smirked a little. "A clan, sorry." And though he didn't look at her, he could feel Hal's cheeks pull up against his shoulder. "Clan Inquisition? Clan Skyhold? Anyway, you've done real good for yourself here. Not just as a leader. As a...you know, as a person. The point is, family is what you make it."

"I know," she sighed softly. But there was longing there. He knew it well. It didn't matter how often somebody told you you made your family; it could never quite fit in the hole left by the one that was supposed to be there for you.

"Yeah, but I want to remind you. Just because somebody's parents are the same as yours doesn't mean..." Maker's breath, it still hurt like Bartrand standing on his sternum every time he thought about it, even after all these years. Even knowing what the red lyrium did to people. Although most people weren't so immediately affected by it like his brother. That greedy shit. May he rest in peace. Fuck. "...it doesn't mean anything. You don't owe her and she doesn't owe you. You have to keep her safe because you're the reason people would go after her, but beyond that, you're off the hook."

"I know," she said again, mumbling almost childishly this time.

He gave a little laugh and twisted to look down at her face on his shoulder. Her cheek was smushed and she lifted her brows in sweet-miened question. Varric pulled his arm around her and squeezed. Now the really rough part. "So your sister, she's had it bad." She clenched her eyes shut and nodded. "Maker knows what happened between her leaving you with Lavellan and now. But we know a few things. We know she's not too much older than you and she has three kids. It's possible they're triplets or from a handful of years. But we also know she was a slave and her kids are her master's. So it's likely..."

"I know," whispered Hal, her brow knit and her lips twisting.

"And then to end up in a whorehouse," Varric lamented. "It's not gonna be pretty, Hal. I know you're not the kid you were when you last saw her, but she definitely isn't. Tevinter does terrible things to an elf. It does much worse to an elven slave. I can't even imagine what it does to a elven woman slave." He winced. "No, I guess I can imagine. But I wish I couldn't." He glanced down at her again, her eyes still closed against his words. He was having trouble breathing, so she almost decidedly was too. He rested his chin on her hair, even though it wasn't very comfortable for his neck. He needed shorter friends. "Did you ever talk to Broody about it?"

Hal breathed out sharply and shook her head. "He tried," she admitted, her throat painfully constricted by the sound of her words. "He tried. Hawke tried. I just...I can't yet. Which is stupid because she's coming but I..." Her face contorted beneath Varric's jaw. "Dorian still won't even look at me."

"Yeeeeah." He picked at a catch in the fabric of his breeches. Bull was taking care of Dorian. They had decided on divide-and-conquer. Bull on Dorian. Hawke on Fenris. Varric on Hal. Bethany was to accompany Merrill to the rendezvous point so she didn't get lost chasing a butterfly or fall down a sinkhole never to be heard from again. And Cole was flitting from duo to duo saying inappropriate things at the most appropriate times. Last Varric checked, he had been sitting between Bull and Dorian lilting sadly about how Dorian had always felt owned too. Owned by his father and Altus expectations. "That's Sparkler's problem, though. You didn't do anything."

"It means I don't have one of my best friends and advisors," Hal pointed out mournfully. "It means he won't talk to me about what's wrong, so I can't--"

"You can't fix everything, Hal." He looked up at the pointed ceiling and rubbed his hand along the upper arm of her coat. "Maker knows I've tried. Some things, you try to fix 'em and they blow up in your face." They both tensed, aware of exactly what he meant. "Literally blow up. In your face."

She was respectfully quiet for a moment before she protested, "I at least want him to let me look him in the eyes and tell him I don't blame him. I at least want to remind him that we're doing something."

"Tiny's on it." He strained to meet her eyes and gave a ghosted grin. "And, from what I understand, in it. Even more than usual. If they're not careful, they'll have their own song."

"Well, at least one of us is satisfied."

Varric let out an incredulous laugh and sat up to really get a good look at the Inquisitor. "Andraste's ass, Hal! Greedy much? He was just here! And I heard all about your little tryst in the woods on the way to Val Royeaux." She turned a sharp pink, but grinned like a rogue. 

"It's not my fault," she laughed. "All week long, all I've been craving is pickles and p--"

He held up both hands in alarm. "I get it! I get the picture!" Hal looked rather pleased with herself. "It's like hearing about my sister!"

She kissed him teasingly on the cheek. "And yet you keep bringing it up."

"I know," Varric bemoaned at the stone above them. "I'm a sick, sick man. I blame my parents."

But of course that was one of the worst possible jokes to make today of all days, with Hal constantly glancing to the door to the battlements with each shout of guards or clash of practice swords. Waiting for her sister. The one she hadn't seen since her mother died in front of her and her father just gave up. He thought of the story Fen'Harel told him back when he was Solas, of the dwarf who just kept going. He wondered if the Elvhen understood it now, through his lover's eyes.

Eyes that were now focused worriedly at her lap. Varric wasn't as touchy-feely as Hal tended to be, but he knew when it was needed, so he hooked his thumb under her chin and lifted until her eyes met his own. She gave a self-deprecating half-smile. She was about to tell him she was fine. He shook his head. Hal sighed.

"I'm trying not to get my hopes up," she murmured, but it was obvious from the conflict in her voice that she was failing. "I know it won't be some instant thing."

"But part of you still thinks it will be," he finished for her, and he touched her cheek oh-so-briefly before he withdrew his hand. "Listen, Hal...I brought this up because when you mix with the dregs of Lowtown for as long as I did, you get to know a certain element of people. The ones everyone else forgets are people. It can take years, a lifetime to come back from that. And in the meantime, it can be...hard. For everyone."

"Yeah," she sighed, and braved a crooked smile. "That's what Hawke said. Well, she said 'it sucks big sweaty nugnuts all the time, forever, except when it's the best'."

Varric grinned wearily. "That about sums it up." Below them, a door opened.

"Inquisitor!" called a young guard from on the first floor. "Are you in here, Your Worship?"

Hal made a gagging face at the moniker. "Yeah!" Because something in Hal'lasean Lavellan was determined to undermine any holiness she may have accrued at every possible opportunity.

"Our men at the gate, serah! Can't tell who yet, but I was told you'd want--"

"Yes, thank you! I'll be down in a minute!" Hal's face drained of blood then flooded with it in turns. Teal eyes went wide and locked anxiously on Varric. "Fenedhis, Varric, what do I do? What do I say? Shit, should I have gotten her a gift? I don't know what she likes! Maybe something Dalish? Creators, what if she doesn't like me? What if she hates me? What if I hate her?"

The dwarf laughed fondly. "It's gonna be all of those things, sweetheart. That's what it means to have a sibling." He inclined his head in admission. "Before they try to kill you. Twice. But you'll probably be just fine."

Hal took in a steadying breath and pulled her gloves back on, rewrapped her scarf. She stood to leave and then hesitated, bringing her fear back to Varric. "Don't laugh, but...how do I look?"

Varric didn't laugh. Nor did he point out that with her windburn and the tangled silver of her hair and all her layers, she looked like some kind of wild mountain urchin. Which he supposed was just about right. So he didn't laugh, but he did smile. "Like the prettiest princess in Arlathan."

Behind the mask of her thick scarf, Hal grinned.

Chapter Text

With Varric as fast on her heels as a dwarf could be when there were shemlen ladders and reckless leaping involved, Hal'lasean sprinted down two floors and out onto the walkway that ran along one side of the portcullis. It was easier to ignore the pounding of her heart when she couldn't hear it over the pounding of her feet, but once she stood with her fingers gripping the banister, angled forward with her swollen stomach resting between her hands, it could no longer be ignored. She lit there like a hummingbird, her toes barely touching the stone beneath her, and stretched her chest forward like she might take flight at any moment. And she waited. Heart raging within her, beating in her ribs, in her ears, in her fingertips, in her throat.

Naya, it seemed to murmur, echoed by Fen's power in her blood and bones. It was strange and startling and something fast and fun, excitement maybe, anticipation. Because she hadn't even seen her sister yet but already she was remembering new pieces, new lights in the dark forest of that part of her life. Naya naya naya naya naya.

The gate was just lifting, loud and jolting as her pulse, and when it finally got above the heads of the soldiers waiting in formation, they began to file in. She strained to see behind the first of them, frowning when they weren't troops she recognized, magic thrumming in agitation when she didn't find Cullen's armor or a woman with silver hair. She didn't even see Merrill and Bethany. It was nothing but soldiers, actually. Travel-tired but relieved and proud, and when the woman in front noticed Hal and Varric, she snapped a salute and the whole group followed suit, sounding like very angry and precise applause. Hal returned the gesture, a little more distracted than was polite. She opened her mouth to ask after Cullen and her sister, her cousin and the younger Hawke, told herself they were just down the road with the children maybe riding in a wagon with supplies, but the front soldier spoke first.

"Well met, Inquisitor! We are honored to be greeted by the Herald herself! We bring supplies and trade from Nevarra!" Nevarra? "And Commander Rutherford sends his regards...and a gift!"

Hal's mouth fell open. This was a troop transfer, a supply run, not her sister or her children or handsome, muscled Cullen with his broad chest and shemlen body hair like a sexy carpet of-- no, stop that! Blighted infuriating pregnancy lust! This was the gift from Ferelden he'd promised her in his letter. It was only then that Hal noticed the sacks on the backs of the first six soldiers. Some of the sacks were wiggling. All of the sacks contained exactly one chubby Mabari puppy.

"Aww," said Varric with amusement, his voice too low for the troops to hear. "Your faithful puppy sent you puppies for your Dread Puppy."

"I might stab you," she replied under her breath. 

"See? Thorny. Like a rose."

~~~

"Oh, Maker, lookit you and your fat widdle chubby wubby belly! I'm gonna pet it! I'mmmmm gonna pet it! Uh-oh! Uh-oh, I'm petting it! I'm petting your fat fat belly! What're you gonna do? What're you gonna do! Nothing! That's what! Because you are tiny and squishy and perfect and I am going to eat you forever! I'm gonna chew on your bones like a...well, like a Mabari!"

Everyone had thought the arriving group would be the one. The big one. The one to bring the Commander home, the one to bring Hal a family. So when word got out that there were puppies instead, somehow they had all -- Josie, Cass, Varric, Hawke, Fenris, and Hal -- ended up on the Inquisitor's floor, their legs splayed wide for a make-shift puppy pen. Most of them had become babbling idiots immediately, but none of them quite so loud or dedicated to their babbling idiocy as Hawke. Fenris was staring at her in amused horror as she blew raspberries on a soft squirming belly.

"You put that mouth on my mouth," he pointed out with dry disgust. But it was clear he was gratified to see Hawke so happy again, even if just for a moment.

"Yes I do!" Hawke cooed at the puppy. "I put dis mouf on your tum! And I put dis mouf on his mouf! And I put dis mouf on his--"

"What does the letter say exactly?" Josie asked delicately, clearing her throat. She wasn't part of the puddle, what with all her expensive skirts, but she sat by the fire in an armchair and watched quite contentedly.

"Er," began Hal intelligently. "He says his sister's -- well, it says 'bitches' but then he scratched it out and wrote 'lady dogs' -- his sister's breeding Mabaris all whelped this season and she was going to have to take them into a city to sell them off, but was worried she wouldn't fetch a worthwhile price with so many. So he bought three breeding pairs from her litters and he plans on starting a Mabari-partnered vanguard for the Inquisition."

"It's not a bad idea," admitted Cassandra. She was holding one up with her hands under its already-muscular front legs, examining it at arm's length as though it were a piece of fine armor she'd had made. "I have seen Mabari in action. They are fierce and loyal companions."

"So fierce!" bubbled Hawke at hers. "The fiercest!"

Varric was smirking at the whole scene, but only because it wasn't his style to smile meaningfully. He was more than pleased to see Hawke so light-hearted for once. Maybe he could talk Cullen and Hal into letting her buy one of the pups. It would do her good to have a dog again.

"You were always saying Mabari hate being spoken to like that," said Fenris, his brows lifted.

Only then did Hawke look up from the little furball, frowning harmlessly at Fenris for being such a killjoy. "Sure, when they're grown!" And then it was right back to the puppy, whose paws she was wiggling in her fists. "But these are baaaabies! Dumb little babies who don't know aaaanything! Yes they are! Yes they are! Dumb dumb dumb!"

"Oh, okay, here we go," Hal interrupted. She pointed at a place on the scibbled note and the yawning puppy in her lap mouthed sleepily at her hand. "Hi, puppy," she purred, pausing to kiss an ear. And then back to the letter. "He says it'll be a while before they imprint, so he suggests we keep them together and train them and then find out who they're supposed to be with. But he says he's giving them to me, so it's eventually my decision. He wants one for the--" Dread Puppy, Varric finished in his head. Hal blushed, so that must have been what she intended to say as well. "For the baby, to grow up with. And he wants one. But other than that..."

Hawke blew again on the puppy's belly, making a noise like a bronto with a cold. 

"Well," laughed Hal, "obviously Hawke's getting one."

The Champion's face lit up like a lighthouse and she was suddenly staring at Hal like she might burst into happy tears. Varric would pull that elven urchin into the biggest hug later when they were alone. He was going to take her in his arms and squeeze until she begged him to let her go so she could breathe. Maker bless that beautiful woman. 

Fenris seemed to be feeling similarly because when he was done narrowing his eyes in appraisal of the Inquisutor and she glanced over at him, he favored her with an approving nod...and an actual smile.

Hal shrugged, dismissing the sentimentality of the moment with a half-smile that was the only indication something was wrong. "Don't get too excited. I get first pick."

Chapter Text

She doesn't knock. She never does. There isn't ever anything that happens in his tower office to which she isn't privy; there isn't a single moment of his life he doesn't want her to fill with her impish smiles. With that wiggle of her hips when she's delighted. He wants to carry her burdens for her as he carried her through the snow, not because she can't carry them more gracefully than anyone else he has ever known, but because that is what a man does for the woman he loves. It's what a man tries to do. Let her always be light and grins and waggled brows. Let him hold all her darkness. He has so much of his own; what's a little more, if it means she never hurts again?

She doesn't knock. She bursts in excitedly or drags in like a weary pilgrim. Sometimes she peeks in and smiles at him with the one that's just for him until he beckons her to him. Sometimes she slips in like a secret and puts a chair near his at his desk, where she works on her own correspondence in a silence so intimate it is almost like making love. Almost. Almost.

She doesn't knock. He's working late; there's much to do and he has spent all his long day with his head between his legs as his veins and organs protest violently the absence of their faithful companion lyrium. Nights are a little easier. It's darker, quieter. She knows that if she can't sleep, if she's lying awake missing the man who abandoned her, aching with being alone, she knows she can come to him. He'll be up. She prefers to go to Dorian or Varric. She feels guilty when she comes to him. She worries she's using him. He's happy to be used. He tells her so. Still she worries.

She doesn't knock. She opens the door and he already knows it's her, it always is, and she strides in like she's on the prowl. She's hunting something. She's hunting him.

She wears a warm housecoat and nothing else. He knows because he can see her pale legs right up to above the knee and because he can see only her moonlight-kissed skin all the way to the dip between her breasts. She is covered. But barely. She closes the door behind her with a lazy kick and struts to the center of the room, planting herself a few feet from his desk with her hands on the tie of the robe and her brows expectant. She waits for him to say something.

His throat has gone dry.

"Hal," he breathes, but it is a parched sound. "What are you doing?"

"I want you, Cullen," she purrs, but she is not begging. She is the Inquisitor. She always gets what she wants. Tonight she wants him.

"Hal," and this time her name is a whimper of agony. "You're lonely. You want Solas, not me."

"I love you, Cullen," she whispers, still not begging. Declaring. Like the wind declares the trees should kneel before it.

"And I you," he sighs. "But I know you, Hal'lasean. You will regret this come morning."

She takes one powerful step forward, all pelvis and hips. "My only regret is not doing this two years ago."

She pulls the tie of the housecoat and it falls in a puddle at her feet, revealing herself to him completely. She is white marble and starlight and pale pink pebbled flesh. He has never seen anything in all his life so beautiful. He gasps audibly and she is -- oh, she is pleased. His eyes are greedy on her form, memorizing her desperately after two years, two long years of fantasizing, of imagining the shape and color of her nipples as he stroked himself, of hungrily admiring her lithe body beneath her fitted breeches and tunic, of wondering obsessively if the thatch between her legs is the same dark liquid silver of her hair. 

And it is. 

Oh, Maker have mercy, it is.

"Cullen," she murmurs, throaty and covetous. "Come here."

He stands without knowing he does it, steps around the desk and toward her, but he stops a little more than an arm's reach away.

"Is this what you want?" he needs to know.

"Cullen," and she laughs, "shut up and kiss me."

He is happy to oblige. He takes her in his arms, wraps her up and pulls her to him, presses her naked body to his clothing. His hands are on her skin, her bare skin, her back, her sides, like softest silk, even the scars, even the places she's bled for the Inquisition, she is warm and pliant and real beneath his fingers. She's looking up at him; she has to, she is elven and he is not, and he will have to remember to be careful when he takes her. To be patient and gentle. At first. She's looking up at him and he dives willingly into the deep tropical pools of her eyes, shimmering teal with threads of violet, and there is such love in them, such desire. For him. For him. Not for Solas, but for him. It is all he has ever wanted. He fears he might start to cry with relief.

When he kisses her, it is two years' worth of kissing. It is all the kisses he would have given her in all their many varieties. Tentative, testing kisses, sweet and tasting, like trying a fine wine. Ravenous and rough kisses with biting and tongues that fight like the Templars of legend, wrestling for dominance. Seductive and sensual with caressing and licking and tongues that dance like she did so well at the Orlesian ball. Kisses of longing and kisses of comfort, kisses of length and kisses of passion, kisses that set his soul on fire and burn away all the necrosis there, scour it clean and new for her. She makes him new. She makes him clean. He is drunk on her taste.

But then she starts to change. Something in her kiss becomes strange, the burning is no longer healing, no longer restorative, it's harsher now, it is agony and searing and...familiar. Maker, it is so beautifully, transcendentally familiar. It lifts him, changes the world around them, pulses white-blue at the edge of his vision and then it changes again and it is consuming him. It eats away at his new soul, rips into it, tearing out chunks with eager claws of jagged crystal even as he floats on it, soars on it, even as the constant pounding of his head this last year drowns in the scalding heat of what it most craves, what everything in him most craves.

Not Hal.

Lyrium.

She's kissing him and it's lyrium! It's boiling in his blood and ripping through his body like Corypheus rent the sky asunder and he tries to pull away because it hurts, it hurts, and he is confused, he is betrayed, his heart struggles to understand why and how she could do this to him, she, who held him as he shook, she, who believed in him, she, who kissed his brow and sang him Dalish songs until he fell into a troubled sleep. Hal, he thinks as he finally pushes her away, as he finally tears his lips from hers, why?

But the teal eyes that greet his when his vision clears are not Hal's. They are not cool and clear, they are not for sinking into after a long, hard day. These eyes are crystalline and broken, shattered into a million pieces and sewn back together, grown over with pulsing white-blue that swallows it up and turns it into something else. These eyes are hard and sharp and they are eyes for getting lost in, for becoming trapped in, eyes for ocean waves to break themselves upon, and that's what he is now because she smiles at him and it's Hal's smile, Hal's smile just for him, but it isn't Hal. He is broken. He is trapped. He is lost.

"Is that what you want?" Lanaya asks, slinking to him like a cat. "What would she do? She'd be bold. Bold but sweet."

He cannot make his body move, cannot think to flee, and he craves her, craves the lyrium and craves her, or, no, does he crave Hal? He wants Hal. Hal! This woman is not his Hal'lasean, but still he can't seem to run. Her body presses to his, fuller now, hips and breasts and ass and his hands find flesh and grab hold and then their lips meet again and there is nothing left of him but white-blue pulse, pulsing with her, pulsing together, and he burns from the inside out as lyrium lines take root just beneath his skin, marking him like Hawke's pet elf, making the lyrium always a part of him. He can never escape it now.

~~~

Cullen sat up in a panic, his heart pounding, his blood racing, his breath coming in gasps. His bedroll was soaked in his sweat as were his tunic and breeches, his hair, anything that touched him. Before his eyes even focused in the dark, he slapped a hand out to one side for the box he knew would be there, for the box that held what he needed, white-blue and pulsing, for the box that would calm him, help him, soothe him, make him strong.

It was only when his hand raked the dirt floor of his tent that he remembered. He was not in Skyhold. He was in the Anderfels. And he was not a man who needed lyrium anymore. Never again.

Never again.

He held out his arms as his vision adjusted to prove to himself he was not tattooed with the stuff like Fenris. To assure himself that he was still here, still whole, to remind himself that lyrium did not have him. Never again.

Never again.

He let out a groan and pushed his palms over his face, willing his body to calm, breathing slowly in and out through his nose, listing things he knew to be true of this place, this place in the present.

Hal is not here. Hal is pregnant. The child is Fen'Harel's. She chose him. She loves me. I love her. She chose him. It will never happen. I am in the Anderfels. I am protecting Hal's sister. We are waiting to be taken through the Eluvian. I will be at Skyhold soon. I will see her soon. I do not need lyrium. Lyrium does not have me. I do not need lyrium. I will see her soon.

I do not need lyrium. Never again.

Never again.

Only when his heart was thumping its normally clumsy beat in his chest did Cullen become aware of the strain in his trousers. 

"Oh, for fuck's sake!" he whined at his erection. "You are killing me!"

He thought this time of cold water. Of cold steel. Of troop movements and maps and piles of reports. He thought of his mother.

Still his arousal would not ebb. "Andraste's ass," he sighed. "Fine!"

Cullen stuck his head out of his tent and peered at the sky overhead. The first fingers of light were stretching out at the horizon, but it was the deep blue of night still. There was time before the camp began to wake. And since they were just waiting now, waiting for Fen'Harel to come, they would probably have a slow start anyway. He had time. He pulled on his boots, then his coat, fastening it tightly around his waist to hide his unfortunate situation. Then he snatched up his scabbard and stepped outside. Cullen crossed the camp as though he had nothing at all embarrassing happening in his breeches, even making himself meet the eyes of the man on watch. They nodded. Cullen passed him.

From there it was a little enough thing to pick his way through the trees to the hot spring at which the Eluvian was hidden. He would undress, take care of his problem, bathe, and be back before anyone even noticed his absence.

And soon he would be back at Skyhold. Soon he would see Hal.

His cock twitched in anticipation. Cullen sighed miserably.

Chapter Text

"We should rest here at least a half day, Liall," Babae says. His face is always serious like hers is always serious, but this time it's worried too. 

Mamae's face is stubborn like Tama's is always stubborn, but this time it's twisted with pain. "Deyriel, I swear to the gods, if you tell me to rest one more time..." But then she trips.

This is the fourth time in the past twenty minutes that she's stumbled and nearly fallen. It would be no wonder because her belly is so big now with the baby -- twins, Babae thinks, as he is a twin and Mamae never carried Naya or Tama like this. It would be no wonder except that Mamae moves like the wind, always forward, never falling. Nothing ever stands in her way. But there has been no food and she has been having trouble hunting, so she's taught Naya and Tama to make traps. They set them overnight because they're always moving in the day, but the only thing they catch is nothing. This land has been picked clean by the clan they follow. It's why they moved on in the first place.

Babae catches her as he always does with his steady crafter hands, and they have a conversation with just their eyes the way they do when they don't want to say something upsetting in front of their daughters. But Naya is nine and smart and she understands more than they think. 

"Come, hallabell," she tells her little sister, holding out her hand. Tama looks up and waits because she never does anything unless she's convinced it's something she wants. "Let's go for a walk."

Tama isn't having any of it. She shakes her head, her braids flopping, and plants her hands on her hips. In Alerion, her braids would have jingled like the halla. It was how she and Merrill kept track of her while the grownups were working. But out here, they don't want to be heard. Out here, her braids make no sound. "We always walk! Walk walk walk walk walk!"

"We can go to the riverbank and check for frogs," Naya tries again, making her face look like it will be the most fun thing they've ever done. Tama's eyes light up but she waits for further convincing. "And maybe there will be sweetroot on the way and we can have that for dinner!"

Tamalin gasps in delight and eagerly takes Naya's hand, pulling pulling pulling as she always does because she wants to see everything there is to see, wants to be the first to the frogs and the sweetroot. Wants wants wants. But Naya looks back at Mamae and Babae. They are smiling at her with gratitude and pride. She smiles back. She is a good daughter. Everyone in Alerion said so. At the Arlathvhen when they tried to find her a new clan, they said to everyone, "Lanaya will do you proud. She always does as she's told. She listens well and is good with the little ones. She is eager to please. She is a good da'len, an excellent daughter of Alerion." But there was no place to take her and Mamae and Babae could not bear to send her off on her own as some clans do. "We're staying together," Babae swore. "All of us. No matter what."

She is a good daughter.

"Nayanayanayanayanayaaaa! Let's go!" Tama hollers. Babae sighs and rubs his temple. Tama is a wild daughter. She is always moving, always talking. Babae says she is made of questions, that she will go into even the Beyond asking questions and she will talk so much the gods will send her back. She will be the first elf in thousands of years to return. Keeper says Tama is one of those children to watch closely or she will pull the Dread Wolf's tail and turn his eyes on the clan. Mamae laughs at that and always says the only way their Tama could pull the Dread Wolf's tail is if he let her because he will hear her talking and her braids jingling from miles away.

Tama is a wild daughter.

Except when something captures her interest. Then her focus is unbreakable. So they find a single sweetroot on the way to the river and wash it off and share it between them. Tama would eat the whole thing but Naya tucks it in her pouch to bring back for Mamae and the twins inside her. She is a good daughter. And when their bellies have a little something in them, Tama spends the next two hours staring in rapt silence at the tiny frogs and tadpoles that wriggle through the mud. Naya sits nearby to make sure she doesn't fall in (though Tama is a strong swimmer) and sings. She sings the songs her people sing. Then she sings songs she makes up. Tama joins in sometimes without realizing it, and when that happens, Naya takes the harmony. When Merrill was with them, they would do three parts and Tama would shake her braids to keep beat. Now it is only the two of them and no bells. Still, they sing. Two shemlen women arrive an hour into their play to wash clothing on the rocks, and when they hear the harmony the little Dalish girls make, they smile and murmur with approval.

When the sky darkens, they go back and add the last of the sweetroot to water they boil with bark and leaves and fennec bones. It is cold that night, so they snuggle together under their furs and blankets and cloaks, and when the stars come out, Babae points to constellations and she names them dutifully. She gets them all right until there is one that stumps her. As she gropes for the name, Tama blurts out that it's Fen'Harel, the Trickster. She points with a fat little hand -- her cheeks and hands are the only things about her with any fat on them now -- to show Babae the parts of the Wolf, but then she stops. They all stop. Everything stops.

Tamalin's hand is dripping thick, clumpy blood.

~~~

When Lanaya woke with terror in the night, she never jolted or cried out. A lifetime of stillness and invisibility, of lying beside her master's sleeping form, of sharing beds with little children had taught her well that thrashing and screaming as she woke only made it worse. But she hadn't dreamed of that night in years. She had been dreaming of her sister, of her parents, of the Dalish, since leaving Minrathous, which was also new and more than a little unsettling. But this was the first time she had dreamt of the night Mamae-- no, her mother, not Mamae, that was an Elvish word and she was not Elvish anymore -- died since being pregnant with the twins. Pregnancy always seemed to make it rear its ugly head. But she was mostly certain she was not pregnant now. 

She had, however, become increasingly anxious over the course of the day. They had arrived at the rendezvous point and set up camp before midday, so the rest of the day was spent in relative leisure. Cullen -- no, the Commander -- had taken the children to a hot spring nearby to swim and she had let them go, partly because she and her sister's advisor had come to a quiet agreement in the dark that night, partly because Spurian had told her she was ruining this, but mostly because she thought if she was alone with the soldiers, one of them might come to her.

But they hadn't. They had only smiled at her and tried to talk to her and gone about their card games or hunting or polishing their swords. And not the kind of sword polishing she was paid for. So she had wandered the woods and when the trees and the scent of the mountains made her breathing difficult, when her confusing waves of fear nearly crippled her, Lanaya retired to her tent and curled up in a ball and imagined she was in Amantius' manse in Minrathous, that all was well and safe and stable and she was loved and needed.

She woke from the dream with tears already in her eyes and that made her furious with herself and with her sister and with the Commander and with the situation. She couldn't breathe inside the tent; the children were too close, taking too much air, and Tully had his arm thrown almost over her face. Just that touch made her skin crawl. His fat little child's hand. It wasn't dripping blood, not yet, but it could be if they stayed here much longer because that was what happened when a little family waited in the woods. 

Lanaya extricated herself from her son's limbs and sat up slowly, careful not to wake her children. She pulled on her coat and her boots and grabbed her staff. Spurian was a light sleeper because he, like her, was always waiting for something to go wrong, but he had spent the day running and playing and swimming and he was deep in the Fade now. For that, Lanaya was grateful. 

She stuck her head out of the tent and took in the deep blue of the early morning sky, the secret sunlight peeking over the mountains, and decided she had time before the camp began to wake. Time to go to the hot spring and bathe and float and remember how to breathe.

The man on watch nodded at her as she passed. She dropped her gaze to her feet and pulled her coat more tightly around her. Lanaya didn't want the way he looked at her. Like she wasn't desired. Like she was any person. 

Better for him not to see her at all than to see her and not want her.

Chapter Text

Once Lanaya had been able to move through the forest like the whisper of wind through leaves. All Dalish could. When they learned to walk, it was silent like a shadow over dirt and grass and brush. That was how they survived.

But now Lanaya only knew how to move through stone-tiled hallways like the whisper of silk on silk. All slaves could. When they learned to walk, it was silent like a shadow through parties and bedrooms and parlors. That was how they survived.

At some point in her life, she had learned the latter and fogotten the former. She had not been in nature -- not really -- since the slavers first brought her in chains to Minrathous. So she was loud. For a Dalish girl, anyway. For a human, she was quiet. For a city human, she was invisible. But she was not so loud as the gentle splashing of the spring or the trickling waterfall of runoff that tripped down the mountain to join the river in less than a mile. That's why the man in the water didn't hear her.

From the safety of the trees, Lanaya studied him; the corded muscles of his broad shoulders and back, the narrowing of his torso toward his waist and hips, the mass of clenched flesh that was his ass just under the surface of the pool. It was the kind of ass that could really fill out a pair of breeches, that meant the thighs beneath it were thick and strong, that the calves below that were well-turned. It was the body of a soldier, a man trained to fight for his life with steel and shield.

His head was bent and his hair soaked, and in the dark, she couldn't determine which of the men that accompanied them it might be. But Lanaya knew what he was doing. That was unmistakable. He was punishing himself vigorously, roughly, almost angrily. His grunts were agonized, as though this were torture, as though he got no pleasure from his pleasure. 

Lanaya could help with that. And in return, he could take her mind off the waiting. Take her mind off her dreams. In return, he could look at her with desire and she could feel wanted. Useful. Important.

But the truth was once she saw what he was doing, she was already moving toward him. There was no thought involved, only instinct, only conditioning. A slave who served the food did not think before refilling an empty glass of wine. A slave who serviced the master did not think before attending to his needs.

She was already pulling off her coat and boots as she moved toward the spring, leaving them in soundless heaps to mark her progress. His were in a neat, military pile -- she recognized the sword, knew now this was the Commander, and so much the better because he was handsome and because she knew he wanted her, or at least wanted someone who looked like her -- but she didn't care about these plain Southern hand-me-downs. They were perpetually filthy. A little more mud wouldn't change that. Coat. Boots. Breeches. Tunic. She didn't wear the smalls they got her. She had never had need of smalls.

Lanaya was completely nude as she first put her toes in the water, holding in a satisfied breath at the marvelous heat, like the bathhouses in Minrathous. But as she stepped closer, moved deeper into the water, one foot slipped and she hissed as she caught her balance, the water sloshing around her. That's when he knew he wasn't alone. He froze like a stag who knew he was being hunted, one hand still clutching his length while the other held his weight, out in front of him, braced hard on a mineral-slick boulder. His back rose and fell dramatically with the tension he'd been building so determinedly and then suddenly abandoned.

There had once been a Magister marred by blood magic gone wrong who felt himself too hideous to be touched. His wife had purchased Lanaya's skills to help him through it. She approached the Commander as she had that malformed man, moving slowly, languidly, one hand out. He was rigid and panting, and only when she trailed magic through the water and up his back like ribbons did he shudder and chance a look over his shoulder.

The Commander's face was red with effort and his easy blushing, more red than she had seen it yet, which was saying something. She marked his eyes dipping down her chest and then jerking back to her face in panic, but still he didn't turn around. Didn't even move his steadying hand to cover himself, which is why she decided he wasn't as embarrassed as he was conflicted. Which meant he wanted her. 

"Please," he almost sobbed, his voice low and rumbling in his chest. But he didn't specify if it was please touch him or please don't. Lanaya had never before this man ever been told not to touch. With the sentence left open to interpretation, she did what she knew, what she had been taught: she touched. Her fingers found the curve of his ass and he let out a sound that was something between torment and relief. Just at her fingertips dusting his skin. She felt for him in that moment, understood him, in her own way. Two years of loving someone who didn't love back, two years of feeling invisible, unwanted, useless, unimportant, unneeded. These were things Lanaya knew well. And the idea that her sister had done that to this man, who her children seemed determined to love...

He deserved release. He deserved to feel desired and wanted. And she looked just like her sister.

"Lanaya," the Commander murmured, still sounding pained, but he didn't say more than that. 

"Close your eyes, Cullen," she instructed, bold but sweet. She wished she knew how her sister's voice sounded now. If she could approximate... "With your eyes closed, I can be her. I'll be your Hal. Let me help you."

The hand on the boulder clenched into a fist that turned his knuckles white and his thighs trembled beneath him. She couldn't quite see his cock yet, not from her current angle, but Lanaya imagined it must be throbbing uncomfortably by now. 

"I just want..." he croaked out, and clenched his eyes shut.

"I know," Lanaya purred soothingly, reaching for his strong human shoulders to turn him slowly toward her. He went clumsily but willingly. If his back was impressive, his front was magnificent. He finally covered himself as best he could with both hands, but he was swollen with anticipation and a sizable man, so he couldn't hide much. Lanaya admired him, but not for long. She had seen many, many men, some of them built like this or better, and she was uninterested in beauty. Lanaya had beauty on her own. What she wanted was a man with lust for her in his eyes, a man who needed to own her, even if just for a few minutes. And if she had to pretend to be her sister to get what she wanted, so be it. Her sister was taking her away from everything she had ever known, the life she had built from less than nothing, where she had been desired and wanted by the richest men in the country. If she could take all that from Lanaya, this Hal, then Lanaya could take something from her too. And she had her eyes on her reparations now.

"Cullen," she breathed, trailing fingers down his chest. "What's my name?"

He whimpered and shook his head.

"I want this too," Lanaya assured him. "What's my name, Cullen?"

It was another near-sob, his face contorted around his tightly closed eyes.

"Hal!" he gasped, like he was calling for help. But he didn't run. He reached for her. And when he opened his eyes, they locked on hers with two years of need.

Chapter Text

Cullen was not a good man. He was not a good man at all. He tried to be a good man, but he was fundamentally defective, he must be, because bad things always happened around him, terrible things, whole Circles became abominations, cities exploded beneath him and ran with blood, the skies themselves tore apart, and every time, every time he tried to be a good man. He was the best man he knew how to be. But it always turned out he wasn't doing it right. It always turned out he was not a good man. Maybe that's why Hal'lasean chose the Wolf. She could see in his heart that he wasn't a good man. And she was so good. She was so purely, compassionately good without even trying. And he, he tried and tried and tried and just when it seemed like he might finally be getting somewhere, like she was helping him be better, just when he was proud of the man he was every day, along came Lanaya.

His thoughts were steamed with sulfurous heat from the pool and the thick, humid scent of lust, of desperate groping sex. He made no excuses for himself. He knew better. Maker, but he knew better. Still, he was naked already and aching for release, driven practically mad with his need, his long pent-up need because, fuck, a man can only satisfy himself with his hand so many times before it stops helping. When he was a young man, the other Templar recruits used to call it 'performing the Rite of Tranquility'. Maybe that's why it always felt shameful and abusive. But he was under no illusions, even with his brain addled as it was by the nearness of naked flesh, that this, what they were about to do, this was more shameful and abusive than anything he had yet done in his long life as a failed good man.

He already hated himself. But he couldn't seem to stop.

So Cullen made himself a compromise. He would sate himself with this woman, but he would do it with respect for her, if he could do anything sexual with a woman like this with respect. He couldn't. But he would pretend. He would try. He would fail, but he would try. So there would be no pretending she was Hal, no matter how the idea of it twisted his insides with sick want. He wouldn't do that to Lanaya. He wouldn't do that to himself. He wouldn't do that to Hal.

No, if he was going to be the kind of shameless, selfish man Lanaya already thought he was, he would at least make sure it was reciprocal. He would make sure it was loving and tender and took her into account even if it was rough and fast and dirty. He was not so far gone, so out of his mind yet that he couldn't do that at least. He could not bear to be like the other men who had used her all her life. Even though he already was. Even though he was nauseous with the thought of it. Even though when he was done, he would never be able to look the love of his life in the eyes ever again.

Hal.

Hal!

They hadn't even begun yet and he already couldn't do it. Part of him was disgusted that he couldn't. Part of him was disgusted that he got this far without running as far away as he possibly could. 

Maybe he should have taken that vow of celibacy after all.

Cullen was reaching for Lanaya with his intestines in knots, with his heart like lead in his stomach. He couldn't bring himself yet to look at her body, which he knew, he knew must be perfect in its imperfection. He imagined she would have stretch marks, that whereas he thought Hal's nipples must be pink and soft as rose buds, Lanaya's would be permanently peaked from suckling three beautiful children. He imagined the plump pendulums of her breasts and the sweep of her waist and her hips, wide from birthing babies, though still narrow for being an elf. He didn't have to imagine. He could look. She was right there in front of him, his hands almost touching...

But he was trapped in her eyes, eyes like hard lyrium. Eyes that would consume him if he wasn't strong enough. 

"Lanaya..." His voice sounded strange, taut with frustration and desire and pain and regret. How could he regret something he hadn't even done yet? He needed...something from her. He wasn't sure what. He needed assurances. He needed to know he wasn't as terrible a man as he thought he might be. "Why do you want this?"

Her brow knit and she recoiled slightly, affronted by the question. Or maybe confused by it. Maybe it scared her. Maker, did that simple question scare her? 

"Stop talking," she replied, and it wasn't an answer. A little of that steam lifted from Cullen's mind. Red flag, his brain said. Red flag! She stepped purposefully forward and he stepped hesitantly back, bumping into the wet boulder behind him. He was trapped now. If she kept advancing, he had nowhere to go without picking her up and physically moving her. And if he touched her, he didn't think he could stop himself from having her.

"I have to know, Lanaya," he insisted, his voice a little stronger. His throat, however, still felt like it was intent on constricting until he could no longer swallow or breathe. "What are you getting out of this?"

Her lip twisted into a sneer, but those eyes, those lyrium eyes were snapping, coursing with energy. Her one moment of uncertainty was all it took. Cullen felt his heart spasm painfully. He was a monster. He was just the same as all those other men. She was right. Maker forgive him, she was right. He wanted to drown in the spring. He wanted to sob brokenly in a fetal position in the mud. He wanted to find a cave in the woods and live there until his beard overtook his face and he began to speak only in rhyming riddles. But instead he tried to be a good man.

"You don't want this," he sighed.

She snarled silently at him, moving neither forward nor back. He was still trapped, but at least he had her stunned. He could fight this. He could still fight this. And maybe Hal wouldn't hate him after all. "Don't tell me what I want!" Lanaya snapped, her teal eyes flashing. "You don't know anything about me!"

It wasn't pity that overtook his expression, but it was pain, conflict, the manly withholding of tears. "Exactly," he breathed earnestly, holding out his arms to his sides in a gesture that said that one sentence was everything they needed to know about why this couldn't happen, shouldn't happen, and -- Maker give him strength -- wouldn't happen. Never mind he was stark naked and standing at attention. "I don't know anything about you! You don't know anything about me!"

"I doubt that's stopped you before," Lanaya tossed back, agitated and coiled like a cat preparing to pounce. "Certainly hasn't stopped anybody else."

"Exactly!" Cullen exclaimed, "I don't want to be anybody else! I'm trying, Lanaya, I'm...really trying to be a good man! And I am failing because I am weak and confused and, fuck, because you look like the love of my life!" He sucked in a breath so sharp he had to cough. He had never said it out loud before. Never admitted it except to himself. She was, wasn't she. She was the love of his pathetic, miserable life. "But I'm trying not to be like all those other men who hurt you, who used you, who did whatever it is to you that made you this way! Maker help me, but I am terrible at it. But I won't-- I can't-- not unless you can tell me why you want this. What do you get out of being with a man you don't know, a man you don't trust or like, a man who is in love with your sister!"

Hal.

"...Unless that's it," Cullen exhaled in horror, studying the face and only the face of the woman standing naked before him. "Is that it? Is this about Hal?"

Something dark slid across Lanaya's features, something slid shut behind her eyes. Her face was a mask of disdain. "Isn't everything."

He thought to be offended or defensive, but instead Cullen found himself giving Lanaya a crooked, miserable smile. "Sometimes it does seem that way." Not that he minded. Even the agony of not having her was tempered by the sweetness of the thought of her. He sighed and scooped water from the spring to pour over his face and head, still struggling as best he knew how to get himself back under control. "Look, we're both...dealing with a lot right now."

Lanaya crossed her arms lazily over her breasts and lifted her brows at him as if to say he should speak for himself. He saw Hal in the expression, but it was a twisted Hal. A Hal that was bitter and angry and hurting beyond her ability to cope. Hal could always cope. She coped for herself and for everyone else. Lanaya couldn't even admit that she couldn't cope. And Cullen...well, Cullen was just trying (and failing) to be a good man.

"...I don't think...this is a good idea," Cullen finished lamely, when Lanaya didn't speak. "I--" He studied her eyes, dangerous and labyrinthine as they were, and something in his leaden heart stirred. It wasn't longing. Or even want. But it was something. An ache. An understanding. Maybe a kinship? A desire to protect. To help. To hold and make it all okay. 

I want to save her, Cullen realized suddenly. As Hal saved me. 

"If one day I take you to my bed," he heard himself saying, his voice surprisingly steady even as it was gentle, coaxing, "I don't want it to be because of Hal. Because you're angry at her or because I can't have her. If it happens, I...I want it to be because we...because of just the two of us. Because I do...I do desire you, Lanaya Alerion." His face flushed and his groin pulsed. "Maker have mercy, but I desire you." He took in a deep breath and managed to step closer, reaching out to touch her upper arm. But Lanaya jerked away, took a wary step toward the shore. He dropped his hand with a sigh. "But not more than I respect you. And I..." He closed his eyes and tried again. "I will endeavor in the future to remember that. I...I am sorry. I--"

She didn't say a word. She looked at him like he'd just called her every foul name he had ever heard, like she had offered him her heart and he had tossed it to the dogs. His own weary heart creaked in protest. Why did he feel guilty for doing the right thing? Lanaya let her hurt turn to distaste and glared ruefully at him before turning on her heels and picking her way out of the spring. But of course she took her time. She tormented him. Each move was a sway of her hips, each piece of clothing she retrieved a careful display of the cards she'd been dealt. He may not have managed to look at her naked front, but she made damned sure he saw every bit of her naked back. And then some. She dressed with her back to him and disappeared into the trees. And Cullen sank under the water and wondered what it would be like to just stop breathing.

Chapter Text

They would have been at the camp with the former Knight-Captain Rutherford by nightfall except for Merrill. Bethany couldn't really blame her; it was a confusing, frustrating, scary situation for people who already had family. But for someone like Merrill, whose only family now was the Inquisitor, whose people had shunned her -- although sometimes Bethany secretly understood when she thought of the means Merrill had used to... -- for someone like Merrill, who hadn't seen her cousin in twenty-three years of pain and death and Maker knew what else, Bethany was willing to be patient and gentle. 

Merrill had frozen before the Eluvian, which was irritating at first because Bethany so desperately wanted to see the Crossroads, to experience that tingling vivacity Merrill and Hal had both described. But Merrill couldn't make herself go through. So instead of being at the camp by nightfall, they made camp before the Eluvian. And there with the fire flickering and casting long, creepy shadows on the cave walls, Merrill confessed her feelings of guilt for going to Sabrae, for taking a place Lanaya could have had instead, and admitted that she thought if Lanaya had gone to Sabrae, Keeper Marethari might still be alive.

Bethany was good at talking people down from self-loathing. Before the Circle, she had performed that trick for Sparrow for years, and after the Circle, well...she tried. Sometimes she was more successful than others. It was difficult to comfort hurts you didn't really understand. Sparrow seemed more at ease these days with Varric and Fenris and Merrill, which made sense, even if it hurt. She wasn't the girl she had been when they'd first come to Kirkwall either. And Sparrow never had been one to share her feelings. Still, she was good enough at easing hurts that she could handle open, earnest Merrill without much work. All she had to do was pretend she didn't maybe a little bit actually agree that this cousin of hers might have been a better First to Clan Sabrae. But she loved Merrill. She would never say those things out loud.

So they didn't get through the Eluvian until morning, with the usually cheerful Merrill grim and determined. Too determined to give Bethany much of a chance to explore the Crossroads. It wasn't what the elves had described, but she could feel...something different. Something more than herself. She had never walked physically in the Fade like Sparrow had, but she imagined it must be closer to that. It was difficult to get and keep her bearings, like being drunk or having vertigo, or maybe both at once, and she felt she had to concentrate to hold herself together, like if she relaxed or let down her guard, she would come apart into a being of pure energy. Merrill didn't seem to have that problem at all. Maybe it was an elf thing.

The next Eluvian let out in a mountain wood near a hot spring. The weather was considerably warmer than the Frostbacks, and they were stripping out of furs and tucking them into a crevice at the mirror before they tramped what looked to be a muddy but recently traversed path from the spring to a camp full of former Templars, as promised, not two miles away. But just before they would have been spotted by the soldiers, Merrill froze again.

"Sweet wounded Ghilan'nain," she breathed. "I don't think I can do this." Her green eyes took up an astounding amount of her face in her anxiety. "She won't recognize me, I'm sure. We were so young when we last...and I have vallaslin now and my hair was much longer then. I could...just be anyone, really, and she wouldn't know--"

"Until she came back to Skyhold and everyone -- literally everyone -- refers to you as Hal's cousin," reasoned Bethany.

Poor Merrill's resignation looked like it was crushing her. Because of course Bethany was right. She liked to think she usually was. There was no escaping this reunion.

"What if she blames me?" Merrill nearly whispered, her features squished with child-like pain. 

"Then she blames you," and Bethany shrugged. "Look at Row and Mother. Or Uncle Gamlen! You can't help how someone thinks about you. The only thing in your control is how you act." She decided for a kinder approach and smiled, touching Merrill's wrist. "And I doubt very much you have anything to worry about there. You're never anything but sweet."

Merrill blushed and looked down at her bare toes peeking out of her wrappings. Bethany still had no idea how they managed that. All that dirt on their feet all the time!

"I'm the eldest of the cousins," Merrill murmured, mostly to herself, "I should be the strongest too." But it was obviously not the case, so Bethany squeezed gently at the Dalish girl's wrist. When she looked up again, it was with a little more of that grim determination. She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin. "Well, if I can't be the strongest, I suppose I must be the nicest." She braved a smile. "I can do that, right?"

Bethany laughed. "You've definitely already won that title from the Inquisitor. Let's go find out if her sister is any different."

~~~

Lanaya was no stranger to humiliation. She was a stranger to rejection, but not humiliation. Her master's wife had made certain of that. As had the slavers, the courts, the other slaves, the men and women she serviced, the other prostitutes in the Dragon, people on the streets. Humiliation was a bitter old friend. One she tolerated with numb silence because the alternatives were worse.

She spent the remaining dark hours sitting in the tent with her sleeping children, stinking of sulfur and trying to understand anything. Any of this. The Commander, her children, the turn her life had taken...

But mostly the Commander. He was still a man who made no sense and of course that was irritating as it had been from the beginning, but then she thought she'd figured him out once she knew he loved the Inquisitor. Her sister. Hal'lasean Lavellan. Tamalin Alerion. Hal. Tama. Hallabell. But, Maker, nothing made sense anymore, least of all this Cullen Rutherford. He desired her, he said as much, and even if he hadn't, it was plain to see. But he kept holding back. No man had ever held back. Not once in her entire life. It made no fucking sense! Even the men who purported to love their wives or love their mistresses still paid for her services. It's just what happened. It's just how things had always worked. So why should this man be any different?

But he was.

And those questions! That self-righteous prick telling her what she didn't want! She knew what she wanted, Void take him! 

Didn't she?

Maker, didn't she?

What did she want?

Lanaya's throat restricted and a lifetime of buried pain burned like reflux in her chest. She had to get out of this tent. But outside the tent, she could hear the Commander's -- Cullen's -- no, the Commander's clear baritone. And then something else. Another voice. No, two voices. Both female.

A stab of something sharp and keen like jealousy shot through Lanaya's ribs, skewering her like a feast day boar. And that also didn't make sense.

"Spurian," she murmured as she shook her son awake. Despite his evident exhaustion he bolted up, eyes wide and hand reaching for his staff. 

"What's wrong." It wasn't a question. 

Her heart ached for her son's readiness, for his constant vigilance. They shared it, he had never known anything else, and she...

She vaguely remembered a time when problems were something for adults. When children were meant to sleep and play and eat and learn. She remembered that time more this week than she had since she had been found by the slavers. It burned raw in all of her always-open wounds. The ones she spent so much of her life and energy pretending didn't exist. Leaving Minrathous was making them burst whatever sutures and scabs she had acquired over the years. The woods, Cullen, her sister's looming presence had her bleeding internally. She wondered how long she could keep pretending she was fine before she drowned in her own blood.

So she favored Spurian with a sad smile and touched his cheek. "Probably nothing, my love. But there are women in the camp. I'm going out to see what's happening. Get yourself and the twins dressed. Pack.  Be prepared, just in case." Lanaya didn't wait to see if he would do as he was told. He almost always did. But as she turned for the tent flap, he caught her arm.

"Mother?" His voice was young and uncertain. She wanted to wrap him in her arms and make promises that life would never let her keep. She met his eyes, turquoise and vulnerable and still clouded with sleep. "Thank you. For staying."

Her heart seized and she took him into her arms anyway, her son who was nearly a man. Lanaya pressed him to her breast as tightly as she dared, aware that he might balk at the affection as he tended to do these days. But he didn't. He bunched his clumsy adolescent fists into her tunic and held her close in return and Lanaya had to work to summon all the hardened scales of her heart to keep from weeping. "You're my son," she whispered fiercely into his silver hair. "Not all the Magisters in all Tevinter could make me leave my little boy."

He laughed then, pulling out of her embrace and wiping at his eyes. His cheeks were faintly copper with embarrassment. "Mother," he complained. "You can't call me a little boy anymore."

She kissed his forehead and ran her fingers through his hair. "I'm your mother. And you're not a man yet."

Chapter Text

Lanaya didn't know what she'd expected, but this certainly wasn't it. As she crawled out of her tent and stood, adjusting her clothing and with her staff held loosely in the crook of her arm, what she found didn't seem to be a threat to the camp or even, as the rejected part of her had feared, two camp followers who had won Cullen's attentions. Not that she had reason to be jealous. Because she wasn't. She didn't even like him. He was just a means to an end. No matter how he made her children laugh and smile. And it didn't hurt to think about it. Because why would it? No man had hurt Lanaya -- at least not her feelings -- since Amantius. She'd made sure of that. And she'd be damned if some blushing doglord was going to change that. 

No, Cullen didn't seem to be interested in them as women, though he clearly knew them. They were standing by the fire where breakfast was cooking, the Commander and the two dark-haired, pale-skinned mage women. One of them was human and spoke with a Fereldan accent as well, but the other, the petite one (neither of them was particularly big, but one of them was an elf, so...the petite one) was Dalish, complete with overlarge green eyes and facial tattoos. Something about the elf tugged at Lanaya's memory, but she decided it was this place, these woods, the girl's markings, the lilting accent of the Clans. Just the sight of it clenched at her chest and made her stomach turn unpleasantly. Breathing was becoming increasingly more difficult the longer she stared. And, oh, she was definitely staring.

She knew the Inquisitor was not beholden to the taboos of Tevinter, but it simply hadn't occurred to her that someone of such rank would openly take up with someone of the same sex. Or was she with both these women? But hadn't she heard somewhere that the Inquisitor was with a male elf? An apostate? Then again, she'd also heard the Inquisitor was with a Tevinter nobleman and a Qunari warrior, so she supposed she would simply have to find out for herself. Though if the Inquisitor fancied women, perhaps that was why she was seeking Lanaya and her children...

No, Lanaya chastised herself firmly. She's not after your children. Cullen made that very--

But since when did she start trusting Cullen? What the fuck was wrong with her? Why was everything so difficult out here in the wilderness?

"I had thought to see Solas," Cullen told the women with a puzzled frown. When he saw her, he carefully avoided looking, but pink crept up his cheeks and made its slow way to his hairline. He cleared his throat.

"Hal thought this would be faster," the human woman explained. "Solas is in the field and she would have had to contact him and pull him from his..." She laughed. "Well, whatever it is he's doing. Besides, she thought it might be helpful to send a familiar--" 

"Sweet wounded Ghilan'nain!" The dark-haired elf had glanced at Lanaya while the others were talking, looked away absently, and then immediately whipped back around to stare, gape-jawed, her eyes even bigger than they had been moments ago. Reflexively, Lanaya held her staff in front of her two-handed, the butt planted firmly on the ground. It was not brandished, but it was between her body and the world, between the world and her children. And it made a helpful cane for when everything she knew inevitably started shifting out of control around her as it always seemed to do. "Naya?! You look...Creators, you look just the same!" The woman blushed and laughed nervously. "Well, what I mean is...you don't, obviously, you don't at all, but I would recognize you anywhere!"

Naya.

No one had called her that since that last day by the river with her sister, singing and watching the frogs. Before her mother bled out all over her. Bled out into the ground to be soaked up like rain. To quench the thirsts of the seeds beneath her, which she always imagined had grown ruby red in the spring to mark where the little family had broken apart. She still wondered sometimes if it had been twins. If she would have had brothers.

No one had bothered to give her a nickname since then. There had been plenty of epithets and insults, but not even Amantius had seen fit to shorten her name. His endearments had always been long and elegant and never included what her parents had given her at her birth. He had taken great pleasure from his ownership of her. Amantius preferred to call her 'girl' or 'child' or 'babe' or even 'slave' during their more intimate moments. But of course his favorite had been simply 'mine'. That one had pleased her too. It had made her feel safe and needed. Important.

But Naya was like a knife in her guts. A knife enchanted with a frost rune that crept icy fingers through her organs until her heart could no longer pump. Until it was glacial and numb and the pain started to go away because there was no room for pain when everything was frozen. Her face must have been a mask of disdain because the Dalish girl took a step back, her expression faltering uncertainly.

"Naya?"

The knife twisted. 

"Naya," the Dalish woman tried again, her green eyes round with anxiety. "It's...it's Merrill."

The knife dragged up her stomach all the way to her throat, leaving her gutted, disemboweled, and unable to speak. Lanaya imagined herself a fish filet, gooey dead eyes staring out unseeing, mouth perpetually in motion but saying nothing, taking in and giving out nothing. Waiting to rot or be eaten.

She was mildly aware that Cullen was now staring between the two of them with growing confusion. "Do you two know each other?" She imagined she saw extra horror on his face at the thought. Was he really so disgusted by her? No, he couldn't be. He desired her. Then why did she still feel so...judged?

"Oh, er," stammered Merrill. Merrill. Merrill, her cousin. Merrill, her father's brother's girl. Merrill, who found a place at the Arlathvhen with another clan. The only clan that needed a child with magic born to them. Merrill, who was once her best friend, her dearest companion. Merrill, who had braided bells into her sister's hair with her so they could always know where she was when they were in charge of her. Merrill, with whom she had shared sticky sweet cakes in the human village near their encampment. Merrill, who had been the third part of her harmony with her sister. Merrill, Lanaya, Tamalin. "You see, well, she's my...cousin. We're cousins."

Lanaya thought she might vomit. 

The Commander's jaw fell open in surprise. "But if you're Lanaya's cousin..." He rubbed at the bridge of his nose with his forefinger and thumb and shook his head. "Maker, how much have I missed?"

"Mostly just this," the human woman assured him with a smile. "Sparrow, Fenris, Merrill, and I came to collect Varric, but now it looks like we're going to stay at Skyhold at least through the winter. Oh, and the Inquisition is taking in unwanted mage children."

Lanaya's frozen heart cracked in alarm under the weight of that thought. Mage children. The Inquisition wanted mage children. Cullen seemed to sense what she was feeling, or at least realized why she was starting to panic because he took a step toward her, holding out his palm and searching her face with those light brown eyes of his, always so easy to read even when what she read made no sense. But she wasn't easy to read. She was locked down like the Magisterium. "The Inquisition is doing...uh, doing what?" he asked the human woman without looking at her. Despite his earlier hesitancy, despite his blushing and his rejection, the Commander now didn't look away from Lanaya's unfocused gaze. Merrill was doing the same, but she wasn't worried about Lanaya; she was worried about herself. Cullen was...Cullen was worried. For her. Or. No, that couldn't be right. Cullen was worried for the situation and she was the potential catalyst. The wild card in this group. That must be it. That was it.

"Oh, they're making a school! It's a lovely idea, really," the woman enthused obliviously. "There were these two Dalish children who showed up nearly dead because there was no clan to take in a mage child, so Hal met with the Divine and they're taking in abandoned mage children! It won't be like the Circle, though -- well, nothing will ever be like the Gallows -- it'll be a proper school where they can learn to use their magic responsibly and they can leave at any time, so long as a guardian is there to take them! Then when they're adults, they can go out into the world and live their lives." The human beamed. "Merrill and I have been asked to teach!"

Only then did Cullen glance away from Lanaya, though he still kept his hand out to calm her. To hold her still. Even from across the camp. He looked briefly at the human mage with his brows lifted in question. "That was Hal's idea?" The moment he asked, he turned his attention back to Naya.

No, Lanaya. Not Naya. Not anymore.

Right?

"Naya," Merrill ventured, apparently emboldened by Lanaya's stillness, "the school...it's because of you."

Her fists clenched on her staff, her knuckles going even whiter. That was stupid. That was a lie. Why would Tamalin-- why would Hal'lasean open a school for unwanted mage children because of her?

Because of what happened.

Merrill took a step closer and Lanaya stiffened, but didn't back away. She didn't think she could if she tried. Had she always floated above her body like this, watching her life happen like a story about someone else? "Because she doesn't want what happened to you to happen to any other child."

And now Lanaya was floating away, slipping through the Veil even though she was still awake. Her heart, her ice-rock heart was strangely calm. Everything was moving like it was underwater. Which made sense. She felt like she was underwater. Drowning, but beyond care of her fate.

She was detached enough to notice the concern in Cullen's face when he frowned at Merrill. "What do you mean 'what happened'? What...?" He turned his frown to Lanaya but she was too far gone to make her lips move even if she felt like sharing. She didn't. She never did. If she didn't tell that story, it didn't happen. It wasn't real. If she didn't ever talk about it, she magically appeared in Amantius' manse as a nine-year-old and there was nothing before that, nothing at all. She simply coalesced out of nothingness into somethingness. Why were these people insisting on talking about Before?

Merrill shook her head, unable to speak, so the human woman took it upon herself to explain. That lousy bitch. "The Dalish, when they have too many children with magical abilities...they send them away."

Stop.

Except she didn't manage to say it out loud. She meant it, though.

"Merrill was taken into Clan Sabrae because they had an opening, but..."

"Stop."

Was that her voice? She couldn't tell. It was so quiet. So scared. And nobody seemed to hear.

"Hal's family tried to stay together when Lanaya was going to be evicted..."

"Stop."

Still nothing. Maybe she just thought she was making sound. 

"But they couldn't find a clan that would take them, and Hal's mother was pregnant..."

"Stop!"

This time she must have made sound. They must have heard her. Because they all turned to stare at her with wide-eyed shock. Spurian was suddenly out of the tent and standing beside her, a little in front of her, putting his body between whatever was wrong and hers. Her little boy, so brave and serious. Such a good boy. He'd make a good man too. The only one. The only good man.

"She said stop!" he snarled, gripping his staff. "When someone says stop, you stop!"

When someone says stop, you stop.

Lanaya moved for the first time since hearing her childhood name, but only enough to frown at Cullen.

When someone says stop, you stop.

So why hadn't anyone ever stopped when she said stop?

Or had she? Had she ever said stop?

No. No, stop got elves killed. Stop made things worse.

And Lanaya had always been eager to please.

Chapter Text

"All right," Cullen told Spurian with a firm nod, man to man rather than soothing. Direct. Frank. Spurian would like that. "Spurian's right. That's enough." He was in command now, not leaving any room for argument. So different than when he was naked with her earlier. Where had this Cullen been then?

The human woman at least had the good grace to blush her apology. And to keep her mouth shut. Unlike Merrill, who was now staring between Spurian and Lanaya with wonder.

"Creators, Lanaya, is this your...your son?" The Dalish girl's uncertainty and tension were swallowed up into her sudden delight. "He looks like our fathers!"

How could things still be doing so much damage? Shouldn't she be dead by now? Shouldn't she have bled out like her mother, gushing blood from her edhas--

Edhas. Edhas, that was an Elvish word. 

Lanaya swallowed bile. Beside her, Spurian's face was contorted with protective worry. "Mother?" It was many questions. Was she all right. Was everything all right. What could he do. What should he do. Who was this elven woman who knew her?

Somehow her son's need forced her mouth back into action, but her voice, usually smooth and low for the satisfaction of men, was rasping and trembling. She had no idea how she was making words in the first place, so she gave up any hope of steadying her speech. "Spurian," she managed roughly. "This is Merrill. She's my cousin. Her father...and my..." Father. The one who abandoned them. The one who hurt more than he loved. The one who chose death for his daughters rather than life without his lover. She couldn't finish her sentence.

"Our fathers were twins," Merrill said instead, gently, with a smile for Spurian that he returned with a dubious scowl. 

He lifted his chin proudly, and if he was at all curious or impressed by this new information about the mother he knew little about beyond that she was born to the Dalish, he showed no hint of it. "My aunt sent you?"

"Aunt," Merrill breathed, almost a laugh, like she couldn't believe the word existed. "Yes, we thought...a familiar face..." She glanced at Lanaya and her smile faltered. Because a familiar face wasn't helping. There was nothing familiar now about that part of her life. That dream she had when she was a child. It had been a dream, she knew, because there had never been a time before she was a slave. Before Amantius.

Before.

"Naya," Merrill tried again, but the moment Lanaya turned her eyes -- teal like the underside of an iceberg -- on her, the Dalish girl floundered. Whatever she was going to say slipped away in the mountain breeze. Instead, she smiled tremulously and took a step forward. "It's so good to see you. I...I didn't think I ever would, and--"

"Because you thought I was dead?" It was out of her mouth before she even registered the sentiment as an option. Did she even think it before she said it? Did she say it? Lanaya didn't remember saying it, but she was certain it was her voice. It was hard and cold as her words often were. And it sparked something hurt and furious in the glacier of her chest. Like a volcano in the snow.

Merrill looked like she'd been slapped. She even brought a hand up to touch at her tattooed face as though checking for bruising. "I--"

"Did you even spare a thought for us?" Lanaya was saying next, snarling, and she watched herself erupt in rage from a calm place high above. Watched the shock on their faces, the worry, the hurt. Watched Cullen cringe but take a step toward her at the same time Spurian did. Their expressions were so alike. Protective. Spurian was being protective of her. What was Cullen protecting? "Did you ever wonder what happened to us after you went to Sabrae? I hope it haunted you. I hope it kept you awake at night."

Because it haunted her. It kept her awake at night. It changed her life. Ruined it. No, not ruined.

Ruined, some part of her repeated.

The human woman was stepping in front of Merrill now, taking her part. "She was a child! She had nothing to do with--"

"You have nothing to do with this, shemlen." Had she been possessed? She never used that word. It was a Elvish word. Even Spurian turned to stare at her in confusion.

"...Mother, are you...?"

Spurian. Her children.

Would these people still take them to Skyhold if Lanaya abused them? Even if they deserved it?

The tent flat behind her rustled and the twins spilled out, sleepy and confused but fully dressed.

"Oh," gasped Merrill as she spotted them.

It made her sick to her stomach to cram this newfound ire back inside her, to pack it under an avalanche of ice in the hopes of soothing the fire to sleep. Before it consumed her. Before it ruined everything for her babies.

Her face was ice and stone as she swallowed what little pride remained to her and accepted humiliation for her children's sake.

"I'm sorry," she heard herself saying in monotone. "This is hard."

Cullen was studying her with that worry again, and something else, an echo of her own nausea. He inched toward her again, put himself between Lanaya and Merrill. "Why don't we save the reunions for Skyhold," he suggested quietly, and in that moment she was nothing but grateful to him. It almost made her like him a little. Almost. "We've been traveling for a week. We're tired and the children could use a real bed tonight. Let's just...get home and sort this all out later." It was Spurian' relieved glance at Cullen that stood out most in that moment. Cullen's apologetic nod at her son. And before anyone could argue, he turned to the twins with a broad smile. "Morning, sleepyheads! Are you ready to see your new castle?"

Chapter Text

They were packed up and leading the horses within the hour and the business of dismantling the camp and preparing things to move out made it blissfully possible for Lanaya to avoid Merrill entirely.

Well, almost entirely. She kept turning around from her preparations and finding her cousin staring at her wistfully like a kicked puppy. Their eyes would meet, Lanaya would scowl, and Merrill would blush and turn away. She also got plenty of glaring from the human woman, whose name, she gathered eventually, was Bethany. Bethany the Bitch, Lanaya labeled her bitterly. Bethany who had no business whatsoever telling her story or getting between family.

Not that Merrill was family. Not for twenty-three years. Lanaya's only family were the children she bore her master. The very children who, now that they were awake and packed and aware of who the strange woman with the face tattoos was in relation to their mother, were pestering her with questions all two miles to the hot spring.

"Did it hurt?" asked Tama of Merrill's marks.

"Like Fen'Harel's teeth!"

"Who's Fen'Harel?" wondered Tully.

Merrill sent a scandalized look back at Lanaya at that. Lanaya continued her stony scowling. Cullen, who was walking just ahead of Lanaya at the end of the line, coughed several times.

"Oh dear, well, you see..."

"Elven superstitious kaffas," Lanaya interrupted firmly. Cullen started coughing again and Merrill's look back at her this time was wounded and Bethany glared and Lanaya continued her stony scowl. The twins simply moved onto their next questions.

Which was unfortunate.

"Did you really know our mother when she was a little girl?" asked Tama.

"I did," but Merrill's answer was soft and sad. Guilt tapped at the ice of her chest but Lanaya refused to answer its call. "We were inseparable once."

Guilt and something worse, rapping more insistently this time. Pain? Sadness? Longing? Maybe mourning. What the fuck did she have to mourn besides her reputation in Minrathous?

It was Spurian who asked the next question, quiet and serious and troubled. "What was she like then?" There was an unspoken word at the end of his question: before. What was she like before. 

The ice inside her was invading her lungs, freezing her air before she could breathe it. Between that and the physical exertion of walking with a pack along a forest path in thin mountain air when up until that point her exercise had been gotten with a man between her legs, Lanaya soon had to stop and steady herself with her staff, sucking in breath that couldn't seem to make it to her blood stream, to her brain. Their line kept going without her, too wrapped up in the horses or the conversation to notice that their last member had fallen behind.

Except Cullen. He checked on her, and, seeing her standing in the trail, patted his horse and let it continue without him. He moved without attracting the attention of the others, and though he blushed brightly to find himself alone with her for the first time since that early morning fiasco, his eyes were soft and his lips tipped gently upward at the corners.

"Physical or emotional?" he asked, keeping his voice low so they weren't overheard.

Lanaya glowered at him in confusion. "What?"

He smiled an apology. "I beg your pardon. I wanted to know...I was worried..." He flushed again, cleared his throat, rubbed a hand at the back of his neck. "Your shortness of breath. I wondered if it was physical or emotional." He shook his head quickly. "You don't have to say. But if it's the thinness of the air, measuring your breathing through your nose can help. And if it's--"

"Naya was--" began Merrill.

"You called her Naya?" wondered Tully.

"Hush, Catullus," commanded Spurian. "It's rude to interrupt your elders."

"What I mean," Cullen sighed, glancing at the slow progress of the group, "is that if it's the topic of the conversation, I can try to redirect it."

Lanaya didn't blush. She wasn't some shy virgin. But her cheeks did warm with her humiliation. And her chest warmed too, but she wasn't sure what that was. They stood looking at each other for several long moments while the others got further and further away, and just as Cullen pressed his lips together to excuse himself, an accusatory question ripped from Lanaya's throat before she could stop it:

"Why are you being nice to me." 

He turned back around in surprise to stare at her with his mouth open. Like she'd just said something absurd or something in another language. "What?"

She decided to say it like he was an idiot this time, slow and careful: "Why are you being nice to me."

He looked up as if the Maker were speaking to him and then let out a helpless, incredulous laugh. "Don't you think it's about time someone was?"

The question earned him another glower, this time full of distaste. "You won't even fuck me."

The Commander's immediate reaction was one of anger and defensiveness, but as he looked at her it melted away to resignation, to something sad that came with a shrug of surrender. "Has no one ever been nice to you without taking you to bed, Lanaya?"

Her lips curled in a silent snarl. It was a ridiculous question. Of course not! "Not a man." 

For a moment, Cullen looked like he might cry or hug her. She'd hate him for either. Instead, he gave her a smile so pained it hurt her icy heart. "I am so sorry, Lanaya," he said earnestly. Her throat closed. "I hope you'll allow me to be the first."

"Mother!" gasped Tamalin from further up the path. When she couldn't find Lanaya, she tried again. "Mother?" Little feet came running full speed toward where Lanaya was staring at Cullen like he'd just grown a second head. "Is it true?"

"Is what true?" she asked, pulling her gaze from the Commander.

"Is it true Aunt Hal's name was Tamalin? You named me after her? An elven name!"

Lanaya's glacial insides shattered violently. She was aware only of Tamalin's shriek as her knees gave beneath her and her vision blurred, and a man's strong arms holding her to his armored chest to keep her from falling.

Chapter Text

She didn't black out or faint, thank the Maker, so she was at least spared the embarrassment of being thought some swooning noble twit.

Although once she realized that Cullen was holding her to his chest -- his armor, really -- clutching her to him protectively, she began to wish that she'd passed out after all.

He wasn't blushing as he held her, at least not until he noticed Lanaya staring up at him in baffled, prickly shock. Then he turned quite red and mumbled his apologies all the way down to the ground, where he settled her in a seated position and guided her arms over her head.

His gloved hands were gentle, tender even, and something unpleasantly pleasant stirred in her stomach at his nearness and his touch. At the flustered smile he gave her when he could meet her eyes. This time there was no mistaking who it was he was worried for.

Cullen was worried for her.

That too was unpleasantly pleasant.

But he probably just wanted to bring her safely to Hal.

Hal.

Lanaya was beginning to loathe even the sound of that name. It wasn't her sister's name! It wasn't the name they'd given her after they almost lost her, with their mother holding her in the aravel after the storm had finally cleared. They'd had a steady stream of visitors once the rain stopped, kin who wanted to offer the traditional blessings -- June's blessing for a child well-crafted, Sylaise's for saving the mother and child from a difficult birth, to always have a warm hearth for her, Andruil's so she may never go hungry, so that she may know the Three Ways but never need them, so that she may hunt but never be hunted, Mythal's protection and justice for any who may wrong her, Elgar'nan to watch over her and keep her enemies at bay, Dirthamen's to teach her the secrets of the world and to hold hers close to his breast. There were only two blessings not given at a birth for obvious reasons: Falon'Din's and Fen'Harel's. When the others had returned to their business and it was only Naya, their father and mother, and the infant, the Keeper had finally come. Their parents hadn't named the daughter saved by the storm Hal'lasean, Hal, they named her Tamalin. It was Tamalin the Keeper murmured with a string of High Elvish as she welcomed the new baby into Alerion, as she called on the gods to keep her safe and obedient and strong, as she kissed the pink, wrinkled brow.

Lanaya's little sister was not Hal.

Did Lanaya even have a little sister anymore, though? Maybe Tamalin had died in the woods by the river like Lanaya had. Maybe their whole family had died then. The women they were now, maybe those were spirits or demons possessing the bodies the little Dalish sisters left behind. Like hermit crabs finding a new shell.

Tamalin was her daughter now, she reminded herself as her breathing dropped in a little more, not her sister. She didn't have a sister.

Except that just the thought that she didn't made her want to throw up.

Was she dying? What was wrong with her? She couldn't leave her children. She couldn't die in the wilderness like her mother, couldn't abandon them, couldn't make them watch her life ebb away. 

Although, part of her thought a little deliriously, at least they'd have family to care for them.

Family that would teach them Elvish and make them hate Tevinter. But family that would protect them. Right?

She narrowed watering teal eyes at Cullen, whose face was close to hers as he held her hands delicately above her head, his brown eyes all concern. "Would you...keep them?" she heard herself asking, her voice high and breathy. She sounded young and vulnerable and she hated it, but she needed to know. "If I...die...would you...protect...?"

"Breathe," coaxed Cullen instead of answering, but his brow furrowed with pain at the question.

"Would you?" she demanded, or as close to demanding as she could get without air reaching her brain.

"You're not going to die," he insisted quietly, leaning in to speak into her pointed ear so only she could hear it. "But I swear to you, whatever happens, I will keep them safe. They'll never want for anything."

She exhaled sharply, a minutes old breath she hadn't even realized she'd had locked inside, and when her eyes wet, it was because she was in pain. They weren't tears. She wouldn't cry. She wasn't crying. She didn't cry. "Do they...know what they...want?" she needed to know, her eyes focused inward on the turmoil of her mind. "Because I don't...think...I do..."

"Lanaya. Lanaya, look at me," Cullen commanded, and he was that, commanding, Commander, so her body obeyed before her brain even registered what he'd said. Her eyes locked in on his and he nodded calm, supportive approval. "Good. Very good. I'm going to put my hand on your stomach. And I want you to breathe into my hand. Okay?"

She stared at him, uncomprehending, but one of his hands moved from holding up her arms to rest a heavy palm on her belly and then she was doing as she was told, as she always did, breathing low into his hand to make it rise and fall in a slow, struggling rhythm.

"There you are," he encouraged, smiling at her. It was a lopsided thing, kind and simple, and there was that unpleasant pleasant feeling again in the part of her stomach he was touching with his hand. And a more familiar feeling, a warming between her legs. "You're okay. Just a panic attack. We're going to make sure we change the subject for the rest of the trip."

"Mother?" Tamalin squeaked nearby, clearly in tears. "I'm sorry, Mother! I didn't mean..."

"Tama, sweetling," Cullen said soothingly, turning his smile on the little girl, "You haven't done anything wrong. But can you be a big help and go tell the others we're okay back here? Tell them to go on ahead and we'll meet them at the mirror. Can you do that for us?"

Lanaya couldn't see Tamalin nod and run off, but she imagined it. Imagined her sweet daughter's eagerness to help. But her eyes were focused only on Cullen's face. On the little scar on his lip. The stubble that had grown steadily over the course of their week on the road. The twinkle in his brown eyes when he met her gaze again. 

"It'll be all right, Lanaya," he assured her. "You'll be all right."

Chapter Text

Cullen was beginning to lose feeling in the fingers of the hand holding Lanaya's wrists above her head by the time she finally seemed to calm enough that he could fold them gently over her silver hair and trust her to keep her arms elevated on her own. He was kneeling before her, but he moved behind her and touched guiding fingers on each side of her ribs to coach her slowly backwards until her spine was braced against the trunk of a tree. Only then did he settle beside her with his arms on his knees, occasionally glancing at the elven woman beside him -- so like and so unlike her sister -- but mostly staring out in the same direction she did, trying to see the forest through the trees.

His own chest was tight with anxiety and he felt vaguely familiar feelings about his armor being too small and crushing him. But it had been some time since he had succumbed to full-blown panic. It was easier to ignore the terror inside when lives depended on your keeping your head and seeming confident and calm. Command had helped immensely, which always seemed counterintuitive to him. Shouldn't that weight make his panic worse? But no, he felt safer when he maintained some semblance of control, when decisions were his. He could no longer bear the helplessness of sitting trapped, waiting for someone to kill him or save him. Not since the Circle. Maker, the Circle.

Was he really going to talk about this? He barely even mentioned it to Hal, with whom he found it easy to speak about nearly anything. Cullen let out a hard sigh and reminded himself he was not the young man he had been when the Hero of Ferelden had cleansed the Circle of abominations. When she had saved him. When she had granted the surviving mages mercy. Bless that woman for seeing beyond his horror. He would not have survived all that blood on his hands.

He was not that young man, full of guilt and hate and fear. He was not even the conflicted Knight-Captain who had followed orders until it was nearly too late. He no longer wore the Templar armor. He no longer believed the Templar creeds. His blood was no longer Templar blood. He was not that man. So he could talk about this. But only because she needed it.

"What I'm about to say..." he began, and let out a sigh. "It must stay between us. I should also warn you that...I am no longer what I was. I don't even ingest lyrium anymore." He gave an excuse of a smile. "Your sister's doing, mostly." Deep breath. Time to brace himself for the inevitable reaction of mages when they knew: "I used to be a Templar, though I no longer believe in the order. Not what it's become." Cullen chanced a look at Lanaya, who had ceased to stare into the woods and was now frowning at him. But for once, it wasn't bitter or angry. It was weary, vulnerable, pensive. He dismissed his sudden urge to touch her cheek as transference from his love of her sister. They did look so very much alike, especially now that he could see beyond Lanaya's razor sharp edges. "When I was a young man, I was..."

He couldn't look at her while he said it. He simply couldn't. Instead, he focused on his safe, faithful old boots. And he took his own advice. He breathed.

"I was assigned to the Fereldan Circle during the Blight."

Despite her own emotional wreckage, Lanaya sucked in a breath of understanding. So she knew, then. 

"It was..." His throat clenched and he shook his head. No. He couldn't speak about that part. "I was one of the only survivors, rescued by the Warden-Commander herself." He let out a laugh. It had no humor in it. "Then after, I transferred to Kirkwall. To the appropriately-named Gallows. That's how I met Bethany -- she was in the Circle there -- and Merrill, who was under the protection of the Champion of Kirkwall. Bethany's the Champion's sister, by the way. Might be useful to know, considering how you two seem to feel about each other."

He could look at her again, his brows lifted a little, could study the subtle differences between her face and Hal'lasean's. She was listening intently, her expression mournfully blank. He gave her a small, encouraging smile. Her brow knit. He smiled a little more.

"So I was there when the Qunari took the city. And I was there when the Knight-Commander went mad, when the Chantry was destroyed, and all of the aftermath that followed." Cullen took a breath, let it slowly out, and swallowed. He tilted his head as he considered the elf beside him. "I was a man grown when these things happened, and I still wake up sweating and shaking. There are times -- less since the Inquisition, but even still -- when I can't seem to make my lungs work. When everything is suddenly too loud, everyone is too close, too demanding; times when rooms close in on me or there's too much space and I'm afraid..." Her eyes narrowed, which he was beginning to realize was an expression akin to Hal's eyes widening. "Yes, I'm afraid," he assured her without shame.

That acceptance of his fear had been Hal's doing too.

"The things I've seen and had to do would be enough to make any man afraid." He almost reached for her, almost touched her face, but instead he folded his hands carefully over his knees. "I'm telling you this because this is normal, Lanaya. When you've been through something horrible -- especially as a child, it's normal to have trouble facing it." He laughed again, a sharp breath. "Maker, it must have been horrible because Hal blocked it out completely! And I..." He blushed, his expression squinching reluctantly. He most definitely couldn't look at her for this. "If your life after the Dalish was anything like I imagine it was...well, it's a testament, I think, to how truly strong you must be. To how much you love your children. Because I don't know many people in this life who could have survived as you have, for as long as you have..."

It wasn't coming out right. Nothing was. And his chest was still so bloody tight. He sighed slowly and ran his fingers through his hair. Hal would know just what to say.

"What I mean is..."

What did he mean? He was impressed? What was that to her? Nothing. Less than nothing.

So he gave her a helpless smile. "I'm not great with words. But I think..." He cleared his throat. "Well, I think you're..."

Careful, Cullen.

"I think you're going to make it," he finished lamely. When he dared to glance up at her after his disappointing finale, he found her studying him with narrowed eyes and a mask of softest stone.

"Right," he coughed. "Well."

Chapter Text

"We should catch up to the group," was all Lanaya could think to say. Because she didn't know what one said when someone talked like this, said these things. Women shared these things in the brothel when business was slow. Danyl had spoken to her of his past. Occasionally a particularly bashful client would confess a history to explain what they liked or what they didn't. But she had never...no one had ever...

And he was a Templar. A Templar. And not the Tevinter kind that could easily be paid off and who did essentially whatever the Magisters wanted. No, he was a doglord Templar. Of course he was. Of fucking course he was.

Was.

It was too much to process. Everything was too much to process. Everything was moving too quickly. Changing too much too fast. She swung between feeling so many things at once that they choked off her windpipe and feeling nothing at all but an eerie calm, not an emptiness but the way the air went heavy and still before a hurricane. And that too, in its way, was suffocating.

She carefully didn't look at Cullen as she scooted forward to pick up her discarded staff and used it to help herself to her feet. The world spun as she righted, making her clench her eyes shut and lean heavily on the stave in her hands, but eventually things settled again. The Commander was already a few steps ahead, turned around to face her with his lips pressed together like there was something more he wanted to say.

What did he want from her?

She'd already tried giving him her body. Even if he wanted to pretend she was her sister. What else could he possibly want? What else did any man want? The question made her stomach cramp and her anxiety flare.

Whatever he was going to say, he thought better of it. Instead, he gave her a thin, encouraging smile and held out his hand, not as if he expected her to take it, but as an offer that she join him. Walk by his side. It gave her that strange warmth in her belly again, that fluttery one that wasn't nausea or arousal, and she hesitated.

What would it mean to walk beside this man? Was she agreeing to something? What? The whole journey with him until this moment had been spent at his flank in some way or other, so she could watch him. One of his men was always riding further back to keep them protected from the rear, but she had always made sure to keep an eye on the Commander, which meant she stayed behind him. To be by his side was a kind of vulnerability. She wouldn't be able to see what one of his hands was doing. That could be dangerous.

But he wouldn't be able to see one of her hands either. And if she kept her staff hand hidden from him and his sword hand in her sight, she'd have the advantage. 

And there was something else. Something that made no sense.

Despite his being a foreign Templar, he made...she felt...maybe she...

Safe.

He made her feel...safe. Or at least safer. His presence was so...steady. So sturdy. She fell and he caught her. He stayed with her until she could breathe again. He said those things. Those...

He said all those things.

But words meant less than a pot of piss from the mouth of a man. Lanaya knew that well. Too well.

But he promised to take care of her children. Were those just words? He fancied himself a man of honor. His word was maybe more important than the words of other men. And he wasn't hard to read. She'd have known if he hadn't meant those things he said. Right?

Right?

He lifted his brows at her, inclined his head. "I'm not going to hurt you, Lanaya. One day I hope you'll believe that."

It wasn't trust that made Lanaya decide to walk at Cullen's side in thoughtful, uncomfortable silence.

It wasn't.

And it wasn't curiosity that eventually made her ask, "You really knew the Hero of Ferelden and the Champion of Kirkwall and you're the Commander of the Inquisition?"

His laugh was embarrassed and easy. "Er, yes. It sounds absurd when you say it like that."

Lanaya's insides went heavy and still again, like the calm before the storm. "I haven't even left Minrathous since before Spurian was born. And that was only once, to accompany my master on a trip to see his brother's country estate." Because he'd only just begun fucking her.

He'd told his brother he'd taken her with him because she was so sweet and smart and he couldn't bear to leave his pretty Dalish girl behind. His brother had leered and suggested that instead he just didn't want to leave his pretty Dalish girl's behind. Later that night, drunk from dinner, Amantius' brother had crept into her room and ordered her to undress and take him into her mouth. She'd been down to just an underskirt when Amantius had come in and slammed his brother against the wall. She'd been terrified he would hate her for being available to another man, terrified that he'd never touch her again, that he wouldn't want her, that he'd give her back to the slavers or throw her out on the streets. She thought his fury was for her. But after he'd thrown his brother out and forbidden him from touching her, he took her to bed and made love to her and swore that no other man would ever have her. Mine, he'd called her all that night. Mine.

"But nothing happened," she added softly.

Cullen glanced at her with a smile. "Well, you're not in Minrathous now. And if Hawke's at Skyhold, you'll meet her too. So that's the Champion of Kirkwall. And your sister's the Inquisitor herself. But I doubt very much you'd need either of them around to make something happen."

That fluttering feeling came back. She frowned in consternation.

Chapter Text

The humans, the horses, and the elfblooded children were only too pleased to get out of the Crossroads as quickly as possible. Well, the warhorses seemed to be nervous but fine, and Cullen was grateful for the Wardens who took their nags off their hands and sold them a few more capable mounts at a reasonable price. But the people were uncomfortable at best and the usually well-behaved twins became sullen and fussy. Only Merrill and Lanaya were unaffected -- no, not unaffected, positively affected by whatever magic made this strange and dizzying place full of unnatural echoes. They both appeared...a little taller. A little brighter. A little more alive. As if they were always meant to inhabit this world. Even as Lanaya worried for her children and snapped at Merrill for dawdling when her babies weren't feeling well. There was something splendid about them both. But especially Lanaya. It made Cullen wonder what this place did to Hal'lasean. 

He was only too relieved to lead Herald through the Eluvian that deposited him on the firm, familiar ground of the Frostbacks, with the snow smell sharp in the air and the bird song he had come to know as well as his own heartbeat filling the trees beyond the cave. Home. He was home.

And soon he would see his Hal.

Cullen's heart squeezed painfully at the thought. What momentary thrill of anticipation and joy he had experienced was lost under the weight of his reality. She was still not his. Never would be. He had gone away to move beyond his pressing need for her, beyond the quiet intensity of his love for her, but he returned to her fortress a failure in that regard. He still loved her. Maker, but he still loved her. With everything he was. With every breath he took. She was his first thought in the morning and his last thought at night. When something unusual occurred during his day, when he thought something amusing, she was the person he wanted to tell. Hers was the smile he most desired to earn. And now here he was, nearly home to her. And he found himself smothered in guilt and shame for not being over her, for what had transpired with Lanaya. He choked on the thought that when he saw her again, she would be already swelling with another man's child.

Hal.

He suddenly found he could no longer be here. Could no longer wait for the group. When one of his men followed him out of the mirror, he was already mounting Herald. 

"I'm going to ride ahead," he announced, as if this were just business as usual. "The women know the way to Skyhold. It's not far. Keep them all safe." Not that he was particularly worried about safety this close to the castle walls. But if he didn't say it and something happened, he would hate himself.

If something happened and he wasn't here, he would hate himself. But he was riding ahead. He couldn't breathe and he needed the wind in his hair and the pounding of a galloping horse beneath him and he wanted to sneak through the side gate and into his quarters to hide away from Hal'lasean until he felt prepared to face her.

Or, as was more likely, until she cornered him and made him face her.

~~~

It was cold enough now that even Hal wasn't willing to stand on the battlements. But she'd been up and standing on the walkway within the shelter of the portcullis in her furs and skins since the moment the sun even thought to creep in Skyhold's windows. Varric knew this not because he was there with her the whole time, but because when he stopped by the kitchens to grab bread and fruit and to see if she'd had breakfast yet, the cooks said she'd come and gone when it was still mostly dark. That she was standing outside and had been for hours now, so they kept bringing her hot drinks. They wanted to know what the Inquisitor was waiting for, if it was good or bad. Varric had only admitted they'd know soon enough. He took her the next mug of hot tea and stood silently beside her for most of the morning, freezing and looking out at the empty road. 

Now Hawke and Fenris had joined them in their vigil. Fenris no doubt because he had been edgy and restless since Merrill had told them what the Divine's note had said, and Hawke because she never could leave any of her people alone when they hurt. Her sister was out there, and Merrill, who was probably having some kind of emotional crisis, and if Fenris was going to stand with Hal and Varric, she would too.

Dorian kept walking by in the courtyard, peering with guilt-laden worry at the gate and at Hal's back, hesitating like he might want to speak to her or like he felt he should be standing with her, and then dropping his shoulders in defeat and skulking off to work up the courage to try again. 

But it was just the four of them, breathing mist and clutching gloved hands to their cups, when the thundering of hooves headed toward them on the road. Hal had abandoned her tea and leapt over the barrier to the stone bridge below before any of them had even registered her movement. They watched her in silence for some time, standing just where the stone met the mountain road, her chest forward as she had stood yesterday as well, suspended in tension like a bird preparing to take flight.

"Does she ever take the stairs?" Hawke wondered dryly, but before Varric could laugh and say no, she didn't, she was always leaping off cliffs and battlements and balconies, before he even opened his mouth, a horse came galloping toward them, red-brown and white, huge and impressive as the armored man on his back.

Something was wrong. Why else would Cullen come roaring up to the gate like that? Hal knew it too because she was racing toward him, fleet-footed as only the elven were, and then like a scene from Swords and Shields, he reined in his steed, leaping from it almost before it came to a halt, and hurried to meet her the rest of the way. Her sprint was graceful and focused, his military jog long-legged and driven. They were coming together like magnets, like inevitable forces of nature, eyes only for each other, and as their arms went out to embrace, Varric's heart ached for them even as his mind raced with the ripeness of their story for the telling.

"Does he not know...?" Fenris wondered, his frown as clearly etched as the lyrium beneath his skin.

Just as it seemed the two figures on the road might cling together, might clutch needfully at each other, that the Commander would sweep the Inquisitor quite literally off her feet, he stalled. His hands were on her shoulders, hers on his elbows, but they both faltered, blushed, smiled their pained longing.

"Oh, Curly knows all right," the dwarf sighed. "Poor bastard."

"She shouldn't lead him on," Fenris growled in disapproval.

Hawke looked sharply at the elf beside her, her dark eyes in turmoil with their whole history of bloody streets and broken hearts. "She loves him."

Fenris carefully didn't look at Hawke. "She's with Solas. She's in love with Solas. She's having a child with Solas."

Hawke scowled at Fenris, but it was a clear cover for the way this conversation that wasn't really about Hal and Cullen at all was cutting into the wounds she'd acquired that had never closed. Not really. "It is possible to love two people at once."

Fenris made a sound in his throat that said all the denial he needed. Hawke's noise was a strangled one of frustration and hurt, and she flapped her arms in capitulation before turning on her heels and stalking for the stairs to the road. 

Below them, Cullen and Hal exchanged a few meaningful words -- a very few -- and he trudged back to Herald to remount. They stared at each other as he walked the horse past, saying things they couldn't say, and then he left her there alone outside the gates.

"Varric," he called as he passed, his cheeks flaming anew once he realized they'd been watching. He nodded to Fenris. When Hawke appeared at the bottom of the stairs, he greeted her too.

"You're a good man, Cullen Rutherford," she told him frankly.

He laughed as though he didn't believe. "I am trying," he replied. But he sounded exhausted.

Chapter Text

"Where's Cullen?" Tamalin had spent the past week nearly inseparable from the man, so of course she was the one who first recognized his absence.

"Rode on ahead," said one of the men -- Reggie, the others called him, though the Commander named him Trangleton -- with a smile for her daughter. "Probably had some business to attend to now he's back. He's a very important man, the Commander."

"You'll see him soon, da'len," offered Merrill, and she too smiled at Tamalin. Lanaya found herself studying those smiles carefully, trying to read what was intended, what might be behind them. But it was the Elvish that was like a needle in her heart.

"No," Tama argued with a confused frown. "My name's Tamalin, remember? Like my aunt!"

This time Lanaya knew it wasn't the thinness of the mountain air that made it difficult to breathe. When Merrill turned another hurt and horrified look at Lanaya for Tamalin's ignorance of Dalish things, Lanaya thought darkly that she'd like to make it difficult for her cousin to breathe too.

"I know," Merrill said softly, "da'len is an Elvish word. It means 'child'." She hesitated and then offered Tamalin another smile. "Hal'lasean and I can teach you what we know, if you'd like."

Lanaya wanted to attack the woman who had once been her closest friend, her kin, with nails and magic and fists. Wanted to rip at her hair and scream like the savage her ears proclaimed her. But she couldn't seem to move.

It was Spurian this time who came to her rescue, with Cullen gone on ahead. "We're not Dalish," he declared with an edge to his voice. "We're Tevene." And Lanaya was so proud and grateful for that, but something about the way Tama's sudden delight had fallen into disappointment, about the way that disappointment was carefully hidden behind a mask of pride to match Spurian's, something about that almost made Lanaya promise she could learn whatever she wanted. Almost.

Merrill looked like she wanted to cry, so Bethany pressed a hand to her shoulder and addressed the group to change the subject. "We should mount up. On horseback, we'll be at Skyhold before lunch."

And they were.

The ride was relatively quick and painless (aside from a cold unlike any Lanaya had ever experienced), especially once the children mentioned that Merrill and Bethany were also the names of characters in the Tale of the Champion. Once the women confirmed their identities, Tully was asking nonstop questions about other characters and events and all three of them were nearly unhorsed in shock when they heard Varric, Hawke, and Fenris were all at Skyhold as well. It was a relief to have the subject turned to her cousin instead of their childhood in Alerion. It was sweet to see her babies so engaged and delighted. It was downright pleasurable to note how uncomfortable Bethany and Merrill got when asked about Anders and the Chantry.

It was righteously satisfying when Bethany, being confronted by innocent childish questions about her mother's fate, delicately answered with, "It's not polite to ask people about bad things that have happened to them." But it was chafing and irritating when Bethany suddenly turned around to look at Lanaya with what appeared to be realization and pity. Lanaya scowled back and Bethany's recoil was pleasant too.

"Are we there yet?" Tully asked in the silence after Bethany's chastisement. "It's cold. I'm hungry." Which was unsurprising.

"You're always hungry, Tummy," Spurian teased.

"Am not!"

"Yes, you are, Tummy," Tama joined in cheerfully. "You're--"

But they never heard the rest of the sentence. They rounded a curve in the road and where before there had been nothing but impossibly tall pines and naked aspens, now there was only the high walls and stone towers of an ancient and impressive keep, growing out of the mountain side like a vein of grey lyrium. It took up the entire horizon and they were all gaping: the soldiers, Spurian, the twins, even Layana's mouth hung open. But it wasn't only the size of the thing that had her astounded. There was something about, a magic older than anything else she'd ever felt, a magic that felt in some ways as the Crossroads had. Her magic picked up Skyhold's song and joined in harmony as she had once done with Tama when they were children.

Lanaya wanted to explore this stone creature's bones and know all its secrets. She wanted to fall asleep in its heart and feel held and safe and drift into a Fade as old as time itself. She wanted...

Tamalin.

Lanaya's gaze had finally found the road before them, the open gate, and, between the horses and their new home stood an elven woman of easy, unaffected beauty, a wild beauty, like mountain flowers growing in the ash of a cleansing fire. Her hair was loose to the wind, whipped like liquid silver against her cold-pink cheeks, and she stared at Lanaya with eyes that were unmistakable. Her little sister's eyes had been slightly cooler, darker than hers, a little more purple in her teal than Lanaya and their father. Just as the eyes that were locked needfully on her, taking her in like she was fresh water and this woman had been lost at sea. Her arms were straight down by her sides but angled a little so that they looked like wings, and she leaned into the wind with her chest out. Like a bird.

Like a little bird.

"Da'ean," Lanaya whispered. "Ma hallabell."

Chapter Text

In that moment as the sisters stared at each other, the whole world held its breath. Or so it seemed to Lanaya, who was most certainly holding hers. She'd spent a lifetime not daring to dream of a reunion, wishing her sister a simple, happy life with the Dalish in her brighter thoughts and hoping she felt no pain in her death in her darker ones. But even as she had promised Tamalin they would see each other again one day when she left the toddler with the halla for the clan to find, she had long since convinced herself not to hope. Without hope, there was no disappointment. That was the only way to survive. She had forgotten how to hope.

Which was why after twenty-two years telling herself she would never see her sister again and that it was for the best, she'd spent the last week teaching herself to hate her sister in preparation for this very meeting. Teaching herself to resent her. For taking away the life Lanaya had built in Minrathous, for being the Inquisitor, for putting her children's lives in danger with her very existence, for looking like her, for sending Cullen to fetch her, for having Cullen's love, for not wanting Cullen's love, for knowing Merrill when Lanaya had no family but the one she'd birthed, for having Merrill meet them, for the impossible things she'd done, for the way people spoke about her, for the excitement in her children's eyes when they called her 'Aunt Hal', for the life she was surely living and the things she must have, for not finding Lanaya sooner, for not being a slave and a whore in Minrathous. For still being Dalish. For not being dead like she was supposed to be. For reappearing after all this time. For making Lanaya face all these terrible things and feel all these terrible things. Things that felt uncomfortably similar to the thing she was so good at pretending she'd forgotten. Hope.

If they could have hung there, suspended, in that stillness, Lanaya thought maybe she might be able to work through whatever seemed to be coming quickly unglued inside her. 

"Mother!" gasped Tama, who was squirming now in the saddle in front of her mother, "look! It's Aunt Hal! She looks just like you! Mother, I want to go say hello!" Spurian was already dismounting because Tully had been punching him lightly in the thigh as he demanded he be let down, but Lanaya couldn't seem to tear her gaze away from the Inquisitor's. "Mother, I want to get down!"

True to form, Spurian was by their side within moments, holding up his arms to take his sister and setting her gently on her feet by the horse. Tully had already gone running for his aunt and Tama was racing after him, but Lanaya's eldest stayed by her side, frowning worriedly at her as he reached for her hand. "Mother?" He was not a boy who spoke his feelings, not usually, but there was plenty laden in his question. He would be by her side through this, he was telling her. He would protect her, defend her, do whatever it took. And that made Lanaya so heavy with sadness she thought the horse's spine might buckle beneath her. She should be protecting him. Defending him. So she forced a smile to show him she was okay and threw her leg over the horse. The soldier mounted beside her held out his hand to take the reins and gave her a look of understanding that he didn't deserve to offer. He didn't understand. He couldn't. But he thought he did and she hated him for it. Still, she let him take the reins. 

There was that eerie nothingness inside Lanaya again, that tension where something should be but nothing would admit to being, that very full absence that was taking up all the space in her lungs and her heart and her gut. She was only vaguely aware that she was smoothing her hair and dusting her clothing, only distantly in charge of her hands when they swept across her face to clear it of the dirt and grime of travel. Her sister looked so clean, even with her long hair unbound and wind-whipped, even tucked away as she was in her winter clothing. But Lanaya felt filthy. Inside and out. It made her ashamed and that made her hurt and that hurt made her angry. Or it would have, if she weren't still floating in that disconnectedness. 

She braced herself, straightened her shoulders, stiffened her spine, made herself look as proud and independent as she knew how. She wouldn't show this Inquisitor weakness. She didn't want this woman who wore her sister's adult body to think Lanaya needed her. Because she didn't. She would meet this Hal'lasean as her equal. No, more than that. Something warm trickled through the dry, empty chambers of Lanaya's heart and she almost smiled. Hal'lasean may own this keep, may run this Inquisition, but Lanaya was the elder sibling. 

It was a silly thought, one that wouldn't matter to the people in charge, to the Inquisitor, but one that...made her...happy.

A hard lump formed in her throat and then Lanaya's legs were finally taking her the rest of the way down the road, leading her to face the one thing she'd never wanted to so much as dream about again. She was prepared for pain and darkness. She was prepared for resentment and envy and hatred. She was prepared to be used and abused and cast aside when she was inconvenient or boring. Lanaya was prepared to meet a woman who was after her children or who greeted her with cool superiority or maybe just prickly indifference. Because it's what Lanaya had known. It's what Lanaya had been taught. It's what Lanaya would have done if this were her keep.

Lanaya was not prepared to find Hal'lasean kneeling in the dirt with Tamalin in her arms -- her two Tamalins, holding each other, the elder listening with patient and instant fondness to the childish ramblings of a little girl who, until Cullen, was always terrified of strangers, but sharing her attention too with the energetic boy who tapped at her shoulder. She was not prepared for how much of the child she left behind she saw now in this grown woman. The spark of wild joy that had calmed, she thought, with age, but that was still there, irrepressible, in her violet-touched-teal eyes. Alerion eyes. Eyes like Lanaya's. Eyes like their father's. But she was especially not prepared for the unabashed tears streaming down her sister's face when she looked up from Lanaya's children. She was especially not prepared for Hal'lasean's slow rise to her feet, for the uncertain, tremulous, hopeful smile she gave Lanaya even as she stood where she was, a respectful distance away.  

"Naya," her sister breathed like she'd been holding that air in her lungs since they'd seen each other last. "They're beautiful! And you..." She let out a painful gasp that was probably meant to be a laugh and swiped her hand across her cheeks in a poor attempt to dry them. "You named your daughter..." Her dark brow knit with feeling, trembled with it, and then she was staring at Lanaya in touched wonder. 

And it hurt.

It hurt. 

And Lanaya hated her for that.

"Why are you crying?" Tully asked with a deep frown.

Hal'lasean smiled at her son like she had loved him all his life. "Because my heart hurts," she answered, and the tears quickened. "But I've never been so glad for the pain." Her smile spread and she touched Tully's dark silver hair, so like her own, let it move over her fingers in the sunlight. "And because I'm so happy to finally meet my niece and nephews." She lifted her eyes then to Spurian, who stood sentinel behind Lanaya's shoulder, watching warily. She did no more than look at him with her smile and her tears, acknowledging that he was there and that he didn't want to be addressed.

Lanaya hated her for being so good at this.

"Naya..." Those brows lifted in question, in worry, seeking certainty from Lanaya in a way that felt so familiar it stabbed through her stomach like an attack from a Despair demon. Hal'lasean's voice was thick with grief and hope, that fucking hope, but when she looked at Lanaya like that, like she always had when something was going on she didn't understand, something scary, something that her child's mind couldn't quite grasp, Lanaya suddenly couldn't bear to clutch at her practiced resentment. "You kept your promise," her little sister whispered because her throat was too tight to make more sound. 

Something broke away inside her. An iceberg breaking from a glacial shelf and drowning her in the tidal wave. 

Lanaya didn't remember taking those last two steps to her sister. Didn't remember pulling her first Tamalin into her arms. Didn't remember gripping her slender body so tightly she thought she might break bones. But she did. She must have. Because she was held in return, clutched at desperately, fearfully, gratefully, like her sister still wasn't convinced Lanaya was real. She must have. Because they were hugging to each other as though they were nine and four again, as though the night was dark and cold and they were all alone but for one another, as though Lanaya had been unable to leave her sister behind and had turned back and found little Tamalin weeping for her with the halla.

"You kept your promise."

Chapter Text

The sisters embraced each other for what felt like ages, though Spurian knew it must have been only a minute or two. Of all the things he had expected to happen when his mother finally met his aunt again after so long apart, this was not an outcome he had imagined. It was entirely unlike her to show affection to anyone to whom she hadn't given birth and even then it more often felt that she did it out of some remembered idea of how a mother should behave with her children. She had no friends, not really, although she and Danyl got along better than she did with the others at the Dragon, and even when Amantius had lived, affection was something he bestowed if the whim struck him. She was not allowed to give it in return. Never to initiate. Spurian had been taught the same hard lessons as a boy: his father was his master first and always. Signs of affection, touch, hugs and kisses, even smiles, these were things exchanged freely only between legitimate purebred human relatives. Sometimes he wondered if his mother knew that when she hugged or kissed them and told them they were loved, she was participating in a small act of rebellion.

She must have known she was rebelling when she changed his sister's name to Tamalin. He hadn't realized until today that she had given their little Tama an Elvish name. Her sister's name. It made Spurian imagine that she must have fought back in other ways all her life, all his life, without his even realizing it. And all this time part of him had condemned his mother a coward for her insistence that Tevinter saved her, that Amantius loved her. Guilt drenched him, making his heart prune. Maybe she was more like him than he thought. Even if she'd never admit it. He would try to remember that the next time he wanted to violently shake her free of Amantius' grip from the grave.

And this. He would remember this, he already knew, for the rest of his life. The two sisters, reunited, hugging to each other like the twins during the brutal storms that swept in from the bay during the summer. He had never seen his mother look so young and vulnerable. Not when she had given birth to the twins, not when she had wept over Amantius' fresh corpse. Even on the road from Minrathous, there had been a holding out, like a cornered wild beast. He almost didn't recognize his mother in the road with the Inquisitor in her arms. There was a sudden softness to her, a dulling of her edges, and though she didn't cry like his aunt did, her features were contorted with a kind of pain that had no anger in it. Perhaps that was why she didn't look like herself. For once, she wasn't angry. Part of Spurian hated this Hal for bringing such genuine gentleness and feeling out of his mother when he and his siblings had never fully succeeded. Part of him hated his mother for not loving them as she clearly did this sister of hers. For not showing them this side of her.

But mostly he felt...glad for her. Pleased that someone, anyone had coaxed it from her before it went away forever, even if it couldn't be her children. And he wondered, as they finally pulled apart but continued to clutch each other's forearms, as they memorized the way they looked now -- his mother with an agonized frown and his aunt with a smile that hurt -- what it was that had separated them so long ago, how it was his family ended up where they did and his aunt lived with the Dalish and now...now owned all this. He'd have to ask someone who knew when his mother wasn't around. Cousin Merrill, perhaps, or maybe even this aunt of his, if she seemed the sort to talk about it.

His mother's already frighteningly loving expression morphed abruptly into wonder as she reached to tuck Hal'lasean's silver hair behind a pointed ear with a pink tip. And then he understood too. It was the kind of thing one picked up living in a Tevinter brothel. He remembered it too from when his mother carried the twins and he was suddenly grateful. Maybe now his mother could stop fretting that this woman was after her children.

And maybe, he thought with suddenly child-like hope, just maybe it's Cullen's. The idea of the Commander being even vaguely related to them, being a new part of their tight little family...

"You're pregnant...?" And his mother actually laughed, a breathy sound that still didn't let her smile, though her eyes were bright. "Tama..." She reached without asking, as she did with her children, which meant she already claimed her sister as family, and traced fingers along the Inquisitor's still-small belly. "How far along?"

His aunt's joy even in her pain dimmed, a shadow passed behind her eyes, her smile faltered, but she plastered it on more firmly to compensate. "It's complicated," she murmured. "But I'll tell you everything." She broke her gaze away from his mother's and turned it on Spurian, offering him now not just acknowledgement but also a small, hopeful smile. She was seeking his favor. He waited, unresponsive. She smiled a little more, like she knew exactly what he was doing, and that made him frown. "Are you my eldest nephew?" Even though she clearly already knew the answer.

"Spurian, my lady," he introduced, and she laughed in surprise. It lit up her face and Spurian wondered if his mother had ever been capable of such easy delight.

She offered out her hand for him to shake. "Why don't we call me Hal, since I think..." She flashed Tama a smile on her other side. "Tamalin might get a little confusing." He heard his sister laugh, high and clear as she did only for family (and now for Cullen too). Something possessive clenched at his guts. How dare this stranger make both his mother and sister laugh! Those were his jobs!

"Why not Aunt Hal?" demanded Tully from Spurian's side, and his aunt's face filled up with warmth and barely-withheld fresh tears.

"That's my favorite so far," she told his brother sincerely. "But I only want you to call me that if it feels right." Hal'lasean's eyes paused briefly on his before they rested meaningfully on his mother's. "Blood is important, but family is what you make it. I won't rush you."

Something shifted in his mother's expression, something he couldn't quite make out, and her frown became much more pronounced to cover it. Her body stiffened protectively. She was upset. Why was she upset? Had this Hal insulted her some way he hadn't noticed? "My children are cold and hungry," she murmured.

Hal's face -- so like his mother's -- flushed with embarrassment. "Of course! Oh, of course! We have a suite all prepared for you and we'll send for lunch and hot water for the baths immediately. We'll have your things brought up and we'll find warmer clothes for all of you. I would have had some made, but I didn't know--" She turned pinker and Spurian was reminded of Cullen. "Please, follow me." She turned around to head back toward the gate and only then did Spurian realize that there was a small crowd on the walkway, watching them carefully. The moment the Inquisitor saw them, they scattered, rather comically trying to pretend they were casually walking by and not spying. 

Tully practically squealed with excitement. "Was that a Qunari?!"

"That's the mighty Iron Bull," Hal explained with a twinkle of mischief in her eyes as she started for the castle. "Fierce warrior and leader of the single best mercenary company in all Thedas." She grinned. "He also has a lovely singing voice."

Chapter Text

This is real, Hal'lasean kept reminding herself because it truly didn't seem possible. She kept having to remind herself not to reach out and touch them just to make sure. They're real. They're real and they're here. My family.

Each time she thought the words 'my' and 'family' in sequence like that, she felt a thrill that was almost sickening, like leaping off a cliff and realizing the bottom was further down than you thought and you're suddenly not sure if you're going to make it in one piece but that's a thought for when the bottom comes up to meet you because for a few glorious, literally breathtaking seconds, you're flying. You're flying.

Hal was flying. But she knew that sooner or later, the bottom would come up to meet her.

And then there was that guilty twinge as well, as if by finding what remained of her biological family and bringing them to Skyhold, she was somehow betraying her Inquisition family, the clan of powerful misfits that had seen her through so much, had stayed with her no matter what came, had bled and sacrificed with her and followed where she led. They were all around her now, trying (and, for Bull, failing) to be inconspicuous as they watched with fascination the little matching set of elves and elfblooded children cross the courtyard.

In fact, everyone was watching. Cullen's lieutenants stopped putting the soldiers through their drills and the walls were suddenly eerily silent without the clash of steel and the shouts of effort. The merchants and their customers had ceased their haggling and even the attendants and castle serving staff were peering out of windows and gathering around. The twins hadn't noticed yet -- they were too busy gasping and pointing and being amazed by the size and age of the keep, by the feel of its magic -- but Spurian and Lanaya were becoming more and more anxious and on edge with each person who gathered to stare, until Hal was flushed with frustration. She couldn't shout at her people to go about their business without drawing more attention, so she did the only thing she could: she looked to one of her friends for help. Dorian was the closest so she tried to make pointed eye contact, to signal him to call Skyhold off their scent, but as soon as she looked his way, he ducked his gaze and tried to melt back into the crowd, guilt and color on his cheeks. 

Dammit, Dorian! Not right now!

But there was Bull, holding Dorian's upper arm to keep him from fleeing, and he at least met Hal's eyes. He nodded once and she returned it with an expression of relief and gratitude.

"All right, Inquisition, back to work!" He practically bowled himself through the crowd and it scattered like flies from a fresh corpse. "Nothin' to see here! Go about your business!"

She was warm with appreciation for that great horned mountain of a man. And she was raw with her worry for Dorian. But that at least would have to wait. For now she had to face her sister and her sister's children with her pink cheeks and her contrition. So she walked backwards up the long staircase toward the Main Hall and gave a small smile. "Sorry about that. Word gets around quickly in a fortress like this. They're just curious. They mean well. We'll make sure everyone knows to give you some privacy." She felt the burn in her cheeks fire up a little more. "And this is your home now, the castle, the keep, the forest outside the grounds...it's yours." She lifted her brows at Lanaya meaningfully, still skillfully slipping backwards up that long, well-memorized stairway. "Nothing is off-limits to you or them unless you want it to be."

Lanaya narrowed her eyes and Hal turned around to finish the ascension facing forward because she didn't want to show her sister how much just that one expression hurt.

The ground would come up to meet her sooner or later. She needed to be prepared. Lanaya's life had been difficult, she had known that since Leliana's letter, but it was only seeing just how old Spurian was that it truly hit her what must have happened. Not that being older somehow made having children by the man who owned you better. But being...what, fifteen? That made it so much worse.

Hal's breath shallowed and she stopped to catch it at the top of the stairs under the pretense of showing them Skyhold from this much better vantage. But truly her heart was breaking for the big sister who left her behind. The big sister who saved her from a life of cruelty and abuse, but who couldn't escape it herself. One day, when the moment seemed right, she would need to thank Lanaya for that. But maybe that needed time. They probably all needed time.

"So this is it," she said with a smile that required effort. "This is Skyhold. This is the Inquisition."

"You own all this? It's yours?" Tully squeaked in wonder. And her smile was no longer quite so forced.

"The Inquisition does."

"But you own the Inquisition," Spurian argued with his apparently perpetual frown.

"I'm the head of the Inquisition," she corrected gently. "But the Inquisition belongs to everyone. All of us. From the scullery maids to Commander Rutherford. The Inquisition is Thedas."

Spurian's frown only deepened. Lanaya was watching her with suspicion and her chest tightened again, but not nearly as much as when little Tama tugged on the hem of her tunic.

"Where are all the slaves?"

Her air left her lungs in one sharp burst.

Don't cry. Don't cry. 

Hal knelt in front of Tamalin, in front of the little girl named for her, and made certain they were understanding one another, turquoise eyes to turquoise eyes.

"There is no slavery in the Inquisition, da'len." Lanaya made a sound in her throat but Hal kept her gaze on Tama. "Everyone is free here. They are beholden only to themselves. They make their own decisions and are accountable only to themselves and to each other. Skyhold is a place of equality and free will. Everyone here has chosen to be here." Again Lanaya made a sound. She couldn't quite help her slight wince. She would have to apologize for that too then. So it made what she would say next all the more important: "And everyone here may leave whenever they choose."

"Are we going to the cathouse?" Tully asked, glancing up uncertainly at his mother. Her face was an impenetrable mask.

This time Hal would not, could not show how she felt about that question. She just smiled, thin and sincere. "There isn't one here."

Tama and Tully both gasped. "But where do the whores stay?" Tully demanded. "Where will we live?"

Don'tcrydon'tcrydon'tcry, Void take you, don't you bloody cry!

She swallowed and took a steadying breath, hyperaware of her sister's eyes on her, boring through her, of Spurian's ever-watchful attention. Whatever she said next could very well mean the ground came up to meet her immediately. And she was not ready for that. Not yet. Please, not yet.

"There are people here who sometimes exchange those services for other services or for coin. But they do so because they choose to. It isn't anyone's main profession here. But you're my family. You're taken care of. You three will have the best tutors we can offer and your mother will only work..." She may come to regret this. "However she wishes to work...if she wants to. And you have rooms prepared in one of the guest suites, but it's yours as long as you want it. We want--" Hal paused and backtracked, seeking out Lanaya's gaze. "I want this to work. I want you to feel safe and happy here. Whatever it takes."

Lanaya's face gave away nothing.

"Aneth ara," Hal murmured like a prayer. "Ma'linen." And that was a mistake. Lanaya looked furious.

"What's that mean?" asked Tama.

"It's Dalish!" declared Tully.

And despite the hatred that flared suddenly in Lanaya's eyes, Hal'lasean, refusing to look away from her sister's ire, said softly, "It's Elvish. It means this is my safe place and I'm offering it to you. My family. My blood."

Chapter Text

The castle proper was impressive, just as everything else in Skyhold appeared to be. The stone was old but it was full of life and drive and a lightness that Minrathous lacked. It seemed that everyone here had a purpose that made them come alive and even if they weren't fulfilling it right at that moment, they belonged. It was like the crew of a fine ship, activity and energy and...

And something else that Lanaya didn't feel ready yet to name. Maybe she would never be able to name it. She knew what it was, she thought, there was something startlingly familiar about it, but to name it was to admit she had been without it most of her life and that was too big, too much.

She walked just behind her awed children through the stately magnificence of the Main Hall -- warm and welcoming and understated in a way that nothing in Tevinter ever was -- and while the twins pointed excitedly and even Spurian asked questions, she kept her growing jealousy and resentment and astonishment to herself. They were at the mid-point when Tully shouted out and went sprinting for the Andrastian throne. It was the one thing in the room that invoked any sense of unease. Lanaya hated all of it.

"Catullus!" she snapped, fearful of his audacity, and he froze in place with one hand out to touch the seat. And because the situation seemed to call for it, she instinctively switched to Tevene: "Do not forget your place!"

"But she said it's ours!" Tully complained, still in the Tevinter tongue.

"It's not," Lanaya insisted, her voice hard. She pointed down at the ground before her and Tully sulked all the way back to her side. "None of this is ours. People will say anything to get what they want. People with power most of all."

Bile rose in her throat as something earth-shaking vied for her attention from the deep dark tombs of her mind, the places where she hid the things she could not survive. Something there echoed her words back to her, power and desire and lies, words that mean less than nothing but had to be everything. She swallowed the acid and let herself float just beyond her body until the urge to vomit faded, until she could convince herself nothing she said to her children resonated in those voids she kept within places secret even from herself.

Her sister was watching them with an uncertain, thoughtful dip of her forehead and lips, as though she were translating what was said, or maybe just figuring it out through body language. "It's all right," she ventured quietly in the trade, lifting her brows -- their mother's brows -- in question. "It's a ridiculous thing to have a throne." She laughed as though to prove it. "Even the word is ridiculous. But the human nobles expect it. We only use it for passing judgment and for banquets. Honestly, it'd make me feel better if they played on it. I hate the blighted thing." 

Even while part of Lanaya thought quite reasonably that her sister was only trying to help, to be nice, to make her feel at ease, most of her was irritated at this Hal'lasean's presumptuousness.

"Do my children still belong to me?" Lanaya asked, her voice taut and ice in her words. Her sister blanched in horror, her mouth falling open, and struggled to compose herself when she realized she'd let her hurt show.

Weak, part of Lanaya condemned.

But how could a weak person build all this?

"Of course!" the Inquisitor breathed thickly. "Always, Lanaya! I wouldn't-- fenedhis, I would never--!"

"Then don't argue with me about what they're allowed to do," growled Lanaya. Her sister sucked in a breath and took an unsteady step backward. "If they are still mine, they'll do as I say. You may be the power here, but I am their mother! And you are nothing to them but a woman who looks like a sister I once had!"

She immediately regretted it. All of it. Most of it. Not only because of her children staring at her in surprise but because of how Hal'lasean-- how her little sister was looking at her. Without malice or anger. With only hurt and vulnerability, as though Lanaya had slapped her in the face. As though she had never hated anyone a day in her life. Some piece of her was glad to find her hallabell still pure and sweet. Most of her was turning rancid with envy. But she didn't cry again at least, this weak girl with her sister's face. She gave several small nods and averted her gaze, carefully collected herself, and murmured apologetically, "Of course. Ir abelas. Ma nuvenin."

Lanaya might have forgiven her if she hadn't fallen into Elvish. But those words set an unquenchable fire in her veins that consumed all reason she retained. "And as long as they are my children, you and yours will cease with your infernal Elvish nonsense around them! They're Tevene, not Elvish, not Dalish, and no one will be filling their heads with superstitions and that hideous tongue! You may be a heathen and a savage, Inquisitor, but you won't turn my children into your pet barbarians, is that clear!"

When did she start to sound so much like Amantius?

That spark in her sister's eyes disappeared, as though her spirit had stepped away, and though her mouth hung slack, her face was otherwise expressionless. But her chest rose and fell in quick, small breaths and she stood very, very still. "Yes," she whispered. "Very." She swallowed and turned slowly away from them, stopping when she found a man in livery standing gape-jawed from his eavesdropping. "Please show my sister and her children to the prepared suite and see to their every need." Her voice was too soft like still water, like stagnant water, as was her visage when she gave her attention back to Lanaya, not really seeing. "Please excuse me, I have..." Something cracked and bled behind her sister's blank mask.

Lanaya refused to feel guilty. To feel remorse. Refused. And yet it still rose up in a knot in her throat.

"I have some work to do," the Inquisitor finished lamely. "I'll come check on you later." She took in a breath, her brow trembling slightly, and without really meeting Lanaya's gaze, murmured a choked, "Forgive me." But she meant it as more than just a courtesy. She walked brusquely through the nearest door and disappeared. 

Lanaya hugged her waist to hide her shaking hands and did not look at Spurian and his judgment. 

"T-this way, my lady," the servant stammered, and led through the opposite door. "The Inquisitor had you placed as close to her quarters as was possible."

"But Mother," Tama protested unhappily as they followed, "I like Elvish. It makes my heart sing along."

Something inside Lanaya spasmed with pain.

Chapter Text

All Hal wanted to do was throw the door shut behind her and run, fast and far, run through the garden and down the stairs and into the courtyard and out the gate and into the mountains, to disappear between trees that whipped her cheeks and arms with pine needles, to feel soft earth beneath her feet and breathe in open air, to have no one around but the birds and the foxes and to sprint with all her might until her legs gave out and she dropped into the rotting leaves too tired to think or hurt.

She desired nothing more than to be the heathen savage her sister named her. A barbarian, howling her pain at the wolves. She could strip bare to her skin and dance as the moon rose and eat flesh raw from the bone until she was the animal they all must secretly believe she was. That all Dalish were.

Her own sister.

If she were with her clan, she might have done just that. If she were anyone else but the Inquisitor. If she could go unrecognized as Bull had once shown her. But she was trapped. Trapped in shemlen clothes and shemlen customs in ancient halls that cut her off from the sun and the wind.

Skyhold. Holding her back from the sky.

So instead she held herself together until the door was quietly shut behind her and pressed her cheek against the cool wood, shutting her eyes tightly. She knew she wasn't alone. She knew at least Josie was watching her. And possibly an attendant or a lesser Inquisition ambassador. If she was desperately unlucky, perhaps a visiting noble. If that were the case maybe she could convince them it was morning sickness. Better pregnant and unwed than broken hearted by her sister, the Tevinter wh--

No. Not that word. Never that word. Never again.

"...Hal'lasean?" Josie was already worried. Hal could hear it in her voice. She heard the other woman shuffle papers and push back her chair and rise from her desk, but it was a man's heavy footsteps that met her at the door. A man's hand that found her back. Achingly familiar in its reassuring, steady weight.

Cullen.

"What happened?" he asked gently when she tensed under his touch. He didn't pull away, though. Of course he knew her well enough by now to know her flinch was against the tide of her emotions, not him. She had always been sensitive to touch, perhaps because she had to work so hard for it in Lavellan, but Cullen's touch had long since been one that went beyond warmth and skin and companionship. Cullen's touch always went straight to her heart.

But not her soul. That was the difference, she suspected, between the man who touched her and the man she chose. Cullen's love was earthly, here and now, for life in this world. Fen'Harel's love was all of her in every world, for an eternity. But still she couldn't ignore how Cullen spoke to her heart.

She thought to sob, but when she pushed away from the door and turned to face him, when her face contorted with anguish and her heart splintered and she opened her mouth to give in to the rending of her organs, Hal instead laughed. But it might as well have been a sob. She knew she must look half-feral, wild-eyed and shaking. But she was a heathen after all, wasn't she? A barbarian.

"A savage," she croaked. When neither Cullen nor Josie now behind him seemed to understand, she tried again. A whole sentence this time: "She called me a savage!"

Josie looked stricken, horrified, then furious. It was a sharp contrast to Cullen, who seemed to already understand. Who was, if anything, sympathetic more than shocked. She wondered suddenly what had happened on the road with Lanaya.

"Who was it!" Josephine gasped, breathless with her righteous indignance. "We'll have them removed immediately!"

Now Cullen was reaching a hand for the Ambassador, to calm but also to capture her attention. He must have sensed that Hal didn't have it in her to explain.

"Her sister," he said softly. Josie's eyes went wide as she looked to Hal for confirmation. She felt her cheeks heat and stalked past them to collapse into one of the big chairs before the fire, to curl into a ball and cover her whole head and face with her arms.

"Oh," breathed Josie unhappily. "Oh, Hal..." They both followed her to the hearth, the Antivan positioning herself behind Hal'lasean's chair while Cullen dropped into the other. She could imagine him scrubbing at his face and stubble with his big human palm. Josie's fingers delicately moved Hal's arms from her hair and began to stroke and pet soothingly. "Sisters say things sometimes that...they don't..."

Cullen must have shaken his head because Josie sighed. "Tevinter...well, she can't think that, can she? She's Dalish too!"

"Josie," the Commander cautioned, his voice quiet, "I told you. Lanaya is..." He was searching for the word. And Hal needed to see his face as he did. She dragged her arms down and let Josie put her hair back into place so she could watch him struggle between sympathy and embarrassment, between pain and exhaustion, between understanding and bewilderment. When he realized Hal'lasean was watching him, he turned pink and looked away. "From what I gathered, she..." Now he was carefully avoiding both of them. He was staring at his boots.

As he always did when he was trying not to think about sex. Hal's already broken heart twisted inside her chest. He wouldn't. He wouldn't! That wasn't like Cullen. He was too good, too strong, and he...he loved her, he wouldn't...

"I think the man who owned her...kept her as a...a pet. I don't think she...er, knows...anything but..." He cleared his throat, frowned at his boots. "I think she believes that, ahah, Maker, this is..."

Please no!

"She sort of...well, you see, when she wants something from a man, she..." He looked up in alarm as though suddenly realizing what they must be thinking. And they were thinking it, both women, watching him with disbelief that could easily become disgust. But for now they were both giving him the benefit of the doubt. "Maker's breath, nothing happened!" Josie and Hal let out a unified breath of relief. "I mean, something...something happened, but not-- it wasn't-- what I mean is--" All at once his eyes were locked to hers and Hal felt the urge to run to the safety of the forest once again. His cheeks were aflame with color. "She tried. Three times. And I--" Red, from his collar to his hair. He looked completely miserable. Ashamed. "Well, she's...she looks so much like--" Josie's hands had stilled in Hal's hair. He closed his eyes and shook his head. "I can't...I was tempted, and I--"

"Cullen," she choked out past the malignant lump in her throat. "You don't-- You don't have to-- You're a free man and I--"

"Oh, will you both stop!" Josie snapped from between them. "Did it happen or didn't it!"

Cullen gulped audibly and shook his head. "A-almost, it almost-- but it didn't."

"Well," said the Ambassador. "Better you than a...a lady of the night!"

"Josie!" the Commander cried out in mortification. "She was abused, she was-- she doesn't know any better! She thinks he loved her! The man who-- Maker, her life must have been a nightmare! I'm not-- I won't-- Hal's sister!"

"Precisely," Josie replied with gentle pragmatism. "The Inquisitor's sister. We will need to make certain she seems to be...remorseful of her old ways."

Hal thought she might be sick. She jerked out of her chair and stood gawping at the Ambassador.

"I am not saying I feel that way!" Josie argued. "But you're already an unwed mother, Hal'lasean, we cannot have the Herald of Andraste's sister turning tricks right under our noses!"

"Josephine," Hal countered. She meant it to be calm and collected. Instead it was a growl. "I don't give a dragon's dick what the shemlen nobility thinks about me or my sister! If you think--"

"What I think," Josie sighed, her voice sharp but not unkind, "is that you've been plotting elven glory behind my back for months and if you really want it, you have to play the Game!"

Hal's mouth fell open. Because of course Josie was right.

Chapter Text

"Oh, Hal'lasean, don't act so shocked," scoffed Josie, but it was impossible. Hal and Cullen were both staring at her wide-eyed and slack-jawed. And Hal was choking on her guilt, but she didn't trust herself yet to say the right thing. Besides, she seemed incapable of saying the right thing today, if Lanaya was any indication. "Did you think I wouldn't notice? Leliana's not the only one who keeps track of the goings on in this place! I understand of course. If you had come right out and proposed it to me, I probably wouldn't have agreed. You needed to soften me to the idea, introduce things gradually. Elven outreach here, an agent in an alienage there, overtures for Celene and Briala. And this school of yours -- a brilliant thought, truly -- but how long did you expect me to stay oblivious?" She was grandstanding now, her ruffled arms akimbo, looking intimidating and impressive in her skirts like soft armor. "You are a skilled player of the Game, my friend, but you are not the only one."

"Josie..." Hal whispered apologetically, her cheeks pink with shame.

"As I said, I do understand. I am not angry, not really, but I am...that is, I--" And now Josie's lips twisted uncertainly and her shoulders dropped. "My feelings are hurt, Hal'lasean! I thought we were closer-- I thought you trusted--"

Hal was on her feet and reaching for Josie's elbows before she even knew what she was doing. "Josie, I do! I do trust you!" Through everything -- her pregnancy, the arrival of the Kirkwall contingent, the resurfacing of her memories, finding and preparing for Lanaya -- Hal had been exhaustively going through all the possible ways she might finally broach the subject with Josie and Cass, might finally convince them of her plans for the Inquisition. Cass would be the hardest, so she would be last, but for Josie...the time had simply never seemed right. Even as they worked together to maneuver the Montilyets into a place of near-monopoly in Antiva, trading exclusively through the family's holdings, she could never quite bring herself to say it, to confess. Maybe she was being a coward. But the thing with Cass and Josie, the thing that didn't apply to anyone else in her trusted circle, was that they had both benefited and still did benefit from their positions of privilege; from the circumstances of their births. Dorian did too, but Dorian had been fast falling out of love with the system that created him in the last few years. "Oh, Josie," Hal sighed miserably. "I'm so sorry, I--" Deep breath. This was not how she'd imagined this conversation going, but if the Inquisition had taught her nothing else, it had taught her flexibility. "I-- the world I want to create, the one I'm-- it won't be the one you so love. And I--" This wasn't coming out properly. The Ambassador was being endlessly patient with her fumbling, somewhere between trusting, amused, and bracing for something offensive. Fenedhis, was this going to be offensive? What was the core of her reluctance? What was the simplest truth? It was out of her mouth and stinging at her eyes before she even realized what it was. "I don't want to lose you, Josie. You're my dear friend and what I'm trying to do, it isn't what you signed up for, it's...anathema to the world you grew up in. That life...if I succeed, could be dismantled almost entirely. I couldn't bear to make you choose between the Inquisition and your family, and I..." She let out a sharp breath as a failed attempt at a laugh. "I couldn't do this, any of this without you. Not only because the Inquisition wouldn't work without you, but because you're my family and I--"

Josie was smiling even as her eyes were wet, and instead of letting Hal continue to trip all over herself, she kissed the elf on both cheeks. "Why didn't you just say so." But Hal knew Josephine Montilyet too well to feel relief just yet. Accepting an apology was not the same as declaring herself to the cause. The Antivan's eyes narrowed appraisingly. "Who else knows?"

Hal sucked in a breath.

"I do," Cullen confessed softly from his armchair. "I've already given my support. Where the Inquisition goes, I go." But what he meant was Hal. He would go wherever Hal asked him to go. The thought simultaneously warmed several pleasant parts of her body and tightened like a fist in her chest. So much trust, so much responsibility. And wonderful Cullen, who would never leave her, even though it might be best for him if he did. If she were a better person, a better friend, she might send him away. Find a replacement. But there was no replacing him. Not in the Inquisition and not in her life. She was selfish and probably cruel. 

"So it is to be a military endeavor," Josie surmised, and Hal flushed.

"There will be a military component eventually, if we make it so far."

Josie studied the elven woman in front of her for quite some time, lips pursed, before she sighed. "You want Tevinter. That's why Fenris is here. So he knows as well, which means the Hawke sisters, your cousin, and Varric must know. And Dorian, of course."

Hal'lasean shook her head in slow denial. "They know pieces. Bethany Hawke knows less than the others; almost nothing, comparatively. Dorian and Varric know more. Bull is in. Cassandra...doesn't know any of it. Not yet."

Josie let out a hard laugh. "I suppose I can comfort myself with that. At least I was not the last." She paused and sighed. "And your Wolf will know too, I imagine."

This time Hal nodded. "Cole knows some. Leliana knows...everything."

At that, Josie frowned deeply, creating a crease between her well-manicured brows. "Leliana? And she's agreed to...to all of it?"

The confusion and hurt and intensity of concentration in Josephine's face made Hal's guilt flare like throwing a dry log on a fire. "Not without great consideration. Her part will be...controversial and dangerous. She can back out whenever she wants, but for now...I have the Divine's blessing." She tilted her head as a caveat. "Well. Not publicly. But Leliana..." Hal cringed a little. She should have fled her sister through another door. The rotunda perhaps. She was already too raw and scattered for this conversation. "She got me the Hero of Ferelden," she admitted quietly, and both Cullen and Josie made sounds of impressed shock. "This..." She sighed again. It felt like running out of energy, like her body was shutting down with each hard thing she said. Like her sister had triggered some kind of mechanism in her heart and brain and soon she'd be completely incapacitated. 

Josie finally seemed to realize it too because she slipped Hal's hair behind her ear and gave her an apologetic smile. "This is...not the best time for this, is it. You have more pressing concerns."

"We'll tell you everything," Hal promised without hesitation, her face even more earnest than usual. "In a day or two? When they're more settled. Is that...?"

"Hal," and Cullen was standing just behind her shoulder, his hand tentatively reaching for her back and then retreating before making contact. When had he even gotten up? He was a big man and not a quiet one; for something so obvious to have escaped her notice...

Savage, whispered a malicious voice in her heart. The room was closing in on her.

"Hal," he tried again, this time beside her, searching out her unfocused gaze. She blushed her embarrassment. "I'll walk Josie through it. You should..." He frowned worriedly at her. She felt the stabilizing weight of his hand finally settling on her spine. It was enough to make her want to cry. 

Savage.

"Go take some time," he finished softly. "Get some fresh air." Go run the forest, he didn't say. But of course he knew. That's where she went when she was upset. Because she was, at heart, a savage.

"Hal'lasean," added Josephine, her own brow knitted with concern now. "Breathe, my friend."

Hal obediently dragged air into her lungs. And held it there until Cullen's thumb brushed against her tunic in reminder. "You'll win her over," he murmured, not quite in her ear, not quite with his breath on the sensitive point. Hal's center didn't quite heat in response. Not quite. That was their love story. Not quite. "You always do." He leaned in and pressed a kiss to her hair, a lingering one, and Hal shut her eyes tightly against the onslaught of feeling. "Go. Take your time. Josie and I will make sure you're not disturbed."

Her breath came out in a knife's edge exhale. She took a step away, toward the garden, and then turned to face both her loyal advisors, her friends. Her family, even if they did think her savage.

Maybe she was. Maybe she was savage.

"If Lanaya..." Hal's cheeks went pink. "If they need me, send someone to find me." 

"Of course," he swore. Her love for him swelled inside her.

"Josie?" The pink turned to red. "I'm sorry...about everything. But we need time. Please? My sister and I. Just. Time."

Josie's frown was pensive but considerate. "Ma nuvenin, ma falon," she agreed, and Hal loved her fiercely then too. For what she meant and how she said it. And then she remembered. 

"...We should..." The tears welled up hot and shamed behind her eyes. "Less Elvish. For a while. She..."

But she couldn't finish. It hurt too much, cut too deep. First Herald of a religion that hated her, a leader of a movement for shems. Then her vallaslin, her gods...

And now her language. She was giving herself away in pieces to please everyone else.

What else was there with all that gone?

A savage.

Just a savage.

Chapter Text

He had no reason to knock on the door but courtesy and concern for the little family beyond it. He considered bringing them something they needed, but the food and bathing supplies and new (old) clothes had already been delivered by attendants who assured Cullen they had anticipated and met Lanaya and her children's every need. He thought maybe a puppy, but wasn't sure how Lanaya would react. She did call him doglord, after all. Arriving with a Mabari in his arms was hardly shattering stereotypes. But he did want to check in on them, not the least because of what had transpired between Lanaya and Hal and largely because he hadn't seen them since the Crossroads and he did want to know how they were settling in.

And he missed them, just a little, even though it had only been a few hours. He missed the lively chatter of the twins and the serious thoughtfulness of Spurian. He didn't miss being glared at constantly or watched with suspicion. He didn't miss feeling that no matter what he did, Lanaya would find fault in it. He certainly didn't miss how she made him feel about himself.

No, that wasn't fair. She didn't make him feel any particular way. He felt that way around her. It wasn't exactly her fault.

It wasn't exactly not her fault, though.

The point was, he felt he should check in and so he was, with a tray of tea and cakes and preserves and cookies and anything else he thought a child might find irresistible. And he just hoped that wouldn't somehow be a terrible offense in their mother's eyes. 

So Cullen rested one side of the tray against the wall and the other against his stomach and knocked. There were voices inside and giggles and shuffling. Then Spurian -- even more handsome now that he was clean and dressed in a soft woolen tunic and doeskin breeches that were only slightly too large for him -- opened the door just enough to see who it was, wary of whoever disturbed them as though expecting an ambush. His eyes widened in recognition.

"Cullen!" He didn't smile, but his voice did. And Cullen's heart swelled pleasantly. He did smile, as if he thought it might teach Spurian the expression. 

"Spurian." There were apologies he wanted to make and things he wanted to say, but he wanted to do all those things with Lanaya in front of him. He adjusted the tray back into both hands. "I've brought tea. May I come in?"

Spurian twisted around and disappeared behind the mostly-closed door. "It's Cullen," he heard, and Lanaya's quietly murmured response overshadowed by Tama and Tully's enthusiastic echoes of his name. "He has tea. He wants to come in." Whatever Lanaya said, Spurian opened the door the rest of the way and held it so that Cullen could enter and settle the tray down on the nearest sideboard. The moment he was inside and his hands were free, two sets of small arms wrapped around his middle and he laughed his gratification as he placed an arm around Tully and put a hand on Tama's long, wet hair. "Who do we have here! I almost didn't recognize you two without all that dust and dirt!"

"Cullen!" gasped Tully, "We saw soldiers training in the yard! With shields and swords and everything! Were they yours!"

"Cullen!" cried Tama as though he has wronged her greatly, "You left us!"

His heart squeezed with guilt, but it wasn't entirely unpleasant. "I'm sorry, sweetling," he assured the little girl, "I've neglected my duties for months and I had to ride ahead to take care of some things. But I'm here now and you have my..." He glanced at Tully with a smirk. "My mostly undivided attention." That answer seemed to satisfy his little friend, so he turned his attention to her twin: "Those were indeed my troops." His smile was crooked. "Well, they're Hal's. But I recruit them and train them. I'll be taking control again this week now I'm back, and if it's all right with your mother, you're welcome to watch me run them through their drills." Tully's eyes lit up and he twisted away so he could look hopefully at his mother for her permission.

His mother. Lanaya. Who had only an hour or two before named her own sister savage. His Hal, who was wild at heart but more civilized than most people he had ever known, be they noble and human or no. Certainly more civilized than he could ever dream to be.

But that wasn't what had Cullen staring. It wasn't that he had forgotten just how stunning she was -- even in sweaters and thick coats, even covered in the grime of travel, she had been gorgeous -- but it had been a whirlwind week and a half since that brief meeting in Minrathous and since that time she had not worn makeup or anything that flattered her form (though with a form like hers, there was little that could be called unflattering). Such disarray suited her sister, made Hal come alive, made her more radiant, but Lanaya had seemed uncertain and uncomfortable with the way she'd looked on the road. Not now. Now she was a portrait crafted by a master's hand -- no, not master, there had to be a less offensive word...genius? artist? -- each touch of color expertly placed so that it enhanced but did not hide. She was...exquisite. She wore a Tevene dress, more informal than the one that had draped her thrillingly when they first laid eyes on one another, a simple fashion that left one shoulder and arm bare but bathed the other in lace. It was violet like the touches of their Alerion eyes, and a floating fabric he couldn't name but wanted desperately to touch. It was soft and full like the lines of her body. Cullen was momentarily amused with the thought that while Hal's eyes were gentle and beckoned you in, her body was lithe and her muscles taut. Hal's eyes were sweet and warm but her body was dangerous. Lanaya was her opposite; jagged lyrium eyes that spoke of forbidden places and lethal entanglement even as her body was pillowy flesh and curves like an elegant dance.

"What," demanded Lanaya of Cullen when he had let his look linger too long. While he might have expected her voice to be sharper, more accusatory, it wasn't. It was almost vulnerable, it was so quiet. He blushed slightly, but this was hardly the most compromising position she'd caught him in. Somehow that made him bold. So he smiled at her, slow and pleased but pure. His desire was tempered by this place, by his duty, by thoughts of Hal'lasean's pain at being called savage. He was warm, but not hot. Something that drew a frown from her but not a scowl.

Progress.

"You look lovely," he told her, and was gratified that he was not the only one to turn pink. "Skyhold suits you."

She didn't smile. She rolled her eyes. "Bathing suits me."

He smirked. "That too."

Chapter Text

Only Tully had no interest in the tea, but he tore through the cakes like he was starving. It was such a luxury, sweets and sugar and preserves, these exquisite fluffy pastries whose like she hadn't tasted since she lived in Amantius' favor. Even then, they had been rare treats when he was especially pleased with her or wanted her fuller of figure to be shown off at a party of his fellows. It was common knowledge among the Magisters that she was a mage and eventually she overheard them discussing with Amantius that she could sue for her freedom based on her magical ability, but she'd found the idea both hurtful and terrifying. Why would she ever want to leave her master's side? He loved her. She bore his children. There was no freedom worth parting from the man who'd saved her. She had told him as much once. There had been cakes aplenty after that.

She made a point to purchase such delicacies for her children on their namedays and of course their little Tummy always enjoyed the food better than any other small gifts he might receive. But even just this small tray Cullen brought them piled high with tea cookies was more than her youngest had ever seen. Certainly more than any of their little family had ever been allowed to taste. Tully was being greedy, but for once, Lanaya felt no fear of what it might mean for him to partake. They played a little game, she and her youngest son, in which she would chastise him playfully for eating too much and then pretend to look away and be distracted just long enough for him to steal another. Cullen and Spurian joined in and soon Tama was shyly, with a scandalized look on her dark Tevene face, helping her brother pilfer the supposedly forbidden goods. They would scamper away with them in careful fists and hide in the room they would be sharing -- a room the attendants had fitted with two child-sized beds; an extravagence that had left them all hushed and staring -- to hide them away for later or share between them, giggling as though they had never known hunger in their young lives.

It hurt that Lanaya had been unable to provide them with such excesses. She felt ashamed and guilty for what her babies had lacked all their days, another reason she was a poor excuse for a mother, and then ashamed and guilty for what she'd said to her sister, for how she'd said it, when Tamalin -- no, Hal'lasean -- was the source of all of their current good fortune. And it was, she had to admit, good fortune. So far. There might be strings attached but for now...for now even Spurian was openly amazed and practically gleeful for his own room, his own bed, for the feast that had laid before them, the fresh clothing, the vast, impressive hearth. Their suite was not a slaves' bare quarters, rickety cots and stained, moth-eaten blankets with a filth bucket in the corner. It was nicer even than the private room Lanaya had earned just before Amantius had bedded her that first time. Though now she wondered if the upgrade hadn't come because he meant to bed her and did not want to do so on the old sheets she slept on each night. That room was tiny and delapidated compared to these ancient quarters. These rooms and the shared space that connected them and the proper washroom were the sort she might have cleaned or served in, occasionally made love to Amantius in, but never have slept in herself, much less been given such a feast and sweets and clothing that, while unfashionable and woolen, were still brought to her for her personal use.

She and the children had wandered blankly from room to room, not daring to touch at first and then touching everything obsessively until the baths were brought up and drawn. It felt like a dream. It made her uneasy. Some part of her was bewildered that she didn't feel relaxed, that she wasn't enjoying this decadence while it lasted. Because nothing good ever lasted. Not for Lanaya. And yet she was wary and watchful and crushing her ribs with her anxiety.

And Hal'lasean. Her little sister. She wanted to start again, to try again. She meant what she said, but...the look her hallabell had given her when the word 'savage' had come hurtling from her mouth. She wished she could start again.

But even if she couldn't seem to really soak up the riches of this place, she would encourage her children to partake. They may never have this chance again. Maybe that was why she should keep them from it. Maybe she would have to pay later for letting them eat from Inquisition plates. Nothing was free for people like her. For people like her children. But she would pay nearly any price to see her babies full and happy.

She should apologize to her sister. She should play nice, ingratiate herself. Make herself irreplaceable. Then maybe her children could grow up like this. Like the Magister's children they were.

Yes, that was exactly the thing to do. If Hal'lasean wanted a big sister, she would get it. Lanaya was the only one who could deliver that to her. Her little sister was pregnant; she could play that angle. She'd been through it twice.

It was instantly relieving to have a plan. To decide where she could fit here, how she could keep her children safe. She would play the part for the Inquisitor as she had once played the part for Amantius.

"Cullen," she said suddenly, looking up from her thoughts and interrupting the Commander telling Spurian about the various arms of his military. Spurian was particularly taken with the idea of battle mages. Something to worry about when they were settled. "Where's my sister now?"

He flushed slightly and cleared his throat. So he knew but didn't want to say. "I'm not sure. But if you need something, I'm happy to--"

"A tour," Lanaya decided. "Would you show us around?" She offered him a hopeful smile.

He frowned at her warily. Perhaps she should let the transition to happy family build a little more slowly.

"Oh! Oh, yes!" gasped Tama at the same time as Tully shouted, "Please, Cullen!"

He was helpless to resist their charms and grinned his resignation. "It would be my pleasure."

Chapter Text

Once Fenris decided to stay through the winter, things between the former slave and Dorian Pavus, current Tevinter noble, had simmered. What had been another explosion waiting to happen was set to a low boil, an unspoken and begrudging agreement on Fenris' part not unlike the one he'd once struck with Anders that allowed the two of them to be in the same room, even sit at the same table and be in the same conversation.

The boundaries seemed to be clear to both parties: Dorian had to give Fenris at least a seat's space at all times, was not to look in his direction and never to make eye contact. There was no touching and no talking between them. On the rare occasion one required something of the other, they would seek a mediator in Varric or Merrill or Hawke. It was childish and absurd, but when the children were capable of killing each other and one of them might actually try given half a reason, compromises had to be made. It was an uneasy truce, but one that had lasted with few flare ups since they'd come to it. And it was even more peaceful since Dorian had learned that Hal's sister had been a slave. Mostly because the poor son of a bitch could barely speak.

When the records of slave purchases for that year came in, he had scoured them until he had proof it hadn't been anyone related to him or that he loved, though this Amantius was someone Dorian had known. An acquaintance of his father's. A practitioner of blood magic, but not -- because apparently in Tevinter such distinctions were important -- one of the truly bad ones. Amantius' slaves never mysteriously disappeared. There was more that Dorian knew about the state of the Magister's slaves, Varric could tell, but that was as much as anyone could get out of him about it, and even then it was only Bull who got details. Their Hal could have pulled it out of him, but Dorian was refusing to go near her. And, as if to keep the balance, Fenris had started spending more time with her. Dorian was in a self-imposed exile from his best friend that had no foreseeable end. Bull was worried. Dorian was all self-loathing. Fenris was restless (and therefore quick to anger...well, quicker). And Varric? As usual, Varric was the only person he knew with any sense.

"Anybody else feel like they'd gone a little mad?" Sera asked, breaking the pensive quiet at their usual table in the Rest. She waited to give someone a chance to make a joke, probably the easy one about how she must be used to that or how could she tell? But no one had the heart to be flippant. Not even Varric. So Sera continued. "Coulda sworn I was lookin' at Quizzie an' the Magister over here's gay babies! Gaybies, yeah?"

The only person he knew with any sense.

Dorian recoiled as if suddenly and very physically ill. His eyes were full of disgust for both the blonde elf and himself as he snapped back, "I am not a Magister!"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. Point is--"

"Sera," warned Bull quietly.

"--those kids look like dark-and-slavey here--"

"Sera," Bull said again, with an edge this time. Dorian's knuckles were white atop his quivering fists. His mustache trembled and he stared down at the table with unfocused but intense eyes. Fenris sat across from him, watching with sharp interest like a cat with a bird in its sights. Bull went to rest his hand on Dorian's shoulder, but the mage jerked away, his back hunching, his lips twisted in a pained sneer. 

"'M jus' sayin' what we're all thinkin', yeah! Coulda been Hal, couldn't it! Might be the sister's the Inquisitor and Hal the slave with a buncha halfbreed brats with her master Lord Dorian--"

"That. Is. Enough." Bull had pushed to his feet slowly and didn't bother to raise his voice. He didn't need to with a size like his. He towered over Sera's lounging form and she pretended it didn't bother her, waving a hand as though he were a fly. 

"Tiny," sighed Varric, because he could already see that Sera wasn't going to back down if she thought it was in any way expected of her, "sit down. Everybody take a breath. Buttercup--"

"Why are you protecting him!" It was too late. He should have intervened sooner. Now Sera was on her feet, leaning in toward the dwarf and pointing an accusing finger at Dorian. "He's nice enough, yeah, I like him, but he's a Vint! He owns people! Common people! Thinks they're nobody, so he can keep 'em like pets!"

"I don't own anyone!" Dorian cried out in horror, his mouth hanging open with the anguish of even having to say the words. He slammed his fist on the table to punctuate, sending mugs clattering and electricity skittering across the little puddles of ale. That was all it took for Fenris to fly backwards, knocking over his chair and leaping from the table with one hand already reaching for his weapon.

"Kaffas!" accused the freed slave.

Hawke was on it, quickly putting herself between Fenris and Dorian, trying to stare her lover down as she'd done when he first arrived. Trying to get him to look at her and remember where he was, who he was, before he started ripping out hearts. Bull took a protective stand behind the Tevinter mage's back, his massive arms crossed over his massive chest for a look that still freaked Varric out a little, even though he knew he was safe.

"Sera, please," Varric cautioned, lifting his brows at her pleadingly. She was like a Mabari with a rabbit, refusing to let go once her jaws were locked on warm, wriggling flesh. But this time it wasn't annoying pranks or casual racism or thoughtless cruelty. Well, not just thoughtless cruelty. This time she'd tripped over the powder keg while playing with matches. The whole of Skyhold was about to go up. It was the kind of situation that called for real names. "Let's just talk about something else, okay? Have I ever told you guys the story--"

"Maybe you don't, but dear ol' daddy does, doesn't he!" Varric reached slowly for Bianca, who hung on the back of his chair. Just in case. Sera was draped across the table now to shout directly into Dorian's reddening face. Musicians could have kept time by his mustache, it was twitching so furiously. "But I guess Quizzie wouldn't be your type, huh! You like the slaves with cocks--"

"FASTA VASS, WOMAN!" roared Dorian, who finally took his feet with a dramatic swipe of his full stein of ale off the table. It clattered across the floor and if they didn't have the attention of the entire tavern before, they certainly did now. "DO YOU EVER THINK BEFORE YOU SPEAK!" Fenris nearly lunged out of pure instinct, but Hawke had his face in both hands and instead he stood and shook and glared murderously at the mage. But Dorian was beyond caring about Fenris. Dorian had been a mess for two weeks now. Two weeks of pressurized feelings he wouldn't let out, two weeks of self-flagellation and punishments, and now it was all bursting out of him at once.

Varric glanced at the lyrium-etched elf to make sure his attentions weren't needed more there and then put himself in front of Dorian, holding up both hands. Because if he couldn't reason with Sera, he could at least get through to Dorian. His good friend. His dear friend. He tried his best to send that message with his eyes. "Come on, Sparkler," he coaxed, "she's just a kid--"

"When is that going to stop being everyone's excuse for her!" Dorian interrupted, and now he was pointing straight-armed and vicious at Sera. "It's one thing if it's a couple pranks every once in a while, and even when those are overkill, yes, all right, she's a child--"

"'M not a child!"

"She's a child so it's tolerated, encouraged sometimes even! Well, if she's such a child then she shouldn't be here! She should be...doing whatever it is children do in the South! Catching rabbits with her teeth or something! But, no, she's here, she's valued because of her contacts, and that's all well and good, but what about the things she says to Hal! Laughing in her face about her vallaslin! Telling the whole of Skyhold that she's pregnant! Those things would be problem enough except that we both saw her murder a man in mid-conversation with the Inquisitor! She bashed his face in because she couldn't wait five blighted seconds for Hal to get her information?! And no one said a word except Hal! She's not a child, she's just a brat!"

"He had it coming! He--"

"Shut up, Sera! Shut up, shut up, shut up! Maker's bloody breath!" Dorian let out a hysterical laugh, his eyes wide and too white. "If you gave a dragon's dick about the common people, you'd be doing something to help them, really help them, not just turning out the lights at a ball and giggling about it! It's just an excuse! A pathetic excuse to--"

"If you cared about your slaves why aren't you in Tevinter setting them free!" Sera had become shrill, standing with her fists clenched at her sides like an angry toddler, and now she was quivering too, thrumming like a bowstring after it lets an arrow fly. Varric began to worry that it wasn't Fenris they'd need to protect Dorian from, but the little blonde girl. Or perhaps vice versa.

Dorian opened his mouth to shout back, even made a little sound, but then stopped abruptly, tensed, froze, staring with an agonized frustration as he slowly realized that what he was about to say -- no doubt that he was still here because of Hal's plan to free the slaves -- was not something he could announce to Sera, who remained in the dark. Nor was it something he should bellow in the tavern. His cheeks were bright copper as he brought his jaw closed with a click of his teeth. For a moment, it looked like the Tevene might cry. Instead, he turned around and trudged in humiliation to the bar to purchase a new drink. The table breathed a simultaneous breath of relief. Even Fenris relaxed slightly.

Except Sera. Who was staring at Varric like she wanted to both rip off his head and run away sobbing. She looked...hurt. Betrayed even. Did he miss something? Why was she staring at him?

"S'at what you think!" she demanded. The dwarf's mouth fell open in confusion.

"Is what what I think?"

"You think I'm a kid!"

"You are a kid."

"No, but you think-- you think I'm some baby!"

Shit.

"Buttercup--"

"No, it's true! You all do, don't you! You all...!" Her chin dimpled and then she pushed it as high as she could, looking down at her nose at the whole crew. "You can all just go fuck off, yeah! Just fuck right off!" For emphasis, she flipped them off with both hands and backed away to the stairs. She retreated to her room and left behind only uncomfortable, guilty silence.

Chapter Text

"Sparkler," sighed Varric hours later when they had reconvened in their little dining room for dinner, "you should probably apologize to Buttercup when she comes out of her room." He picked listlessly at the salad on his plate, irritable and melancholic in turns because it was easier than feeling guilt. Maker, how he hated hurting his friends.

Dorian was equally uninterested in his food, his elbow on the table ("like a low-born drunk", in his words) and his chin propped on his upturned hand. With both the Tevinter mage and the dwarf out of sorts, their evening meal had become a dour occasion indeed. It was like a whole room full of Cassandras and Fenrises. And of course actual Cassandra and Fenris were there too, though the latter was as far from Dorian as he could manage. But at least they were still holding to their truce. 

"Have you apologized to her?" the mage shot back with mild annoyance. He was too deep into his self-loathing to muster up much more than that. 

"Through the door," Varric admitted with a helpless shrug. "She didn't respond, but I said my piece."

"I meant everything I said," murmured Dorian, but his cheeks colored slightly and he kept his eyes on his untouched food. "But I do wish I hadn't said it. Not like that at least."

"She's right." Even Dorian looked up in surprise to seek the owner of the low, gravelly voice. Fenris. Shit. Varric sent a warning look his way and then one to Hawke beside him and finally to the magical Vint himself, who was already flinching away slightly, protecting his raw and broken self-esteem from the inevitable derision of the former slave. But then a miraculous thing happened.

"I know," whispered Dorian, and he broke a rule. He looked Fenris right in the eyes, his guilt and shame and turmoil laid bare for the elf. "But I would never-- I didn't-- not with slaves." 

Fenris narrowed his eyes, calculated and sharp but not yet dangerous. Just the threat of danger should Dorian answer poorly or push his countryman too far. "But you knew nobles who did." It was not a question. Dorian's subtle, weary horror was all the answer he needed. "And you did nothing."

Dorian looked away, cleared his throat. Bull's hand hovered at his lover's shoulder, but he decided better of it and set it on the back of Dorian's chair instead.

"Everyone..." Dorian began with a choked voice. "That is...it's...common. I didn't--"

"You didn't care." Fenris' accusation was infinitely more nuanced than the full-assault method of his fighting. That must have been Hawke's doing. Or, no, maybe that was unfair. Fenris was making progress himself.

"He didn't know," Bull protested, his face pained with the effort of not touching Dorian. Of not being able to soothe him. Varric imagined they'd have loud sex again tonight. It seemed to be the only comforting Dorian would allow himself. That and drink.

"Didn't he." Fenris lifted one brow, his green eyes flashing with challenge.

"Broody," groaned the dwarf, scrubbing a hand over his face. "Haven't we done this enough for one day? Lay off. Leave well enough alone."

"Is that what you said, mage?" Fenris pressed, turning Varric's words against Dorian. "Is that what you said when you saw a noble beat his slave? Or rape her?"

"Fenris," Hawke cautioned, touching his arm. "Too far."

Fenris shot his lover a look of betrayal, a flare of hurt that turned quickly to anger. Anger he pointed at Dorian, who was clutching fists in his lap and looking at the floor, his every muscle tensed. "Did you laugh with them, mage, when they bragged about their helpless conquests? Did you watch!"

"Fenris!" snapped Hawke, her eyes wide. Everyone at the table looked distinctly green with moral disgust. Dorian was somewhere between rage and defeat. Powder keg. 

"Enough!" It was not Bull who came to Dorian's rescue this time with a fist pounded on the table. It was Cass, who stood and out-glowered Fenris like the glorious, furious mother hen she was. "Dorian has more than earned his place at this table and I will not stand by and listen to this...this...slander!"

Varric could have kissed her. Well, no. No, he couldn't have. But he was grateful. Except that when Fenris fluffed up in response and turned his ire to the Seeker, Dorian stood slowly and pushed his plate away. "It isn't slander if it's true."

"Dorian--" Bull stood to reach after him, but the mage held out a staying hand.

"It's fine," and he gave a laugh he didn't mean. "I don't want to be around me right now either." He slumped his way around the table -- the side away from Fenris -- and was headed for the door that led to the Main Hall when the voices of two young children with Tevene accents and Cullen's laughter echoed down that very corridor. Dorian became a statue, he went so still.

Varric braced himself. "Here comes trouble..." 

He had seen her from the walk above the drawbridge when she and Hal had hugged and again crossing the courtyard when the damned enormous humans moved enough to give him a glimpse. She had been far away and travel stained, but even then he could see her beauty. When she and Hal stood together, it was a sight to make a man's head spin with possibility. They looked so much alike from a distance. But when she stepped into the dining room, dressed impeccably in purple with her silver hair in elaborately pinned up curls, it was clear just how different they were. This woman was dangerous. Not least of all because she was stunning and she knew it. She moved with her hips first, breasts up, and let the rest of her follow. This was a woman to bring empires to their knees with the promise of a kiss. A careful scholar of the arts of seduction and love. Or at least sex. Even the members of their party who preferred men were staring a little more than they should. But when she saw Dorian, took him in with shrewd and wary teal eyes, she dropped a curtsy and didn't dare look at his face. Fenris made a sound like a strangled cat.

"Lord Pavus," she greeted formally.

All around the table, and Cullen behind her, jaws dropped open. Everyone but Bull, who just looked worried.

"You know her?" Varric didn't manage to keep the accusation from his shock. 

No fuckin' wonder he'd been such a mess!

Chapter Text

"No! Of course not!" Dorian protested immediately, his voice several notes higher than he would have liked. But his answer wasn't strictly true. "I mean, yes! Well, no, but I--"

"Which is it?" demanded Cassandra, turning her ire from Fenris to Dorian with that look that meant she was about to go on her own personal Exalted March. "Do you know her or not!"

"It isn't what you think!" Dorian didn't realize he'd backed up from the table until he very nearly bumped into Lanaya, and then he twisted away from her as well. Nothing was going the way it should have. Everything was falling apart and there was nothing he could say to defend himself because all of it was true. Anything terrible they thought about him, it was completely, horribly true. He just hadn't noticed it until this week.

"It's exactly what we think!" Fenris was on his feet now, they all were, standing and staring at him with disgust and suspicion in their eyes. Everyone but Bull, who knew, who already knew. The room was too hot, too close, too many people. He couldn't breathe and there seemed no way to escape because the bloody doors were all blocked by former slaves. He was trapped. Sometimes as a child he'd had nightmares about this, about the slaves coming to kill him in the night. He didn't know whether to laugh or cry. No, he wanted to scream. He wanted to shriek until his voice gave out, scream out the twisted, inverted things he'd been thinking about himself and the world for a week and a half ever since he saw the words 'Gilded Dragon' in Leliana's hand.

"Then what is it!" snapped Cassandra.

I'm sick, he thought to shout at them, the people who'd been his friends, all of Tevinter is sick only I didn't see it before, didn't care to see it, didn't want to know or even look closely at what worked in my favor! Didn't want to disappont my father further, couldn't bear the derision of my peers, and if I had noticed and bothered to care and if I had spoken up in the clubs as the other men discussed their female slaves as little more than tits and cunts and ass except to agree, they would have looked too closely at me and seen my secrets and my entire life has been about keeping those secrets until now, until Hal finally made it okay and then it turns out I betrayed her, my best friend, before I even knew her! And I was too much of a coward to tell her to her face that I used to sneak through her sister's room a few times a month to find my way to Danyl for a quick, shame-filled fuck! So I hid from her! I avoided her! And now she will be the last to know and she will never forgive me!

But he couldn't bring himself to admit those things out loud, especially not to the people who accepted him as he was. Or as they thought he was. Before this. Before it turned out he was no better than the worst of the Magisters, that his hands were red with blood and black with guilt from the moment he was born and nursed by a (human) slave, from the first day he learned they weren't people, that he was more worthy than they, greater than, from the moment he learned to curse them and punish them when they misbehaved. Perhaps he should do them all a favor and go home. If he left before they exiled him, he could keep some little shred of his dignity. He could go to Minrathous and find those slave tunnels and help them escape one by one. Maybe he'd finally have to marry a woman and have an heir to cover for his activities, but it was a small sacrifice when compared to the horrors in which he had been complicit. But she would never exile him, not really, not his Hal. It wasn't her way. She would convince him to stay because she needed him and because she was kind, but she would be distant as she had been to Blackwall, compassionate but apart. And that...that would be worse. Either way, he had already lost his best friend.

Boss'll understand, Bull had told him. But he was still a coward. Maybe he didn't want her to understand. Maybe he didn't want to be forgiven. Maybe he didn't deserve forgiveness. Maybe, some part of him insisted stubbornly, maybe there was nothing to forgive. Maybe he wasn't guilty of anything but being Tevene. And was that so bad? He loved being a Vint! There were so many things about his home that were magnificent, that were glorious, that made a man proud to know his ancestors built it! His ancestors...and their slaves. But weren't some of those slaves happy? They were fed and safe and...well, some of them. What would they even do if they were...?

His head throbbed and his stomach churned and his chest was a solid rock of tension and anxiety. Nothing made sense. Nothing made sense anymore! And he would lose everything for something he didn't even know he'd done at the time. He would lose his home, lose Bull, lose Hal, lose the one place where he ever felt even a modicum of acceptance and belonging. 

"Maker's breath," said Cullen, stepping around the still deferential Lanaya to place his large, commanding presence in the center of the tension. "Everyone calm down. There's no reason to--"

But Fenris wasn't listening. He had crossed the room, stalking like a mangy, stray cat, until he was in front of Dorian and pointing behind him at Hal's sister. "She called you by name, mage! She won't look you in the eye! You knew her master, is that it!"

Dorian was vaguely aware that Lanaya's eldest son was moving himself between his mother and the argument, that Lanaya then tried to pull the boy back behind her to protect his siblings instead. Cullen tried to insinuate himself between Fenris and Dorian, but the elf was closing in the remaining gap too quickly and Dorian put forward his hands with his magic thrumming over them in case he needed to defend himself.

"Hawke!" Varric's voice.

"Fenris!" Hawke's voice.

Fenris' tattoos were pulsing with light and had it been any other time, Dorian would have been delighted and fascinated by the activity of the lyrium beneath his skin. Would have been, except that Dorian's back hit the wall behind him. "You watched him use his little 'pet' and you did nothing! Or did you help him hurt her!"

"Fasta vass, man!" Dorian tried to regain ground, flaring more magic into his fingers. Just space. He just needed space so he could breathe, for fuck's sake! "It was the whorehouse! I saw her at the whorehouse!"

Fenris' eyes narrowed, though with the thought to attack or with consideration for Dorian's shouted explanation, he couldn't say. Whatever might have happened next was prevented by Bull's mass suddenly between Dorian and the elf, which should have been impossible considering just how big he was and how little space remained between the two Vints. Dorian could just see beyond the Qunari to where Fenris was forced to back up right into Hawke's waiting arms. The elf whipped around to face her, glowing hand up and prepared to strike, but she stood her ground, stared him down, didn't so much as flinch with his lethal fist inches from her face. 

"Come on," she said softly, not so much as blinking with his gaze locked in hers, "let's go for a walk."

He struggled with the request openly, his muscles twitching with the urge to smash and destroy, but eventually he let out a gravelly huff and stalked past her through the entrance Lanaya's little family didn't occupy. 

"Dorian..." said Bull, turning to face him with worry and...and pity. It was too much. It was all too much. 

"I don't need defending!" Dorian would have been humiliated at the emotion in his voice, but he was too far past caring. He shoved at Bull with both magic-laced hands and his lover took one stunned step back, confused but still forgiving, always forgiving, and patient and Void take him! "Stop looking at me like that! I don't deserve it! I don't fucking deserve your kindness! What I've-- the things I've-- you should hate me! You should have let him--" He shoved again, harder this time, and then his feet were turning for the door, for the only other exit, occupied by the Tevinter family but not the one Fenris had used. Because as much as he felt deserving of having his heart torn from his chest, he had no desire to actually experience it.

But as he fled toward the Main Hall, he thought darkly that he already knew what it felt like to have his heart ripped out.

Chapter Text

It was too cold to go barefoot or even to strip down to her breastband and breeches as was her preference in moments like this. So Hal whipped through the trees and the light layer of the snow that had just begun to fall with soft Dalish boots instead of wrappings, with a coat and a scarf and gloves. They would be damp with sweat by the time she was done and the wind would cool it and chill her to the bone, but that was fine. That was good even. Better shivering with cold than with feeling. 

Fleet-footed and relentless she ran, away from the castle and the road, out of sight from curious guards and any merchants eager to reach Skyhold before what promised to be the first real snowfall of the season. Away from her sister. She ran like the noble savage they thought her, catching pine branches in the face and relishing the sting. Good. Give her back her vallaslin in bloody scratches to horrify and amaze the shems. To prove Lanaya right.

Hal wasn't aware that Cole had joined her at first. He was the only one who might have gone unnoticed to her elven hunter's ears. He became her shadow, flitting just beyond the trees to one side and then switching to the other. They were silent and swift as the deer that roamed these woods. As in tune as the wolves who stalked those deer.

But eventually Hal tired. Eventually she resigned herself to Cole's help. Eventually she realized that the sun disappeared quickly behind the mountains and the snow that fell was twisting in a sharp wind blowing at the forefront of what looked like a dark and vicious storm. 

"The bunnies are hiding," Cole murmured as she rested with her hands on her thighs, panting silently as the fat flakes danced around them.

She couldn't respond for a few long moments. "It'll be a blizzard."

"She's the storm and the bunnies but she hates it, hates the rabbit she is, hates the storm inside her."

Hal let out a miserable sigh and straightened up, wiping beaded sweat from her forehead and turning to regard her strange companion. "She's had a hard life, Cole, I know." She didn't, not really, but she knew that too. That was the best she could do for now. "I'm not..." Hal shook her head. "What am I supposed to do? What do I do to make it better? She wants...she wants control over her children. So I'll...I could ask her what she wants for them? I just assumed she'd want them educated, that she'd..." She sucked in a sharp breath of recognition. "So I'll...apologize. For not asking. For assuming. And for disrupting her life. And I'll offer her everything and she can take what she wants or take nothing and that...that's free will. Right? Like the elves. Fen freed The People and was horrified by what became of us, but that's free will. And I...I have to offer that to her." Right? Hal hesitated, peering between naked tree limbs to the darkening sky beyond. To the coming storm. "Cole?" Because she needed someone to tell her. Someone else besides her own tumultuous mind. 

"Survive the storm, find the bunny," he mumbled and she frowned at him uncertainly. 

"What?"

"Survive the storm, find the bunny. Stand still. Wait."

Hal let out another sigh, this one all reluctant acceptance. She was strong enough to survive any storm, wasn't she? And still, so still, when the hunt was on. She could withstand the storm that was her sister and then make no move once she'd proven herself. She could assure Lanaya of her loyalty and determination and then wait for her sister to come to her --  the one she'd already seen that lived inside the woman she'd become. These were things she could do. Endure. Survive. Be stronger than the storm. She'd shown that to be true again and again. She'd waited for her sister this long; what was another few months? A year? Whatever Lanaya threw at her, Hal could take. It was a simple matter of focus. Indomitable focus.

The snow fell harder now, sharp little pebbles that sprayed her already raw and rough cheeks. The wind picked up like a promise. "We should get back."

But Cole had gone very still himself now, was staring like a hunting hound toward Skyhold as though he had picked up a scent. The scent of someone in terrible pain. He looked toward Hal with his eyes wide and round beneath his scraggly bangs. "He needs you."

Her heart stuttered with anxiety. "Cullen?" she asked. Cole shook his head. "Dorian?" The smallest of nods.

Dorian. Her wonderful, darling Dorian.

Hal coached her burning thighs and cramping calves into action and turned her feet for the keep. 

They sprinted before the blizzard, the Dalish huntress and her spirit shadow. They arrived just as the flags began to snap with fury.

Chapter Text

The snow was falling in thick swirls by the time Hal'lasean finally found Dorian. He hadn't been in his room or Bull's or the tavern or anywhere else he normally went when he was upset.

This time Hal found him in her quarters, standing on the balcony with the doors closed behind him so that he took the worst of the icy winds without coating her room in a blanket of flakes. But Dorian hated the cold; he complained of it constantly, cursing Skyhold for not being located somewhere more pleasant, like a tropical island on the Waking Sea. He didn't turn to acknowledge her when she reached the top of her stairs -- but then, she was quiet and the wind was roaring -- and he didn't so much as glance her way when she opened the glass doors and stepped out into the already piling drifts of snow.

Dorian's only reaction to let her know he was aware of her presence was the way he hunched when she moved closer. She hesitated there, studying his goosebumped back in his weather inappropriate clothing as if she could divine from the patterns there what best she could do for him. But this was Dorian, her very best friend, closer to her than her own skin, better than a brother, and, unlike Lanaya, Hal knew precisely where his boundaries lay. More than that, she knew that those boundaries were meaningless where she was involved.

He didn't speak, so she didn't either. Instead, she stepped so close that she could rest her chest against his back and reached around his waist with both arms. He flinched, hard. Pulled away so sharply that she almost lost her balance. His face, which he was unsuccessfully attempting to avert from her attention, was a wretched mask, contorted with self-loathing and pain.

He looked, she thought for a moment of surprise, not unlike Fen'Harel in his darkest thoughts. It clutched at her heart like a stone fist.

"Dorian," she sighed, voice thick with hurt and worry, "please talk to me. Please just tell me."

He refused to look at her, refused to let her see his face. And instead of finally confessing what ate at him, instead of explaining why her best friend had been avoiding her for a week and a half when she had needed him most, he mumbled, "You shouldn't be out here in this. Not in your condition."

Her brows lifted in challenge and her arms crossed beneath her chest. "I'm going to be wherever you are, Dorian, so if you're out here, I'm out here."

It shouldn't have been a difficult decision. Dorian hated the cold, he didn't want Hal out in it, so logically they should move inside. But he wavered, uncertain, tormented. She nearly wept for his pain.

"Come inside, falon," she beseeched, venturing a hand out to touch his arm. Again he jerked away. Hal carefully buried the sting of it, the way it reminded her that she was always left behind eventually, the way Lanaya's voice echoed in her head, calling her savage.

"Don't," Dorian whispered, and it was so soft under the screaming wind that if she'd been human, she wouldn't have heard it at all.

"Don't what?"

"Call me that." He sounded so beaten. It was only Hal's empathy for him that kept her from showing how much his distance hurt her. So much like Fen'Harel. Like Solas. It was suddenly difficult to breathe. "I'm not..." His voice was stronger, louder, but it cracked with strain. And still he didn't let her see his face. "I'm not...your falon!"

Hal recoiled as if she'd been slapped; there was no hiding her pain, not at that kind of rejection. Not from this man, who she had never thought to...who had never... 

All at once her hurt became agitation, a fire in her chest instead of a hole. "Gurnshit!" she snapped, her breathing shallow and her eyes watering. She could no longer insist it was only from the wind and cold. "Look me in the eyes, Dorian! Look me in the eyes and tell me I'm not your friend!"

He jerked his face up in shock, his jaw slightly slack in horror, his dark eyes round and wet. "No! No, I--" For a moment it seemed he might burst into tears or maybe just burst, then it looked as though he would collapse in on himself just to have her see his agonized expression. He always did loathe his own vulnerability. He had gotten used to hers, but rarely did he offer his own in return. He wasn't offering it now. She had dragged it from him. He was beyond maintaining his flippant guard. But he didn't fall apart or explode. Dorian locked his gaze needfully to hers, even though it clearly cost him. "You-- I-- I will always," he gasped in a ragged breath. "Always love...love you! But you don't-- I don't deserve--" He made a strangled sound in his throat and looked anywhere but at her. "When you know--"

Hal let out a noise of annoyed frustration and flailed her arms uselessly. "Dorian, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about and we're standing in a blizzard, can we please go inside and sit by the fire and then can you actually make sentences!"

He blanched and nodded several times without ever actually making a move toward the open doors. So Hal reached for him again, and once again he flinched away. She hoped the half-sob she made was swallowed by the wind. But she made damned sure her words weren't. "Get inside, Dorian! Right now!" Hal pointed straight-armed at her room and stared the mage down until he finally began to move. She followed him inside and shut the doors behind them, kicking at the dusting of snow that already made its way onto her floor. It didn't do much to actually clear it away, but it did make her feel just a little better. It gave her a moment at least to calm down before she wheeled on her friend.

When she did, she found him standing dejectedly in the center of her quarters, shivering violently with the sudden change in temperature and refusing to go nearer the fire. Is this what it was going to be like to raise a child? Because right now she mostly just wanted to shake sense into him. Instead, she pulled off her boots and left her coat and scarf and gloves in a trail that led straight from her balcony to Dorian. When she was in only her breeches and tunic, she crossed the rest of the way to him and wrapped her arms around his middle from behind, pressing her body heat against his severe lack. As though she hadn't been running through the forest for hours. But then, he wasn't wearing anything but his stupid one-armed Tevinter shirt. 

But of course he fought her again, tried to pull away, jerked as if she were hurting him by trying to warm him up. So Hal gripped harder. An agonized whimper ripped from his throat and then he thrashed away, surprising her into releasing him. He darted several feet away, looking hunted by his own shadow, and Hal couldn't take it anymore. Couldn't take being pushed away so many times by people she loved in one day. She was cold and pregnant and hurt and angry and Dorian? Damn him!

"Void take you, Dorian Pavus, don't make the pregnant elf tackle you because I swear to you, I will do it!" There were tears streaming down her cheeks, but she wasn't aware of when they'd begun or even why they fell. "Sit your Tevinter ass down in front of that blighted hearth or I will wrestle you down myself!"

It was an amusing image, not the least because he was so much bigger than she, and at any other time, it would have dissolved their feelings into giggles. Neither of them so much as lifted the corners of their lips. He considered the floor in front of him, his booted feet leaving wet prints on her wooden floor, something he would have chastised her for a week and a half ago. He was almost child-like as he took them off, hooking the toes of one boot at the heel of the other and jimmying himself free clumsily. He nearly fell trying to free himself of the other. Dorian shuffled in stockinged feet to the hearth, stared at the armchairs he usually occupied, and instead dropped unceremoniously to the floor with a thud that looked like it hurt. 

Hal gave him a few heartbeats to settle, to brace for what he must have known was coming, and then she sat down behind him, her legs out on either side of his solid human form, and finally, finally, when she wrapped him in her arms and pressed her chest and cheek to his freezing back, when she held him protectively close and rubbed her palms along his cold-burned arms, only then did he let go.

Dorian had never cried in front of Hal. Never once. But he did now; sobbed and keened as though his heart was dying, making hideous contortions of his face and getting snot and salt water all over himself. 

Hal held him as though she would never let go, even when her back ached and her arms grew tired. And as she held him and he wailed, she grumbled fondly against his bare shoulder. 

"I love you, you idiot. You stupid, beautiful lummox. You're so stupid."

Chapter Text

When he'd cried himself out and they'd been sitting in silence before the fire for some time, when the storm raging outside rattled the doors and piled snow high on the balcony, Hal finally shifted herself around Dorian to get a good look at his sob-wrecked face. She used her sleeve to clean him up, attentions that he accepted with his head slung and his shame clear, dabbing at tears and mucus and the smudged and running remains of his favorite dark eyeliner.

"I don't get how you can wear this stuff," she told him for the millionth time, her voice a soothing murmur. She meant it to be familiar. She meant it to make him smile. She meant for him to tell her, as he always did, that not everyone could be as naturally pleasing as she was. She meant for him to pull his little black pencil from his robe pocket and threaten to give her what he called a "make over". This was their dance. Dorian never refused a dance.

Until now.

Her heart sank, but she said nothing. She wiped him clean and then turned her attentions to his mustache, twisting and tweaking it until it was more or less up to his usual standard. No one could ever do it quite like he could, but she'd learned to mimic it over the years, mostly when she draped drunk and fond on his lap and they touched each other just to feel another person's skin and to know they were not alone. They understood that isolation in each other. Had since the moment they met. Her Dorian.

"Will you tell me now?" Hal asked hopefully, seeking out his reluctant gaze. "I miss you. I need my best friend."

He turned his face from her. So that was the wrong thing to say. Today was not going well at all. "Please," she breathed out miserably. "Don't leave me alone in this."

He flinched, but didn't pull away. And then he forced himself to look her in the eyes, even though she could see how much it was costing him. "I...knew her."

Hal's breath caught. He couldn't mean what she thought he meant. That just wasn't...couldn't...

"Your...fasta vass, I knew...your...your sister. In...in Tevinter. Hal, I--" Dorian sucked in a ragged breath and shook his head, his features contorting as though he might cry again. "My dearest friend," and then he was crying again, and she reached to pet his cheek, "I am...I cannot tell you how...how..." He hesitated, renewing the intensity of his gaze on hers. "Ir...ir abelas, ma...ma uthfalon, is that...is that even...? That hardly matters, I-I knew...her master, but...Maker's mercy, I only knew him...peripherally, and I don't-- I don't remember ever...seeing her b-before, but then...Andraste's-- Hal, Hal'lasean, I...the Gilded...the Gilded Dragon, it's...it's where I went for...to..." His cheeks turned a hot copper and he finally tore his eyes from hers, staring into the fire and then out at the snow, his agony and shame unguarded. "I never...I didn't realize...I never noticed! I should...I should have recognized, when I first saw you! I should-- I--" When he could find nothing else to say, he let his mouth remain open, gaping actively with his effort, with his hurt and fear.

Hal was quiet for a long time, her hand sliding from his cheek and resting instead on his thigh, her vision unfocused as she tried to comprehend just what he was trying to say. There was pain in her chest, she could feel it, but it was mild and distant, and she couldn't decide if it was for herself, for Dorian, or for her sister. Perhaps it was all three.

Finally, her voice almost inaudible, she reached for clarification: "You've been avoiding me because...when you saw she worked at the Gilded Dragon, you realized that you knew her?" He nodded and waited with hunched shoulders like she might lash out at any moment. Maybe she should. How could he have not noticed? They looked so much alike, the two Alerion sisters. He never once mentioned...

But he was Tevene. A Magister's son.

"What...er, who were you visiting at the brothel?"

"A man," he admitted, his chin tucked toward his chest and his eyes on her hands. "Named Danyl. To get to him in secret, there was...a passage. Through...her room." Again color flared in his cheeks with his shame. "So that everyone would think..." 

"So Tevinter thinks you've paid my sister for sex." It wasn't a question. Hal felt so distant from the conversation, so removed, and part of her thought the whole thing was so absurd she should be laughing. "But you've never been with a woman." Her chest clutched slightly at the idea that he might have been with a woman and it wasn't her. Especially if it was Lanaya.

And that was absurd too. Did she expect all the men in her life to desire only her? It was foolish and cruel, selfish and possessive, and unfair to them and to her Wolf. She had never been so jealous before the Inquisition, before these people. But then, she had never known true family before this either. Maybe that was why she clung to it so desperately now. Still, Hal knew enough about such things to be aware that sexual jealousy wasn't a healthy family dynamic at all. 

"Never," Dorian swore, and Hal was irritated at her own relief. Any other time, he would have told her she was the only woman for him, and she felt the absence of their flirtatious interchanges sharply. Because it meant her friend was really suffering.

She sat in what they'd already said for some time, both hands resting now on his leg and both their eyes on her hands.

"You didn't know her when she was a slave?" Hal lifted her eyes to his, waited stubbornly until he met them. He shook his head. "So you didn't actually do anything wrong. Not...not really." He opened his mouth to protest and she pressed her fingers to his lips. "You didn't know. About her. Or me. Or what was wrong with Tevinter. And you're working to fix it now, yes?" But she didn't wait for him to answer. Because there was still one question she needed to ask. "Why didn't you just tell me?" He looked at her, just looked at her, wracked with such guilt and self-loathing and fear, and she knew without him having to say it. Of course she knew. They both had lacked unconditional love with their people. They both worried so often about losing the strange clan they'd found here. "You thought you would lose me."

Tears welled again in his already red and swollen eyes and he averted his face as if she'd said something truly horrible. 

"You don't think you deserve to be my friend," she sighed, and he made a strangled sound of affirmation. 

Hal closed her eyes and breathed, listening to the crackle of the fire and the roaring of the storm and the sound of her heart in her ears. She wasn't really sure how she should feel. Or how she did feel. She was so...calm. So very calm. She knew she hurt for him. But was she hurt by him?

Yes, she found. Something tight rose in her throat and stuck there.

"You can't be held accountable for your old ignorance, my friend." And because she was feeling generous even in her hurt, she added, "Ma uthfalon." Hal took a calming breath and let it out slowly. "When I came first to the Conclave, I thought humans were...I thought most of them were callous, cruel murderers and rapists. I thought they were stupid and not worth knowing. I changed. You've changed. We're not the fools we used to be. And we're doing something to change the things about the world we don't like. That's...that's something. That's everything. The school, the Inquisition, what we're...planning, those things are everything." But no. No, that wasn't true. "No, you know what? They're not everything. Fen thinks they are and sometimes, sometimes it seems they are, but they're not. Those things are important, but it's...it's this," she gestured between them. "It's this, us, people, individuals who love each other and respect each other, families you make, this is everything, Dorian."

He was watching her now, a little warily, but where there had been only shame, there was now an inkling of hope. He needed her to build him back up. But she just didn't have it in her. She couldn't take care of everyone all the time. She just couldn't. 

"I love you, Dorian," Hal decided, "and if there's anything to forgive, you have my forgiveness. But I needed you this week. I needed my best friend and you wouldn't even look me in the eye."

He started to drop his gaze and she caught his chin, gently forcing him to make eye contact. His guilt was fresh, but different. Quieter. Less urgent. "I know," he whispered. "Ir abelas." Tears slipped down his cheeks again.

Hal let out a beleaguered sigh and leaned forward to press her lips to his lips, chaste and sweet. He returned the gesture with immeasurable relief.

When they broke apart she gave him a wan, lopsided smile. "Your pronunciation is atrocious."

The corners of his lips twitched upward and a weight lifted in Hal's chest.

"Go tell Bull you're making it up to me by being big spoon tonight." She tilted her head and added, "And if he wants, he can come be biggest spoon."

Chapter Text

It was a strange first day in Skyhold. After Fenris -- the Fenris -- and Lord Pavus left the private dining room, none of the remaining members of her sister's 'inner circle', as Cullen named them, seemed particularly interested in more than a courteous introduction. Master Tethras had been kindest, but Lanaya entertained a sneaking suspicion he was mostly looking for a story for his next novel. She wouldn't let it be hers or her family's. 

There was no resentment over the awkward reception. After what happened, not even Tully was excited about the prospect of meeting his favorite characters. Tama had withdrawn entirely. Neither her brothers nor the Commander could tease her out of her shell. Cullen spent the rest of the tour assuring them that this was unusual, that typically it was all camaraderie and companionship. Then he'd spent the walk back to their room assuring them it was not their fault, that Fenris and "Dorian" were always on the verge of fighting, that they should know better. That he'd have a talk with both of them and make certain it didn't happen again.

But that was hardly the strangest thing to happen on their tour. No, that dubious honor went to the way she was treated. The way they were all treated. But it was hardly a uniform reaction. Most of the residents of her sister's keep stared, though not openly. This was not so terrible, though it was very different from their lives before. The children had never been stared at; they had been ignored or coveted or reviled, but never objects of a curious crowd. Lanaya was slightly more used to it, but only just. She had, after all, made herself fairly infamous in Minrathous, but Geiger discouraged his whores from leaving or seeing the sun unless that was part of the appeal. Lanaya had been too dark when she'd first begun working at the Dragon; pale skin was a novelty in Tevinter and brought in more coin. So to keep the whores inside and out of the sun, the children of the brothel were paid a little money to run errands. At least until they left or began to turn tricks themselves. Geiger had his eye on Tamalin, so Lanaya made sure she went into the sun as often as possible. Unfortunately, the contrast of bronze skin, turquoise eyes, and silver hair had been attractive too. But Lanaya no longer had to worry about Geiger. She supposed she should be grateful to Hal'lasean for that. 

Those denizens of Skyhold who did not stare regarded her as...well, she wasn't entirely sure as what. Like a peasant might regard a Magister. With...respect. Or awe. Or reverence. It was uncomfortable at best and upsetting at worst. Cullen had explained that it was because many still believed the Inquisitor to be the Herald of Andraste, and that as her sister, there would probably be many within the Andrastian faith who extended their worship to any who shared Hal'lasean's blood.

"Still believe?" Lanaya had repeated, studying Cullen intently for signs of his true feelings on the subject. "So you don't."

"Ah," Cullen said, and gave a strained laugh. He rubbed the back of his neck with one hand before answering, his voice lowered and his gaze wary for eavesdroppers. "She's always maintained she was no such thing, but for a time it seemed..." He pinked slightly. "But, no, I no longer believe she's anything more than a particularly extraordinary person. She...she may have been sent to us by the Maker. Who am I to guess at His plans? Hal dislikes it; the 'Your Worship' and 'Your Grace'. It's...difficult for her, I think, being a holy figure for a religion that...well, that led an Exalted March to kill her-- your--" He cleared his throat. "Elves. But we never discouraged it as a rule because it's useful."

"She believes in the Dalish gods?" she'd asked next, delicate and subtle as folding rice paper. 

He had laughed again, another sound that meant she'd hit on something important. "It's...complicated. She used to say she didn't know what she believed. But that was before we really knew her. I think she just didn't want to admit to the people who'd kept her in a dungeon and held her at sword-point that she didn't believe in the Maker. She's...come to feel differently about the elven gods since becoming Inquisitor." His answer was delicate too. Lanaya couldn't help but approve, even as it irritated her.

Tully had piped up then, his eyes wide with his question. "How come Aunt Hal hasn't got any...what do you call 'ems. The tattoos?"

Cullen's cheeks had gone red then. "Ah, you'll...well, that's a question you'll have to ask her." 

But the thing that was most unsettling, most bizarre were the number of people who surely knew her sister well -- attendants, pages, runners with reports -- who called out to Lanaya as she and Cullen walked past.

"Inquisitor! Er-- apologies, my lady, Commander, I thought--"

"Your Grace! A moment, if you-- oh! ...Oh."

Even a young elven woman with scraggly blonde hair who Cullen explained had once been in Hal'lasean's inner circle, had shouted at her as though she were her sister. "Oi, Inquisitits! You got your sis--" Lanaya thought the girl's chin might have touched the ground, her mouth opened so wide. Her eyes had traveled Lanaya's body greedily and unabashedly. It was...refreshingly familiar. But Cullen had waved her away and hurried the tour to a different part of the courtyard.

And now it was happening again. The children had never seen snow before, so they'd played in it when it first started to fall while she and Cullen watched. Now the twins were settled in the suite with hot chocolate -- another luxury that seemed to cost this place nothing -- in their nightclothes, their faces pressed against the paned glass as the storm raged outside. She'd left Spurian in charge of getting them to bed and was now working her way through the residential areas and the Main Hall, to where she'd carefully memorized the door that led to the Inquisitor's quarters. By the time she opened it, she'd been mistaken for Hal'lasean three different times.

"Sorry, my lady!" a serving girl had squeaked. "You look just like her!"

"So they keep telling me."

But there was no one to make that mistake in the long flight of stairs that led to her sister's room. Rooms? Cullen had implicated she had the entire tower to herself. Of course, there'd been a big hole in one side of it. It was patched with magic so that though the moonlight might have shone through on a clear night, the snow and cold were kept out. Still, the stone was unforgiving without a fire to heat it and Lanaya hurried to the next door. The second door was where the Commander had told her to knock. And this was it. There was firelight flickering shadows on the door frame and no voices that she could hear. She wasn't sure if she actually wanted her sister to be present. 

But this was for her children. For a future in which they were always safe. In which they were happy. In which they had tea cakes and new clothes and their own rooms and feasts fit for Magisters every day of their lives. In which hot chocolate was as simple as a request sent to the kitchens. For her babies, she could do this. For her babies, she would do anything. She wouldn't have to feel, not really. She was just playing the part. Loving sister. Elder sister. Naya. She could pretend. For a little bit each day. It would hurt and she would hate it, but she could pretend. 

So Lanaya lifted her fist to the door, took a steadying breath to help distance herself from any true emotion, and knocked.

"A moment!" Her sister's voice. So this was it.

Quiet footsteps on the stairs, descending toward her, and then the door opened. Hal'lasean was in her nightclothes, warm stockings and a woolen shift, both plain and functional. Not at all appropriate for a woman of her position. She had a housecoat tied around her waist and her dark silverite hair was wind-whipped and unbound, a tangled mess that fell over her shoulders and down her back. Lanaya's heart clenched. How many times had she combed her sister's hair as a child? Her little hallabell, always unravelling her braids, always messy and running and tumbling, always a nest of knots by the end of the day. 

Her sister's face went slack with surprise. "Naya," she said like a breath drawn unwillingly from her lungs. Her violet-touched-turquoise eyes were round with sudden feeling. Shame, Lanaya recognized, and hurt. But also hope. That was good. She could use that. Hal'lasean's cheeks went pink and it spread to the pregnant-red points of her ears. "I was about to come see how you were settling in. Did you need-- are you...?"

"I..." For her children. Lanaya let her expression show her uncertainty. Her hesitancy. "I wanted to apologize. For earlier. ...May I come in?"

Hal'lasean's transformation was immediate. Light bloomed across her visage, starting with her smile and moving to the miraculous return of that perpetual twinkle in her eyes that Lanaya had snuffed out only hours before. Part of Lanaya rejoiced at the resurrection of what she recognized so deeply as her little sister. Part of her was derisive, judgmental of this woman for being such a trusting fool. For living a life that allowed her to be one. 

"You are always welcome here," the Inquisitor vowed like sacred ceremony. Like the Chant. 

This was going to be much harder than Lanaya had anticipated.

Chapter Text

It was such a sudden change in mood, from the surprise and dread of finding her sister at her door before she had emotionally prepared for the encounter to asking her up the stairs to her quarters with the hope of reconciliation. They could start over and try again, remind themselves what it was to be family and sisters. And this time Hal wouldn't screw it up. This time, Hal would let Lanaya make all her own decisions.

For Lanaya, Hal wouldn't be Inquisitor or Herald. They would be only equal, nevermind her sister's troubled past. She would make no assumptions where Lanaya was concerned.

And no Elvish. No mention of their shared Dalish history. She would tread so carefully and show her sister she was not a savage. 

Hal silently thanked Dorian for healing the cuts on her face before he left.

When they reached her room, Hal stepped off to one side to present it to her sister, chewing on her bottom lip as she watched Lanaya take it in. The older elf was guarded, so guarded, but Hal had plenty of experience with secretive people. And so many of Lanaya's expressions seemed to be matches for her own. So she found envy in her sister's reaction to her impressive tower as well as wonder. And uncertainty. Hesitation. Hal gestured to the armchairs by the fire with a smile. 

"You can sit, if you'd like. Or we can take the bed or the floor or...whatever is most comfortable for you. And I can send for tea or...or whatever you'd like. Have you ever had hot chocolate?"

Lanaya gave her a leveled look as though the question was an absurd one. Hal felt her cheeks heat. 

"Oh, of course you have." She felt completely foolish. "I...I hadn't. Until the Breach. Until Haven. But you have, of course you have."

Her sister bristled and Hal's cheeks turned a darker shade of pink. She'd already said something wrong. But what?

"Not 'of course'," corrected Lanaya, her voice like a sharp edge hidden in something soft. "Such things are luxuries. Rewards for good--"

Now they both looked miserable and awkward. Hal'lasean's instinct was to explain that chocolate was an expense her clan couldn't afford. That they got little chunks of it from the elders at the new year. Other children, children with parents, might have gotten pieces for their namedays. There was no one to do such sweetnesses for Hal. But she couldn't discuss being Dalish. So she floundered for a moment and then tried something less specific, "Chocolate was a luxury for me too." It was gentle. An attempt to bridge the gaping chasm of experience between them. "But the Antivan merchants send us bricks of it. They're wooing the Inquisition for trade opportunities. It's...well, it isn't a luxury here. Not anymore. If...if you wanted some."

For a moment Lanaya wavered between irritation and something quieter. The latter won out. "Cullen sent for some after the children played in the snow."

That was something. An offering. And Hal embraced it with a sweet blooming smile. She saw the effort, it said, and she appreciated it. "He's a thoughtful man, our Commander." 

They were still standing, facing each other stiffly a good five feet apart. So Hal moved to her favorite armchair at her hearth and lifted her brows hopefully. Lanaya hesitated only briefly before taking the one across from her.

But now what? This was so much easier with the children around to fill the silence. There was so much Hal was desperate to say. So much she wasn't sure she could or should. Not yet. So instead...

"I'm sorry about--"

"I should not have--"

The sisters stared at each other in shock for a moment following their simultaneous attempts to reach out. And then something shifted. Something eased. Hal laughed. Lanaya smiled. The air was not quite so charged.

"You're so beautiful," Hal said like a breath she'd been holding all day. And then her pale skin flared scarlet. "So much more beautiful than I imagined."

Lanaya's smile grew slightly. Just slightly. But it was all the difference. "I thought you'd have blood writing."

Normally such blunt reminders of the Dalish markings she'd removed would have made her reticent and defensive. Embarrassed. But her sister said it with a touch of mirth, an admission, and Hal found herself grinning. "I did. Purple branches," she demonstrated the sweep of them up her forehead and around her eyes, along the bones of her cheeks, and then over her lips and down her chin. "But the father of my child is a Fadewalker." No, what's the Tevene word? "Somniari?" Lanaya nodded her understanding. "He's learned things from the Fade few living people have ever seen. The vallaslin -- the blood writing--"

"I remember." Lanaya's voice was almost inaudible with the confession. For a few seconds, her older sister seemed truly vulnerable, a scared young girl peeking out tentatively through a woman's hard eyes.

The bunny hiding from the storm.

Hal stayed so still, left her body language open and unthreatening. Let her stillness be easy, not waiting. Not hunting. Just there. "It didn't mean what we thought -- what the Dalish think." But probably best not to mention that it meant slavery. "He said he knew a spell to remove them. I let him." As though the story were so simple. As though that night hadn't been one of the worst in her short life.

The vulnerable thing inside Lanaya slipped away, leaving her studying Hal'lasean with what should have been casual thoughtfulness but that masked something else entirely. It wasn't dangerous, whatever it was. But it was...focused. Intent. Maybe Lanaya thought Hal was dangerous. But then, could she blame her? She was. She was dangerous. She had put Lanaya and Lanaya's family in danger just by existing.

"So he's a mage. Human? Or elf." It was clear which one Lanaya preferred by the way she said each word.

"Elf," said Hal, and was disgusted by the part of her that felt shame for her answer, for not giving Lanaya a reason to approve of her. Of her choices. "But he's not Dalish." Why did that matter? Was she so easily swayed by the racist opinion of a woman who was practically a stranger? "He's not a city elf either. He's...something else." Elvhen. Let Lanaya try to shame her for that. But no, no, there was not enough trust yet for those revelations. Not yet. Maybe never, though Hal had hope.

Or was it hope at all? Maybe it was just longing.

"He's called Solas."

That carefully casual thoughtfulness again. Lanaya was looking for information. Trying to seem like she wasn't. Smart. "Will I meet him?"

Hal's smile was weary then. "Eventually, if you decide to stay. He's in the field until the summer." Or until the child came. But that was another secret for another time. 

This time Lanaya actually did seem concerned. Actively so. Her brow knit and she leaned forward to study her younger sister openly. "What about the baby?"

Hal's smile faltered. Barely. But Lanaya had seen it. "What he's doing is more important than being here with me. And I have...healers and friends..."

"And your sister," Lanaya added firmly, as if she'd made some kind of significant decision. 

Part of Hal was immediately on alert. Something wasn't quite right. Something. But if she had imagined how this conversation would go -- and she had, so many times -- she had to admit that this was exactly how she wanted it. A sister. Her sister.

Hal was helpless to hide the childishly touched and desperate need in her expression.

Lanaya smiled. Something was off. But Hal didn't care.

Chapter Text

These were tricky and trecherous waters Lanaya navigated, more fraught with buried and forgotten reefs of feeling that could easily sink her, drown her, than she had feared. Her sister had already nearly run her aground more than once and the conversation had only just begun. And this would be the first of many such moments between them. For years, if things went well. It was all she could do to keep her breathing even, her jaw from clenching with fury and terror.

But so far, she had navigated this well, if Hal'lasean's expression was a reliable indicator. Nevermind that Lanaya's own heart contracted painfully at the joy and hope in her sister's eyes, nevermind the unsettling warmth in her veins when she called herself a sister. Nevermind the sudden surge of protective feeling at the thought of Hal'lasean experiencing her first pregnancy on her own. Lanaya had done so herself. It was a lonely, difficult road. One full of pain and panic.

It was not one she would have wished on her hallabell.

"Naya?"

She refocused on Hal'lasean and found her expression had shifted, filling with shame and contrition, turning pink with uncertainty. Lanaya said nothing, but her attention was her response.

"I...I think I...wronged you."

The pink darkened. Her sister's face was crinkled with the depth of her sincerity. None in Tevinter but children were ever so earnest. It was a sign of foolishness or idiocy in someone Hal'lasean's age. Weakness. How could someone like this run the Inquisition? 

When again Lanaya said nothing, Hal'lasean gingerly continued. "I didn't...remember. You or...our parents."

Her sister's eyes moistened. Lanaya fought down a strong desire to flee.

"I suppose because I was so young and it was so..." She trailed off in discomfort and swallowed down whatever inadequate words she may have chosen. "Then Merrill came to stay with us and she and I were walking to the Eluvian one day and we found these two...two young children. Dalish." Her lips trembled and she dropped her gaze to her lap, where her hands worried together. 

Weak.

"Siblings, and one of them a mage. They'd left their clan because..." Now Hal'lasean looked up again, her brow knit with pain and the need for Lanaya to understand.

Outside, Lanaya wore a mask of stone. Inside, she floated above her body.

Her sister pressed her lips together. Her voice was tight with feeling. "That night, something shook loose. I remembered...everything. Who I was. Them. You." Hal'lasean's violet-touched-turquoise eyes found the ceiling and she drew fingers under her lashes to check for tears.

Fool.

"The halla. You...you leaving." Hal'lasean gasped softly with hurt as a few tears trickled free. Lanaya felt less than nothing. The memory of that night played in her mind like a vague impression of a story about someone else. Like watching someone else's forgotten dream. 

"You would have died," Lanaya heard herself saying, her voice devoid of feeling. Dead. She floated above it. Watched the two sisters with their silver hair and shared features sitting in the lush armchairs by the roaring fire, protected from the storm. She imagined the scene as one from Master Tethras' books and wondered at the muted frustration she felt that these two long-lost relatives were too stubborn or proud or scared to truly reunite.

Lanaya read the Tale of the Champion once. She remembered feeling irritated with Fenris' unwillingness to reach out to his sister, to forgive her for doing what she had to do to survive. Remembered thinking at the time that he was ungrateful for the opportunity life had provided him. That if Tamalin had appeared in the Dragon, Lanaya would not be so distant or callous.

"I know," murmured her sister with a tight smile and wet eyes.

This was not the Dragon, but here was Tamalin before her. Lanaya thought she understood Fenris a little better now. 

Hal'lasean reached out for Lanaya's hand. Lanaya was too numb, too far removed to flinch or pull away. Warm fingers, rough with wear, slipped into her palm and curled there.

"I didn't...have anyone," her sister persisted. Why wouldn't she just stop? Was she torturing Lanaya on purpose? "Lavellan raised me, but there was no..." Hal'lasean winced and shook her head. "It doesn't matter. Whatever I lacked is nothing in comparison to what you must have..."

Torture.

"My point is, I was so...elated. When we found you. I worried for your safety, for the safety of your children, but I also thought..." A self-disgusted press of her lips. "Part of me thought if I could just...get you here, it would all...we would be..."

Idiocy.

"A family." Hal'lasean gave a strained laugh at her own folly. So she knew, at least. "I should have written to you first. I should have...come to see you...but no, no, that's not even-- you were in danger there because...because of me. Because of who I am. But I took away your choice, and then you got here and I just...I just told you how it would be as though...as though I knew better than you but I don't, of course I don't. I don't know you or your children or what you want or..."

Her sister sighed, swallowed, glanced away. When she looked back, there was resolve in her teal eyes. Decision. 

"Lanaya," she began again, and for a moment she hesitated. "I offer you everything I have. My family here, my friends, my people. The resources at my disposal. This place, my home. Myself. You and your children are welcome to all of it. Anything I can provide. And you...you can choose to do or not do whatever you want with that." She flushed yet again and Lanaya wondered when she'd begun to do that, to turn a pretty pink to show bashfulness or embarrassment. It was not something little Tamalin Alerion had ever done; her sister had once been entirely unapologetic, unabashed. "You can stay here or leave as you see fit. You can have your children educated -- or not -- however you wish. I receive a personal allowance from the Inquisition and it is...exorbitant. I'll pass a percentage onto you if you want it. But if you don't, if there's anything you don't want...even..." The pink went a dusty rose. "Even if you want to take the things I can give but want nothing to do with me. That's okay. I just...I want you to be safe. And I want you to have...choice. As much...as much of one as you can, sharing the Inquisitor's blood."

Hal'lasean kept saying words and they were good words. They were useful words. They were impossible to believe words. Too good to be true words. But Lanaya's body seemed to have simply shut down. She couldn't register what was being said, couldn't quite manage to listen even though it was important, even though it might one day mean her survival. Lanaya was full up with her sister's words. With her sister's face. With her sister's open, flaunted feelings. She was full of all those things and she could take in no more.

When Hal'lasean no longer spoke, when they sat silent and watching each other, Lanaya felt her lips form words in return. But she didn't know yet what kind of words they were.

"Why are you doing this."

Something like pity crossed her sister's expression. Something like it, but not. Something...softer. Something...mournful. She had seen Cullen wear a version of this face, but his hadn't been so...wasn't so...didn't feel so...

Feel? Lanaya didn't feel. And yet...

And yet.

"Because you're my sister. And that's...that means something." When Lanaya's face remained blank, Hal'lasean gave a smile that pressed her lips together. Her fingers tightened on Lanaya's hand. "But if you don't want to accept that as my reason...consider this repayment for saving my life."

Chapter Text

"What's expected of us in return?"

It was blunt, at least, which was how Hal'lasean preferred her negotiations. Even if she wished this weren't a negotiation at all. Still, she had to bite back the incredulous, frustrated laugh at the question.

It was so difficult to separate her own selfish desires to finally have a true -- or at least blood-related -- family from the complex realities of this situation. Maybe if she didn't think of Lanaya as her sister at all, she wouldn't be so easily flustered. Maybe she could keep her head. Maybe Lanaya would be more willing to trust her if she wasn't struggling so openly with her feelings.

And maybe if Hal wasn't so enamored of the idea of a sister, of her sister, she could be more patient, more understanding. Because she did know, intuitively, why it was a person with Lanaya's history would act as she did. If Hal'lasean wanted nothing from her sister, if Lanaya and her children were just important or useful refugees, then perhaps she could do this more skillfully. Perhaps she could do this with more compassion and kindness. How was it she had become someone who found it easier to care for strangers than for her own flesh and blood?

"Nothing," she answered eventually, her forehead creasing with the effort of being only empathetic. "Your lives and your choices are yours. Your children are yours." She hesitated, frowning deeply down at the place where their hands still touched. Because, yes, they were free, but...

Hal looked up with a grim expression to meet Lanaya's distant gaze. "I'll be completely honest. There are...things you could avoid that would make my life...make things run more smoothly for the Inquisition. I'm not the Herald of Andraste. I serve no god. But it's a useful fiction. One that's too dear now to too many people to undo. And as distasteful and false as it may be to...to admit..." Her chest was tight and her stomach twisted unpleasantly. Lanaya's face was blank. 

And then Hal couldn't do it. She couldn't bring herself to so much as hint to Lanaya something like this, anything that might manipulate her from her free will. So she took away her hand and sat back, scrubbing at the sudden heat in her cheeks. 

"I can't. I can't. I'm sorry I even tried," she mumbled miserably. "That's not the kind of sister I want to be and it's not...it's not even the kind of leader I want to be. Please, forget I said anything. Your choices, your actions, they're yours. Do what you will with them."

They sat in silence for a while with just their discomfort and the fire and the wind outside. And then Lanaya ran her tongue over her lips like testing the air between them.

"I did what I had to do for my children." Her voice was cold and so removed. Cracked and dangerous like broken glass.

"I know," Hal whispered immediately, her throat tightening with guilt and pain. Not the time. Not the place. To cry now would be selfish. She would not be Dorian. "But even...if it was something you chose for yourself, I wouldn't..."

This wasn't coming out right. Nothing was coming out right today.

"Fene--" No. Not that word.

Patience, vhenan, she imagined Fen'Harel telling her. You need not fix everything tonight.

"What I'm trying to say is..." Hal cleared her throat. Just the right words. Find just the right words. She shouldn't sound like she's doing Lanaya a favor for not judging her. That was a judgment in itself. What would Josie say if Lanaya were a dignitary? How would she word it? But no. No. It wasn't about that. It was about feelings. And that was what Hal'lasean knew best. "I'm proud. Of you. Of what you've survived and what you've built. You are...so strong. So resilient. You always were. From...from what I've seen, you're a wonderful mother. Your children are extraordinary, and that is to your credit."

Part of her disconnected. She wasn't sure if that was because that piece felt she wasn't being completely truthful or because it was so much emotion to channel. Like using the magic of the Mark, but harder and more exhausting. More dangerous.

"I'm proud to be your sister," Hal concluded quietly. Her cheeks went pink once more. "So the only thing you need to do for me, for what I'm offering, is to just...just be yourself. Whatever that means. Okay?"

She watched with wonder as the life and presence faded from her sister's eyes even more, as Lanaya withdrew further from her body each time it seemed her mask might fall.

Hal'lasean felt sick with vulnerability, whiplashed with it, as she waited for some sign she'd been heard.

It was a long, long silence. A taut, uncertain one. And then Lanaya let out an exasperated sigh.

"I can't spend another minute staring at that tangled nest you call hair." She held out a hand as though demanding a stolen sweet be returned from a naughty child. "Give me your brush."

Hal stared, blinking and uncomprehending. "What?"

"Your brush, Tama." 

The air sang with the intimacy and pain of that one word. That name that was no longer Hal'lasean's. Both women watched each other in shock as they held their breath, waiting for one of them to make the first move.

Hal turned scarlet from neckline to hairline to the very points of her ears. Despite her best efforts to not do to Lanaya what Dorian did to her...

She started to cry.

But Lanaya's frustration didn't turn against her. Instead, her sister walked the room until she found the little vanity, the wash basin, the silver-backed mirror and comb and brush. She returned to the hearth with the instruments in hand and spared no time pushing gently at Hal'lasean's shoulder.

"Sit on the floor."

Hal was in no state to argue, a vortex now of self-loathing for her selfishness that only made it more difficult to stop being selfish. The same vortex that had held Dorian trapped for a week and a half.

She slid unceremoniously onto the floor and wiped at her cheeks while Lanaya settled into the armchair behind her. Her sister put a leg on either side of Hal's narrow shoulders to pin her in place and began the expert handling of her elven hair, the same silver as Lanaya's. The same silver as their mother's. The same silver as her sister's beautiful children.

Would her child have it too?

"I'm sorry," she whimpered pathetically. "I'm so sorry. This isn't...this isn't how I wanted this to go!"

"Shush," Lanaya replied, soft but stern. Her fingers unknotted long strands of wind-blown hair and then she followed up with slow, luxurious brush strokes. "You always did manage to make a mess of your hair."

"I did?" she asked hopefully, childishly, and that helped the tears to ebb.

"Mhm."

"Will you...tell me? I don't...remember much."

Lanaya's hands stilled in her hair. Froze. Trembled. Hal had once again said the wrong thing.

"Naya?" she twisted around to look up at the woman behind her. "I'm sorry. You don't have to-- if it's too--"

The door downstairs opened. Lanaya went tense and still. A bunny who hears the storm approaching.

No, Hal thought desperately. Not now!

"I've returned, my Dalish rose! And I've brought the biggest spoon!"

"I only agreed if I could be called 'the ladle'!" corrected Bull. Their heavy steps came up the stairs. "Hey, Boss...am I gonna have to wear pants?"

"I have to check on my children," Lanaya blurted as horns crested into view. "Good night!"

"Naya!" 

But the other woman was already hurrying down the stairs, past her companions, and out the door. Fleeing. Racing away like the scared creature Cole had named her.

"Aw, shit, Boss," Bull rumbled guiltily when he reached the top of the stairs. "Sorry."

Hal shook her head and moved numbly to the bed, flopping down in her housecoat and staring at the wall. Moments later there was Dorian behind her, sliding his hands across her stomach and pulling their bodies close together. She relaxed against him and felt her tears drip onto her pillow.

"So...is that a yes or no on the pants?"

Chapter Text

It was little enough time by Elvhen standards since Fen'Harel was last in this, the grandest of Dirthamen's temples. He'd left it at a sprint when he'd read Varric's messages those few months ago, transformed into the White Wolf and run break-neck across Thedas to reach the nearest Eluvian. It was a heartbeat in the life of an immortal. And yet with Hal'lasean reigning at Skyhold and he unable to have her but in the Fade, the weeks apart from her stretched on without end.

Perhaps this was how the elves had quickened. The immediacy of mortality was insidious in its many lures. Each moment of their lives was filled with feeling and activity, urgency and need. Even the Dread Wolf, it seemed, was not immune to the effects of a few meager years among them. He had, after all, given his heart to one of them.

In his most private, desperate moments, he even hoped to catch old age from her, if only because the thought they might grow so together was intoxicating.

If not for his duty. His undying duty to a People he had killed with his arrogance and negligence.

His noble struggle. It was the only reason Fen'Harel was so far from the woman he loved, the only reason he had returned finally to seek secrets from the one who kept them. Falon'Din's master of spies. Leliana was a keen mind, adept at the position she had once held within the Inquisition, but even she could not hope to gather intelligence as artfully as Dirthamen had done.

So Fen'Harel, after carefully collecting and destroying the messages that remained for him with Varric's needful words -- "Chuckles -- Halla wounded. She needs you. Come quickly." -- had raised the very stones beneath his feet until they were above the murky floodwaters that now helped Dirthamen keep his secrets. He had dried them and warmed them, painting runes on them with his magic so they remained that way, and laid out his things in the structured routines of hermitage.

And now he slept.

He was on the hunt. In his elven form, eyes sharp with focus, he crouched in the shadows of memories long past, willed the shifting Fade to take him ever backwards. Fen'Harel was searching for impressions left by sentinels and self-proclaimed gods, though he did spare some time as the comet's tail images of Hal'lasean and her companions echoed against the ancient temple walls. The apostate Solas was among them, but hidden, guarded well against other Dreamers who might one day see him there.

It was the violence this place remembered of that time, the battle against spiders and demons and the undead. And then, of course, Hal'lasean's fearful wonder, her growing disgust, her soul-deep yearning as she studied the things left behind by the ruined empire of a people she claimed. A people only she among all the mortal elves had yet proved herself worthy to claim.

Dread Wolf, he could almost hear his vhenan teasing, indignant but playful, have you always been such a snob?

Worse, brightest one, he thought to himself. I was once much, much worse.

With a self-effacing sigh, he waved a hand, a lazy, indolent motion that sent memories spinning away, that drew him through time at a speed no Dreamer today could navigate. It was the bored gesture of a man who was accustomed to having power beyond his use for it. As though he had already forgotten what it was like to live without it.

His Hal'lasean would have teased him for that too.

Fenedhis, how he missed her presence at his side. To share the Fade with her once a week for a few precious hours at a time was simply not enough. It would never be enough. At times he thought, hoped rather foolishly, that he might finish his work more quickly, that he might find some hidden power tucked away by his kin long ago and no longer require to be without her.

He imagined himself standing just behind her as she ruled, as she cast judgments and made pronouncements. As she wove the fates of the races of Thedas without their ever noticing, remade nations and cultures with delicate, nuanced sweeps of her hands. For she would never be lazy or indolent with her power. He saw her at the head of an army that stretched beyond reckoning, brilliant and blazing in armor wrought from memories of her own victories, a Dread Wolf as her mount. He dreamed her on an Elvhen throne before a chamber of politicians and monarchs, holding court with the same grace that guided her blades in combat. And he beside her, a plainer throne, their hands joined as he watched her -- reluctant but masterful -- command the Game of a continent. And then again, in peace, the silver in her hair from age now rather than Dalish bloodlines, relaxed against him in a floating crystal garden that dripped fragrant flowers of their own design, watching their children's children -- and there would be many, for Fen'Harel never could dream small -- giggling and playing, their magic as easy for them as breathing.

Dirthamen laughed in his ear. The Dread Wolf was pulled from his reverie with a jolt.

He had no need of staff now, but habit had it in his hand anyway, and Fen'Harel was on his feet in an instant, lips twisted, eyes narrowed, heart pounding roughshod in his chest.

How? How could he not have felt--

Ah. A memory. The Fade.

And Dirthamen, standing nude before a lounging and equally exposed Falon'Din in a lavish bedsuite Fen'Harel had seen for himself many times. Though not quite in this way. He had enjoyed Dirthamen, had found him a worthy peer in most aspects, but he had never enjoyed Dirthamen.

It was not that the Dread Wolf had never had men. Though his preference had always been for women, certain pleasant sacrifices had to be made for the sake of the Game. But Dirthamen had Ascended before him, and it would have been taboo -- indecent even -- to make overtures for a member of the Pantheon from beneath them. The Pantheon took what they liked. Dirthamen would have needed to reach for him first. And Fen'Harel had never been a man to tolerate anything less than complete dominance. Not, at least, before Hal'la.

Falon'Din had sent for him once. Falon'Din, who was so beautiful, so exquisitely made that it was said Elgar'nan had tried to drown him in his childhood for envy. A story that was not wholly untrue. But Falon'Din would not submit anymore than Fen'Harel. And Falon'Din was a creature of shocking cruelty.

It had given Fen'Harel great pleasure to ignore the invitation.

Fen'Harel set his stave aside and relaxed against the nearest wall, his lips pursed and one brow raised as he intruded on a scene of startling intimacy. He had not expected to find it here. Falon'Din was a jealous man and loathe to enter the temple of another, even -- or perhaps especially -- his mate's.

It was only with that thought Fen'Harel noticed the twisted bonds of magic that secured Falon'Din to Dirthamen's temple bed. It was a bed meant for a god to enjoy the spoils of his office, though that had never been Dirthamen's style. For all his faults, the Keeper of Secrets was a loyal lover. Falon'Din, on the other hand...

"Does this sate you, my jealous heart?" Falon'Din made his disdain for his situation evident in each distasteful syllable he spoke. "Does it please you to see your Ascended husband brought so low?"

Dirthamen spoke not a word in return. He laughed again, something between triumph and cruelty, and walked away without hurry to pour himself a drink of an ambrosial liquid whose scent sweetened the air like sex and high summer.

"You turn your back to me!" cried Falon'Din, incredulous. And then something shifted. Something softened in the God of Death. It was startling. It was improbable. For Falon'Din had never been known to feel what he revealed now: remorse. Vulnerability. Love. "Soul I love above even mine own, look at me."

Dirthamen's face was dark and unreadable, turbulent with feeling as he acquiesced. His struggle only intensified when his eyes met his lover's. Like all of his family, Falon'Din had a certain magnificence to his brutality, to his cold superiority. But with love in his gaze, with his face soft and earnest, with his whole self laid bare for Dirthamen, his mate, he was breathtaking beyond reason.

"I would not have taken the Beast Girl had I known it would upset you so. How can I make amends, my one love? Shall we share her? Shall I kill her for you? What would you have me do?"

There was something rugged, handsome, grizzled even about Dirthamen. He was plain for Elvhenan, unremarkable of face, though impressive of build. It was his presence that drew the lingering, longing eye. It was his manner that rendered his scarred features attractive. But now those features twisted, contorted, shattered themselves free of all accidental loveliness. The Keeper of Secrets was Fury made flesh. Falon'Din blanched.

"I would have you suffer," snarled Dirthamen.

He snapped his fingers and vicious cold fire devoured the bed where Falon'Din lay chained. It would not mar or end the God of Death. But it would be pain past all endurance.

Dirthamen turned his back to Falon'Din again, squared his shoulders and set his face to an uncaring mask as his husband screamed raw agony. Dirthamen walked out.

Dirthamen left him there.

Fen'Harel gaped openly long after the Fade shifted, long after ghosts of sentinels past began their routine marches to and fro before him.

Beast Girl, Falon'Din had named his conquest.

His mocking moniker for his sister's childhood companion. For gentle Ghilan'nain.

Chapter Text

Fen'Harel paced, his thoughts brutal and scattered, turning aggressively, with military vigor each time he reached the confines of the Fade temple. Dirthamen's Fade temple.

What spirits remained with him in his turmoil were ancient creatures, loyal to those who kept the temple once, loyal to Dirthamen. They were harmless except as eyes and ears, gatherers of information. There were six in total, and they took animal forms favored by Dirthamen: a milky-eyed conspiracy of ravens, seated in one judgmental row, and, further off, lurking in shadow, a shaggy Great Bear. 

Darker spirits -- demons and shades -- gathered watchfully at the edge of his consciousness, but he would not let them in. Fen'Harel was agitated, horrified, sick to his very soul, but too skilled a Dreamer for those poor, twisted creatures of this world's Fade to come near.

Not over so superficial a terror, at least. Fen'Harel's vulnerabilities had always been in matters of the heart and conscience. This was...

Whatever else this was, it was not that.

But what was it? What did it mean? This would have been before Ghilan'nain's ill-fated Ascension or even Falon'Din could not have dared speak of her so dismissively.

How had he not known? This was not an easy secret to keep, even for Dirthamen. There were too many players: Falon'Din who took her, sweet Ghilan'nain, Dirthamen, Andruil, and a temple full of priests and sentinels...who could not speak.

Which was of course why Dirthamen convinced Falon'Din to play their game of pleasure here of all places, this place Falon'Din would never have gone without good reason. Dirthamen tortured his husband here, in a temple Falon'Din considered lesser than his own, surrounded by inferior Elvhen sworn to an inferior member of the Pantheon to hear him scream. A scream that must have echoed sharply in these silent halls. Humiliation and pain without anyone able to speak of it.

Fen'Harel felt sick again.

And where was he during all this? Rutting with Andruil like some mindless beast? Wallowing in self-pity as he began to realize the unforgivable wrongs of Elvhenan and those who ruled it? Could he have been too focused on designing the Veil with June that he missed something so significant?

Fen'Harel glanced suspiciously at the ravens, at the soundless bear.

"Is this your doing, silent spirits? Was I meant to see this?"

In answer, the ravens took flight, the bear turned his lumbering back and disappeared into the darkness.

Fen'Harel was alone with his thoughts.

There was nothing in the courts of Arlathan that was without meaning and consequence. The ripples of this memory must have spread beyond this place and that moment. 

Could Dirthamen have played him? Was this his way of gloating? Or was Dirthamen trying to warn him? Threaten him?

The Fade pulsed around him, shifting, and Fen'Harel was on alert, stave in fist again...but the Fade softened, curled invitingly around him, a familiar, most wanted scent on dreaming breeze.

Like a moth to the flame of his suffering, so came his own magic across the Fade, a net of Anchored energy cast from Skyhold's highest tower, a lariat that fell just short of his Fade form.

Hal'lasean. He'd taught her in the blissful month at her side to seek him should she need him.

Her sister must have come.

Fen'Harel stood staring at the lifeline of his heart's own magic, his energy yearning for the green-glowing vine she'd thrown in search of him. When they were bound, such efforts would no longer be necessary.

He longed for it. For that sweetest of intimacies. To have his mark upon her and hers upon him long after she had moved into the Beyond. He could find her there if they were bound. Search her soul out while he lay in uthenera.

He could better ward her then too, better protect his beating mortal heart outside his body. 

But his mark upon her, the mark of the Dread Wolf...

His enemies would hurt her to get to him.

They'll try to hurt me anyway, ma Fen, he could hear her reasoning with him. Stubborn and courageous beyond her ability as always. I'm the key to the prison where sleep the Pantheon.

That was no longer true. This memory, those spirits...

His kin no longer rested in uthenera.

The Pantheon had awakened. How long ago had they opened their eyes? How close were they to freedom?

They were running out of time.

The emerald vine of Hal'lasean's reach shimmered invitingly. Fen'Harel stooped to touch it, shivered when it sent warm tingles over his skin. He wrapped it about his forearm like collecting a rope, put down roots of magic to hold himself still...and pulled.

She would need him to be strong. She would need him to comfort her.

He could tell her his fears another time.

If there was time.

Fen'Harel, God of Fools.

Chapter Text

Fen'Harel summoned his heart to him from a continent away, calling her spirit to his across the fathomless Fade, through thousands of mortal dreams, past wisps and demons and memories ancient and forgotten.

He sent for her and she was there before him, laughing with exhilaration and gripping his forearms to steady herself when her spirit’s travel was over and she could put her bare feet on the changeable floor of the Fade.

"I am glad you still enjoy it," he told her with a smile that he hoped expressed some little portion of how truly pleased he was to see her. To touch her.

"It's like..." Hal'lasean began, then searched his face for the right words to describe it. "It's like flying! It's like jumping from the highest battlements of Skyhold only instead of going down, it's forward and there's no need to worry about hurting myself when I stop because it's not the bottom, it's you. You're the best way to end a journey."

Her gaze was loving beyond adoration, her relief obvious in the softness of her bright smile. Hal'lasean never did have trouble showing precisely what and how much she felt. He loved her for it. He sought always to emulate her in that. His mask was for the rest of the world; for her he would bear his whole self.

Fen'Harel cupped her cheeks with both hands, traced his fingers over the treasured features of her sweet, earnest visage, studied each freckle, the amused arch of her dark brows, the inviting shape of her full lips. Andruil’s bow, they would have been called in Elvhenan. Perhaps the Dalish still used it. He thought to ask, but…

He wanted nothing of Andruil to touch Hal’lasean. Especially not now.

“You’re worried, ma Fen,” she murmured, and her own expression furrowed in empathy.

She placed her palms over the backs of his hands where they rested on her face and stroked her thumbs lightly over his skin. Just that touch soothed his anxiety. At least here. At least now, with his vhenan in his arms. Hadn’t he sworn he would be strong for her?

She smiled knowingly. “I take it your day was even worse than mine.”

Old fool, he thought. How easily she sees through you.

Hal’lasean pulled his hands from her cheeks, let them rest instead on her collarbone, at her upper chest, so she could take in their surroundings. The half-present flood waters of the edifice in the Fade, caught between past and present. Glimpses of the glory the Silent Temple once knew.

“Dirthamen?” she asked, watching his face for signs of what was wrong.

He schooled both it and his magic into calm, sank the turbulence in the deep pool of his immortal spirit. She would know what he had done, would feel the absence of what plagued him...and there it was, the recognition, the coy tilt to her lips.

“Fine then. Don’t tell me.”

He kissed her instead. An apology. A balm. A kiss he meant to be full of relief and ardor but that heated suddenly when their tongues clashed together. It was like coming home. The feel of their magics meeting, sparking, electrified their lips. The kiss became ravenous, quickly turned half-savage, drenched in animal lust. They were wounded, they were both so wounded, and in each other they desperately sought their salvation.

The Wolf in him stirred, eager and alert, its focus entirely on the heady scent that bloomed succulent and fragrant from the heat between Hal’lasean’s legs. Already ripe for the taking. His face flushed as he sent scouting fingers between her warm stomach and her breeches, the muscles of her abdomen contracting in anticipation. He slipped a finger experimentally into the hot, wet valley of those sensitive lips, was rewarded when she whimpered into the kiss, when she dove harder against his mouth, pushed her pelvis into his hand.

Fen’Harel and the Wolf became one in their purpose, seeking somewhere to set their mate, their heart, their seering, drowning desire for her, for having her. He drove her backwards, scraping her against walls, bumping her back into statues of the Pantheon. She gripped Dirthamen's outstretched hand, anchoring herself, becoming another of his secrets in this silent place. This place they were about to fill with unabashed sound.

A flutter of wings behind them.

His every muscle froze until the only thing moving within him was his racing pulse, pounding between his heart and his throbbing erection.

They should never have begun this here. Here, of all places. Not with Dirthamen’s servants awake and seeing.

“Ma Fen,” Hal’lasean panted in encouragement, breaking the kiss only to search his face. His terror. She looked past him, turquoise eyes scanning the shadows before locking on what he knew must be a raven. Or five. When her gaze returned to his, they were overbright. Her smile was covetous and wicked. “So? Let them watch.”

“Hal’la,” he rasped, his voice rough with interrupted desire. “They are not ordinary spirits.”

Her brows lifted in challenge, her chin tipped up. “Have you decided not to bind with me, Dread Wolf?”

“It will mark you as mine,” he admitted, and his words shook with all the emotions he had tried to drown from her sight. “They will hurt you to get to me.”

Hal’lasean’s eyes flashed dangerously. “They will try.”

His brave halla. His heart nearly burst with warmth for her courage, for her endless bravado.

As if in answer to his thoughts, she clasped his wrist and drove it downward, his wet fingers sliding toward the very core of her. Still pulsing. Still radiating heat and maddening scent. With her gaze -- her gaze like the birds of the Arbor Wilds, flashy and free, violet and teal -- bound firmly to his, she dragged his hand from her arousal, lifted his fingers to her lips...and took them into her mouth, tasted herself on his touch, the whole length of each long digit. His cock trembled with want.

“Let them know whose I am. Whose you are. They’ll find out anyway. Let the choice be ours.”

“Hal’la…” he breathed, impressed, loving, aching.

Her grin was wolfish. Which was only right. As she was the Wolf’s mate. “Tell me, Fen’Harel. Where in Dirthamen’s inner sanctum is the most sacrilegious place to fuck me.”

His mind reeled. The altars? Yes, but too macabre. And then the memory. Falon’Din tied to Dirthamen’s bed. The bed of his Ascension. The bed where he and he alone was to enjoy the spoils of his place in the Pantheon.

The Wolf howled.

Fen’Harel changed the Fade with burning intent, sent the outer chambers reeling until there was only that luxurious bed, that lavish suite. He lifted Hal’lasean into his arms as he might have done in Elvhenan when taking his own spoils to bed in his temples. As he might have done in the house of his forebears with the woman to whom he bound his spirit.

He threw her to the bed and stood over her, remembering so many other times with so many other women, remembering his own bedsuites, his own temples. His spoils of Ascension. But she was more than all of them, she, bright and beautiful, Hal'lasean, Tamer of Wolves.

She blew a kiss over his shoulder to the unkindness of ravens and then turned her eyes like stormy tropical seas to meet his lust-drunk grey-blue.

“Come on then,” she taunted him. “Unless you’ve lost your taste for it.”

Chapter Text

"Never," Fen'Harel swore, as fervently as he ever cursed his enemies. "Never, ma vhenan, my wild Dalish spirit. Your taste is my tongue's only craving. And I am ravenous."

He expected her to flush, to grin or wriggle to tempt him to come to her, to take her. But he had said something wrong. The fight and desire left Hal'lasean's teal eyes; only raw hurt remained.

"Hal'la..." He put one knee on the bed to reach her, his palm on her warm cheek. "What have I said, ma lath? Whatever it is, I am sorry for it."

"Is that what you think of me?" Her voice was a taut whisper. "You think me wild? Uncivilized? Savage?"

His mood turned immediately sour. 

"Has someone called you those things?" he demanded. Whoever it was would find a reckoning in their dreams.

She laughed instead of crying, harsh and disbelieving. "My sister."

All his ire left him. He had only pity now. Pity for Lanaya Alerion. Compassion for Hal'lasean.

He kissed her, all lips and feeling, pressed his forehead to hers so the tips of their noses touched. Fen'Harel traced the shape of her pointed ear with paper-light touches.

She hurt. Oh, how she hurt. He could feel it in the throb of her magic, thick as scar tissue. 

"Tevinter," he sighed, and she nodded. "You are the most innately civilized spirit I have ever known, my sweet halla. And if your people could make someone so extraordinary in every way..."

She dropped her gaze from his, her brow knit with shadowy insecurities. Fen'Harel hooked the side of his finger beneath her chin to draw her back to him.

"She does not know you. You are more than her love or approval. You are more than any person's love or approval. Herald, Inquisitor, vhenan. She is a stranger who shares your blood, nothing more. Let her earn her place with you. May she learn. And I know you will help her." He kissed the tip of her nose, the place between her brows, her unmarked forehead.

It pleased him, calmed him to think that Dirthamen would never know she once belonged to Mythal, or at least that he would know her first as free and worthy of the Dread Wolf's love.

"What can I do to ease your hurt? Shall I distract you, ma uthlath? My gentle beauty? Something civlized beyond the ken of modern Thedas. Shall I take you to a ball so decadent the Orlesians would blush?"

Hal'la smiled then, amused at the image and pleased at the idea. "What of our defiling of Dirthamen's temple?"

He grinned. "Another night."

His heart frowned thoughtfully at the bedding beneath her, rough as sharkskin and soft as spring rain. She took in the room, the mosaics depicting Dirthamen in his many forms, the enchanted ceiling of shifting shadow. The ravens. Standing in a patient line to watch the exhibition. Finally her vibrant eyes found his once more.

"You don't think me savage?"

His lips quirked. "Only when you wish to be. I think you untamable. Indomitable."

She laughed, bashful and throaty. "Liar. How many times have you tamed me? How many times have I given my throat to the Wolf?"

His smile became lascivious. "When it suits you."

Her aura prickled like goose flesh, heated pleasantly, rubbed against his in invitation, solicitous as a she-wolf in heat. His flagging arousal tightened eagerly against the laces of his breeches.

"It suits me now, Dread Wolf," she cooed, looking at him through her lashes. Her teal eyes flashed with renewed mischief. "But not without a fight."

His lips twisted in a dangerous smirk as he pulled his tunic over his head and discarded it on the tiled floor. "No ball then?"

Hal'lasean made a show of considering. "I would not want to be thought wild by the nobles of Arlathan, even in memory. Best to get all my savagery out here, now. Besides, we promised the ravens a show."

Fen'Harel's posture became languid and predatory, the Wolf spilling through him, overflowing with desire for the hunt. With battlelust and bloodlust and craving for his prey's savory taste.

"Run, little halla," he told her, his voice low. "Run while you can."

She knelt on the bed, her chest forward, and moved her hands slowly along each lithe curve of her torso, then between her legs. Beneath her palms, her clothing vanished, leaving her in leather up to the tops of her thighs with her sex bare, her ass exposed. Her slim sides flashed pale skin but her breasts remained hidden from sight.

Fen'Harel nearly came then and there.

"You unholy creature," he breathed. 

She didn't smile. Instead, she rolled her shoulders back, tucked her toes beneath her feet to prepare for her flight. This was no frightened prey. If she was a halla, she was a hart of war. His heart of war.

He desired nothing more than to catch her, mount her, ride her to victory and completion.

With a thought, he turned her leather into golden paint, her soft, puckered nipples available to him now, but metallic, gilded. He gave her zagging stripes down her haunches, starting over the firm cheeks of her backside and curving around her thighs, violet as her vallaslin, violet as the embroidery of her teal eyes. Then again on her shoulders, over her breasts, pointing to her navel. To the prize between her legs.

She watched her transformation with laughter on her lips. "What, no horns?"

His lips twitched. Her hair braided itself, tiny plaits that joined to make one large rope in a loop that hung to her shoulders. And then, finally, an opal circlet that reached up and out at her forehead to give her the woven antlers of the halla.

"Planning to ride me?" she teased.

His thoughts were turbulent and dark in the most pleasurable of ways. "Planning to break you."

She stretched out her hands as though beckoning for him, but instead her fingers shaped the dream. He felt a wolf's pelt drape his shoulders, watched as his trousers bloomed black fur and lost the panel at his groin. His erection swung free, none too gently, and he grunted his discomfort.

"Cruel hart," he said. "Cruel vhenan."

The Fade moved across his face at her behest and over his scalp. His eyes widened in surprise, narrowed at her on suspicion, and then he was moving to the mirror that stretched along the wall beside the bed. His face was pitch black but for two additional red eyes on each cheek, a garish fanged snarl across his lips and beyond.

And his hair. His hair. Long dark braids, voluminous and intricate, that swept down his back to end at his hips.

"Is this how you think I looked?" He laughed and changed it for her, sweeping away the paint but for stripes of black and red, the suggestion of the Wolf. He took away the sides of his hair, and, at his forehead, like a crown, imagined into being the small wolf's skull that was once his trademark.

When he turned to face his prey again, it was with the Wolf looking through his eyes. The Wolf was restless, itching for the kill.

His halla's breath came shallow and fast now as she took him in, round eyes traveling every changed inch of him -- and the many inches she already knew. 

"Do I scare you, my hart of war?"

"You awe me, Dread Wolf." And she meant it.

He stalked the bed, his cock out like a tail, already dripping. She tracked his progress warily, shifting on her knees on the bed.

"I will do more than that, Hanal'ghilan."

He lunged.

Chapter Text

The Wolf lunged and the hart dove from the bed, fleet-footed and fine, her gold painted muscles flashing in the veilfire torches. The high, taut flesh of her ass was all Fen'Harel could see, skin pale and pure as moonlight. 

He felt feral, his every nerve aroused and tingling, and she his only care, his only desire, but a maddening one, one that made him rabid, that tickled at his control and begged him to let go, to release the Wolf. 

Soon, he thought hungrily, slate eyes narrowed on his quarry. Not yet. Soon.

If her glorious ass was the moon, her white-hot core was the polestar. His painfully rigid cock a compass, pointing to her True North.

The Fade tightened suddenly around his length, hot and unforgiving at the base.

"Fuck!" he snarled, and from across the room, his halla smiled viciously. Her hand was out before her, guiding the dream to hold him by his tiller, steering his course without touching him.

"That's what I'm trying to do, Slow Wolf!" she teased, prancing from foot to foot so her breasts bounced deliciously. "Stop being so civilized! Savages don't think, they hunt and eat and rut. Haven't you ever been savage, Wolf?"

He banished her power from his arousal with an agonized groan and drew his thumb over the tip, wetting it, shuddering with pleasure.

"You make me savage," he rasped.

That pleased her greatly. Hal'lasean pushed out her pregnancy-swelled bust and widened her stance, giving him tantalizing glimpses of the bottom curve of her buttocks.

The Wolf caught her strong, sweet scent and threw itself at his restraints.

Now! growled the Wolf. Take her now!

Fen'Harel feinted left and she moved to evade, the halla leaping in the other direction. He shifted his weight when the toes of her second foot left the ground and met her in mid-air.

They slammed together, chest to chest, clattered to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs. She scrambled up but his hands grasped her shin. The paint smeared beneath his palms. He wanted that. Wanted to ruin his own art, to leave impressions of his hands on her body.

Hal'lasean bucked in his grip, kicked violently to shake him, but he was stronger. He was Elvhen. He was the Wolf.

Fen'Harel dragged her across the floor, drawing her inexorably to him, and just as he was preparing to take her by the arms, to pin her so she could not escape, she bent forward and, fenedhis, all his vision was that precious diamond gap between ass and cunt.

The Wolf broke through.

He wanted her like this, now, while she fought him. He knew if he did she would wriggle free, but it would be worth it for those few desperate moments of hot, wet, tight glory clasping around his shaft.

Fen'Harel took a knee and prepared.

When Hal'la next shot her captured foot backward, he grabbed for both her thighs, pulled her ass back against his hips, and drove into her sex, thrust with all his strength.

Hal'lasean yelped her surprise, her pleasure, clamped reflectively around the thick of him.

His vision swam.

"You perfect creature," he moaned in Elvhen as he pulled out almost to his turgid head and then shoved roughly back in. "My perfect creature. I will gallop you to the Beyond and back, into righteous war! My mount, my perfect, tight, wild--"

She closed her thighs hard, clenched her every muscle, and Fen'Harel's cock was on fire, was destroyed, volcanic, his whole body molten.

He was so winded he let go. She pressed back into him once, hard, and bolted.

Fen'Harel collapsed forward without her to take his weight, pressed his palms against the floor until they were outlined in bloodless white. His freed erection slapped against his thigh with a satisfyingly wet sound.

He was gratified when he looked up from all fours, his lips sneering and his gaze furious, triumphant, and he found his halla recovering as well, making small whining sounds of sexual frustration as she leaned against the vanity.

Her paint was a wreck. One long drag showed him beautiful pink nipples where gilded makeup had been ripped away by the floor, hand prints on her hips, fingernail marks on the wings of her pelvis. He imagined he must be coated in the stuff as well.

More. He wanted more.

He wanted all of it.

"Stubborn, foolish hart," he laughed, gravelly and rumbling. "Playtime is over."

Hal'lasean tensed, teal eyes round and wide, chest heaving, quivering with want and wariness.

He loved the way she was staring at him, at his slick cock, at his gold-streaked chest and groin, the shining metal of his hands. As though he might be gored or tamed at any moment, as though she were as high on the chase as he, as the Wolf.

Perhaps next time he'd let her impale him. Just the thought made his erection twitch.

His long hair spilled in braids over his shoulders, down his back, reminding him of days of hedonism, excess, nights drenched in wine and sex and intrigue. It stirred his old blood, caught fire there, spread to each humming appendage. 

The chase was over. He wanted his meal and he wanted her now, wanted to fill her with his need, punish her with pleasure for escaping him. 

He kept his gaze locked with hers to avert her attention from his hands, and with the gold paint on his fingers, he dragged a rough rune on the tiled floor. A snare. He need only herd her to it.

He drew a rope from the Fade then, soft as suede, unbreakable as dragon bone. Intricate as the Game in Arlathan for such a fine beast ought only to be touched by the best he could give her.

Her eyes went large in surprise then narrowed in challenge. Her face flushed with love of their game. "You wouldn't!"

He smiled, all teeth, and took his feet. Stepped toward her. "I would. I will. You are mine to master."

"Cheater!" Hal'lasean shouted.

He tossed the noose and she ran from it. He pulled it back to him, threw again. She ducked, stepped into the little circle of his rune.

"Magic is cheating!" she cried.

"Looking like that is cheating," Fen'Harel replied darkly. "Those round little breasts, that pert ass, that smirk, your scent, that intoxicating grace. Ah, ma vhenan, my hart of war, you have been cheating all your life."

Despite her irritation, she grinned. Postured. He knew she would. He sprang his trap, caught her in place, her feet glued to the ground.

Hal'lasean cried out, struggled pointlessly, used her unnecessary hand gestures to shape herself free, to seek the Fade's help. Nothing helped. Her confinement made her eyes flare with lust.

"Think you can escape the Bringer of Nightmares in his own realm?"

She panted, stopped fighting, but she did not give up. She never would. Not his halla.

"Trickster!" she accused. "Cheating Wolf!"

He laughed, throaty and low. "Sweet spirit, the hunt is short when the prey craves the kill as much as the Wolf."

Her weight dropped to one hip. "Go on then, Trickster. Take my throat."

He grinned. "It is not your throat I want."

She grinned back.

Another thought and they were both on the bed, his vhenan on her knees, hands holding the headboard. Fen'Harel took his place behind her, his palms pushing covetously across the cheeks of her offered ass, gripping, digging into flesh. He popped her once, just enough to sting, as he might check the hind quarters of a purebred horse. 

Hal'lasean gasped, tilted her hips toward him.

It was not enough.

Fen'Harel gripped her braid, the looped rein he'd made of it, wrapped it around his wrist and pulled.

He led her back to him until his chest pressed against her paint. Until his cock pushed clumsily against that place that was only his, the very center of her.

She trembled, thrummed with tension, the muscles of her throat tight ropes as she pulled against his hold. He tugged once, sharply, on her plait and she gasped, her mouth opening and staying that way, her chin lifted and chest arched in defiance.

"Willful halla," he chastised playfully, "do you not know when you are beaten?" He dragged his tongue along her throat, tasted her racing pulse. She shivered, brushing against his aching arousal so that he hissed and tugged her hair again. "None of that."

She pushed back this time, drew her energy over his cock.

Fen'Harel buried his groan in the skin of her shoulder, sank his teeth in until he left red marks.

She made a sound like caught prey.

The Wolf keened, desperate for the kill.

"I will ride you, Hanal'ghilan," he murmured in her ear, following his words with his tongue. That sound again. Her thrill at the pleasure he gave her with just a lick.

Fenedhis, that sound.

"Vain, headstrong hart," and he licked a line from the raw, golden skin where his teeth had been all the way to the tip of her ear. His hands roamed her front, shoving her breasts upward in hard palms, pulling on the straining nipples. Again, the sound, and again. She was taunting him now. She was desperate to be taken.

Fen'Harel had not come early since he was an adolescent, but he was in serious danger of it now.

That would not do.

With his wrist still wrapped in her braid, he brought his other hand to her buttocks, parting the cheeks, leaving gilded handprints. He hesitated only long enough to catch her off guard.

Fen'Harel invaded the inner sanctum of her sacred temple ruthlessly, without care or caution, threw his whole weight forward until she had swallowed him completely, until his testicles crushed against her, until his hips slapped loudly against her rear.

Hal'lasean gasped loudly, half-bay, but he gave her no time to adjust. He dragged out of her completely and penetrated her again, again, again, until Dirthamen's silent house was ringing with their animal moans of pleasure and the hard clapping together of flesh and the sucking sound of her sopping core clutching greedily at his manhood as he pumped in and out of her.

They spoke filth to each other in bastardized Elvhen, bucked their hips viciously together, tore themselves apart and tried again with greater force. 

She came with a wail, the loudest he had heard from her, and as the sides of his vision went fuzzy and black he bit her tender neck to hold himself off, tasted her blood, her magic, her soul, tasted Hal'lasean and wanted only ever to taste her.

His climax ripped sound from his throat, a cry that echoed against the Fade and came back to them, beat against them as they beat against each other.

He collapsed forward, gripped her waist with his whole arm, the other hand still pulling her hair, and reamed and thrust and shoved inside her until she whimpered her surrender and her body ceased to pulse, until he was too soft to enter her again.

And then he drove her thighs apart with his shoulders and buried his face in her stretched, exhausted sex, devoured her like a Wolf at the kill, worked her clit with a hand wrapped around her thigh.

"Fen!" she cried, "Fen! I can't-- I'm too-- Please! Ma lath! I can't take--"

She came again despite her protests and fell in a rubbery puddle on his lap.

They held each other there as they caught their breath, drenched in one another's juices and covered in gold and purple paint.

Hal'lasean began to laugh.

"Something funny?" he asked, amused.

"I just remembered. I'm in bed with Dorian and Bull!"

They laughed together then, rich and full and sated. He brought her to him, traced gold patterns on her face that were not vallaslin but war paint.

"My heart of war."

She smiled at him, dopey with happiness. And then behind him at the ravens. In challenge.

"Was I too rough, ma halla?" Fen'Harel wondered gently, soothing her Fade body with softer touches.

"Perfect," she sighed. "You were perfect."

Chapter Text

The mosaic of precious stones and rare metals set in the ceiling depicted an owl and a raven cuddled up together on a long branch, one in starlit darkness and the other in brilliant rays of sunlight. It was beautiful work, not unlike the tiled walls they had seen at the Temple of Mythal, but more intimate. Personal.

Hal'lasean was suddenly very aware they were trespassing on the Creators themselves.

Well, she was. For Fen'Harel this was probably as exotic as the borrowed bedroom of extended family.

But then she'd told him to pick the most sacriligeous place.

And if the spirits that still watched them were loyal to Dirthamen, they would one day report what they'd seen to their master. Would he see through their eyes as Mythal had seen through Hal's? Would he see her lying in the Dread Wolf's arms, naked and exhausted and deliciously sore?

Hal blushed and curled toward her Wolf, tucking her front away from view against his body. Hooking her upper leg over his groin to protect his nudity as well.

Fen'Harel craned his neck to better see where she burrowed her face into his chest and chuckled so low it was mostly vibration. "Now are you shy, vhenan? After all that?"

He tweaked the point of her ear. "You need not hide me at least. It is nothing the Keeper of Secrets has not seen."

Hal's eyes went wide then, and she looked up in mischievous shock. "Why, Dread Wolf! Dirthamen as well? Is there a Creator you haven't had?"

"Are you so excited by the idea?" He grinned crookedly at her, delighted at her delight. "Have you forgotten our bath houses, my lecherous heart? It was our favorite place to play the Game."

Hal let her eyes round, feigning innocence. "And what other games did you play with Dirthamen in the bath houses, ma Fen? Is that the secret the bears kept?"

This time it was not her ear he tweaked, but her rump. "I have never had Dirthamen. Nor has he ever had me."

Something shifted in Fen'Harel's face then. Some of the amusement left, the life dimmed, darkness and shadow passed over his face as a careful mask.

Yet, Hal finished silently for him. Nor has he had you...yet.

So whatever was wrong, whatever worried him, it involved Dirthamen. Her heart thumped slow and loud in her chest as she lifted her gaze to the silent ravens.

They were all staring fixedly.

Hal'lasean shivered and Fen'Harel wrapped her closer, blanketing her in their shared magic so she felt protected and contained. Or so he felt she was protected and contained.

He needed distraction.

And she was so distracting he left her. 

Hal propped up her chest on Fen'Harel's so she could lean up to kiss him. It would be a loving, sensual thing. The kind that always made him respond tenfold, usually with his hand moving for her ass.

But then she got the first truly good look at his face since before their chase. Not only did the Dread Wolf have the remains of his black and red streaks, but he was smeared with gold and purple -- forehead, nose, both cheeks, even the dimple of his chin -- except for a clear space around his mouth, the evidence of the time he'd spent with his tongue between her legs.

She started to laugh and he smiled his confused amusement with her. "What?"

"Your face! Fenedhis!"

"Do I have--" Realization and lascivious delight broke across his mien. "Ah. Am I painted?"

"You're something."

Fen'Harel lifted a gold-coated palm to wipe at his cheeks and only managed to make it worse. He grinned sheepishly when she laughed again.

"Here," she said fondly, "let me."

She meant to gently, lovingly clean his face with her fingers, but as she reached for a smudge that lay perfectly on his cheekbone like vallaslin, Hal'lasean's heart caught like a panicked bird in the cage of her ribs.

So instead she reached up with both hands, palms over Fen'Harel's face, and made one slow pass over his paint-smeared features. Under her hands, she imagined his skin clear and unmarked.

"Ar lasa mala revas," she murmured earnestly. "You are free."

His eyes widened in surprise and more than a little alarm.

Her breath deserted her in memory of that fateful moment when her future hung in the balance and she didn't even know it.

"You are so beautiful," she told him, and meant every syllable just as he had.

She kissed him before he could reply, and when he parted his lips filled his mouth with her worshipful tongue, praying with his, giving thanks with their lips. Hal let her hands wander as his had, crawling on top of him as his body responded, groping unabashedly at the muscle of his ass.

When Hal broke the kiss they were both left panting and breathless, their magic singing for more. 

And then Hal grinned, broad and victorious.

"Well, vhenan, this has been great, but I am sorry," she said cheerfully, grinding her hips into his once and then deftly rolling away. "I have distracted you from your duty. It will never happen again."

He sat up and reached for her, still worried at this game Hal played even though she was beaming at him as she escaped his touch.

"Hal'la! Ar lath ma!"

"No, ir abelas," she sighed loftily. "You're a bright and marvelous spirit and everything, but, alas. Maybe in another world!" He reached again, nearly climbing to his knees in case she fled. But there was a twinkle in his eyes too now, the hint of a smirk on his lips. 

"Come, vhenan," he beseeched penitently. 

"Oh no! That never ends well for me."

"The kiss did not end well?" he shot back with mock offense.

"The kiss was wonderful," Hal laughed, wiggling her hips at just the edge of the bed. "The weeks of waiting after the kiss..."

Fen'Harel's lips curled up wickedly. He lunged across the bed and she let herself be caught, pretending to struggle as he dragged her body under his. He pinned her arms above her head by the wrists and drove her thighs apart with his knee, pausing at the already wet apex to press into her, to rub the hard cap of the joint into the furrow there.

Hal'lasean gasped and he stole her breath for his own, diving into a kiss with playful probings of his tongue, with his free hand wandering her breasts.

She pulled on his tongue, brought him closer, then released and nipped his bottom lip.

Her Wolf broke away to grin down at her. "What of the ball, ma halla?"

"Next time." Hal's voice was low in her throat. She knew her eyes must be gleaming with anticipation. 

With a quick burst of force, she rolled her lover onto his back, pinning him there with a knee on either side of his hips. She sat above him leonine and proud, smugly taking in his pleasant surprise. The love and laughter in his grey eyes. 

"But I'm no halla." She rolled her hips languidly, trapping the base of his arousal between the heat of her parted folds. 

He groaned, reaching to take her waist in his long-fingered hands. "Oh no?" 

"No," she agreed. "I am Fen'Harel, Trickster, Betrayer, Bringer of Nightmares, very mysterious, very misunderstood." Her upper lip curled, her eyes flashed. "I am the Dread Wolf."

Hal'lasean saw her own mischief reflected in her mate's gaze. She felt him move beneath her, preparing no doubt to flip her on her back. So she drove against him again, a liquid movement that went through her lower body like a wave of muscle. 

Fen'Harel hissed and took a fistful of bedding.

"Sorry, vhenan," she said haughtily. "The Dread Wolf loves you, but he must always be in control."

"Minx," he accused, and this time she let him turn her, let him pin her to the bed with his pelvis. Arched when he rubbed the moist tip of his erection against her oversensitive clit and heat poured through her loins like hot oil.

"Wolf," Hal corrected impishly. "Dread Wolf."

"That is my name," Fen'Harel rumbled in warning.

She moved beneath him and his eyes closed...and she scrambled for freedom, grabbing the bedding to try to get out from underneath him. He dropped on top of her, using his whole weight to press her into the bed.

"No!" Hal cried, laughing helplessly as he dragged his teeth and tongue along her ear, down her neck. "I have to go! I have very important Elvhen things to do!"

His hand trailed one walked finger at a time down her body. He took himself in hand and tilted his pelvis, holding the swollen head of his cock at her aching entrance. There, just there, touching her like pulsing fire...but no further.

"No more of this game," he told her, but he was smirking, his eyes were bright.

Hal's eyes rounded, all innocence again.

"What we had was real."

And then she drove down, taking him inside her, filling herself with the hard heat of him.

The Dread Wolf cursed. Hal flipped him on his back.

"My turn," she growled.

 ~~~

Bull had woken first and fetched the three of them breakfast, returning as the sun just broke through the balcony windows with a tray full of pastries and fruit and cheeses, a pot of arbor blessing tea and milk and honey to go with it. And beside it he placed a folded note in Cullen's hand.

"Found it by the door."

"Anything salacious?"

"Nope," said Bull. "Totally boring."

Now he and Dorian sat at the little table by Hal's fire, eating in sleepy silence, as their faithful leader and devoted friend still wandered the Fade with her Elvhen lover.

Lover being the operative word. So terribly, terribly operative. 

And as they ate, it began to be operative again.

She smiled in her sleep -- that was the first sign -- and then let out a soft sound in her throat like a halfhearted moan. And then began the hips, shifting slowly beneath the heavy woolen blankets.

"Fasta vass, again?"

"You're the one always talking about his stamina," laughed Bull. "Boss deserves to let off a little steam."

"It seems almost indecent to watch like this."

The Iron Bull quirked his brow. "We could leave."

Dorian waved a dismissive hand and sat forward with his tea for a better view. "Nonsense! The indecency is what makes it fun!"

"Good point," said Bull. "Sorry, Boss!" 

"Yes, yes, terribly sorry. Ir abelas and all that. Now pass the brie."

Chapter Text

H --

Breakfast in Lanaya's suite? Usual time.

-- C

There was no mistaking which C this was. Hal would know Cullen's sturdy, Templar-trained hand anywhere.

"Are you going?" wondered Dorian, popping a grape into his mouth.

"'Course she is," answered Bull for her. "Cullen's been gone and yesterday was a disaster. This morning she can start again."

Dorian replied with another grape and a smirk. "At least the sexual tension will have cooled some, after last night's exertions."

Hal blushed furiously and Bull and Dorian grinned.

"You didn't have to watch," she complained.

"Sure we did, Boss! Besides, we've seen you in more compromising positions than that."

"Mm," Dorian agreed. "So very many more."

Hal folded the note and set it aside, rubbing self-consciously at her reddened cheek. "If I'm going, I'd better get dressed."

Neither man made any move to leave.

"If you're doing this," said Dorian, standing up to tower menacingly over his elven friend, "I'm picking out your clothes."

Hal's eyes widened in horror. "No dresses. I mean it."

Bull snorted. "You own dresses?"

 ~~~

Cullen had been up before the sun. There was so much work to be done now he was home, especially if he was hoping to feel at all relaxed during the breakfast he'd planned with Hal and Lanaya.

He was certain he must be a masochist.

The Alerion sisters. Both of them, in one room, and Cullen in the middle.

His wayward mind could think of worse fates, but Cullen was stubbornly and forcefully driving such thoughts from his imagination the moment they appeared.

And they did. More frequently than he cared to admit even to himself.

Because Lanaya had seen him on the road for so long, scruffy and covered in grime, and because he had barely seen Hal at all yesterday, he made a point to be well-coifed and clean-shaven, to wear his best embroidered tunic and his newest breeches.

And then he went to the kitchens to make his requests for the group, taking care to have ample meat and milk and vegetables for the children and sweet luxuries for their mother.

A woman from Tevinter would not be impressed with fresh squeezed orange juice, even if a Fereldan farm boy was, but he thought she might very much enjoy choosing from a variety of teas and honeys.

And then he stood in the corridor in the path the Inquisitor would need to take to get to her sister's quarters and tried to appear entirely nonchalant.

He wasn't waiting for Hal'lasean long, thank the Maker. And he was not the only one who had made a little extra effort for this meal.

Hal was a girl of simple tastes; for as long as he'd known her she had dressed in whatever was comfortable and allowed her to move. Josie had only succeeded in getting their Herald to wear color in tunic form, but today...

Hal'lasean wore a shirt the same color as a wild Dalish rose, a pink so deep it was nearly purple. It was embellished in copper and green, vines and leaves and a few simple Orlesian birds in flight. All her shirts were fitted, but this one was cut expertly to her slim frame with a wide neck that exposed the delicate structures of her shoulders. It hung to mid-thigh like Thedas' shortest dress, adorned by a metalwork belt that draped at her hips, with thick grey knitted stockings beneath it.

And her hair, usually messy or carefully out of her way, was a crown of braids that kept her silver bangs from her eyes while still letting it spill enticingly down her back.

She looked beautiful.

She looked miserable.

"Who dressed you?" he asked with a smirk he couldn't have hidden even if he wanted to.

She turned approximately the same color as her shirt and tugged nervously at the hem.

He wanted to shove her against the wall and take it off her. He wanted her to wear it always. He wanted to take her into his arms and laugh and kiss her and promise her she looked like a picture.

"Dorian," Hal admitted, and Cullen laughed until she punched him hard in the bicep. Then he laughed louder.

"He didn't give me a choice!" she cried defensively. "He and Bull read your bloody note and hid all my clothes before I woke up!"

"I'll have to congratulate them later," said Cullen.

They grinned at each other in silence for a moment, basking in the ease of this, their friendship, as simple and instinctive as breathing.

And it burned just as much when he couldn't have it.

"I--" she blurted suddenly, then stopped, balked really, flushed with guilt. "You were missed."

But she meant she missed him. She was being kind, keeping her distance.

He loved her for it. But it didn't work. Distance hadn't done them any good.

"I missed you," he confessed pointedly, and was aware and unbothered by his blushing.

Hal smiled brightly, her teal eyes full of pleasure at his words. And then it faltered. "Is it-- Are you--"

His cheeks were red with guilt now, and no small amount of shame. "No," he sighed. "I did try, Hal. Maker, but I tried."

"I know." She gave him a wan smile this time.

"And are you...?" he wondered softly. Cullen tried not to cringe at the hope in his voice.

Hal laughed, just a touch of desperation at the edges of her self-effacement. "Of course."

Cullen's heart swelled, lightened, bobbed like a fishing float in his chest. It was a stark contrast from his outward misery. "Ir abelas."

She smiled again, all compassion. "As am I." The smile grew. "I do love it when you speak Elvish."

He was pleased. So very, pathetically pleased. His whole body warmed with it. But instead of showing it, he cleared his throat and glanced toward their destination. "Shall we?"

The Commander did not offer the Inquisitor his arm, much as he longed to, and she did not seek it. The quiet between them was tense with unaccomplished desires.

"I was thinking..." Cullen began, mostly to fill the very heavy emptiness between them. "I'd like to give Spurian one of those puppies. What do you think?"

Hal beamed at him, delighted by the idea. "Of course!" She hesitated worriedly. "We have to ask Lanaya first. She's his mother. It should be her decision."

"Of course."

They reached the door and paused outside it, listening to the sounds of the twins' vivacious morning energies on the other side.

Hal'lasean tensed beside him, chewed her bottom lip.

Cullen took her hand. His skin heated pleasantly where hers touched his. Her small fingers fit so well with his clumsy human hands. She looked up at him in question and mild alarm.

So she felt it too.

Maker.

"I'm with you," Cullen promised. "No matter what."

The love in her eyes was nearly more than he could bear. If he could just kiss her again, just one more time...

No.

They took a steadying breath together and let go of one another's hands.

Cullen knocked.

Chapter Text

It had been a long night.

The children had been exhausted. Even Spurian was asleep before the fire by the time Lanaya returned from Hal'lasean's quarters. Rather than wake him, she had covered him with a blanket and kissed his eternally creased brow and joined him in the other armchair.

Because she had tried the bed and found it too soft. Too plush. She sank into it and felt like she was suffocating in down and satin. 

Tamalin loved the beds. She had never had her own before, let alone one so very fine. She had declared it like lying on clouds. 

The children were reverent of everything around them, touching with delicate, uncertain fingers but never holding, never playing with anything. They were afraid -- and rightfully so -- it might disappear or turn out to be a trick. As though a Magister was waiting in the shadows to jump out and accuse them of stealing. As though they might be whipped.

These were important lessons in Tevinter -- essential even -- necessary training for children of the lower castes if they hoped ever to survive unmaimed.

Still sometimes Tully's excitement would get the better of his sense and for a few moments, Lanaya would know intimately the total terror of worrying for her baby's life.

Before. That was before. Right? Before this. Before Cullen and the Inquisition. Before Skyhold. Before Hal'lasean.

If Lanaya believed them. If Lanaya could make this last.

If she could stop trembling every time she thought about her hands in her sister's silver hair for the first time in over two decades. If she could keep back the bile and tears at the idea of talking about her time with the Dalish. That too was a time before.

Before her magic. Before they left Alerion. Before she knew fatigue and starvation. Before her mother miscarried and died. Before her father gave up. Before she left Tama with the halla. Before the slavers, before Amantius, before, before, before.

If she were lucky, if she were very careful, if she played Hal'lasean's game, she could one day split her life into three parts: Before Amantius, Before Skyhold, After Skyhold.

She'd have an after. Her children would have an after.

Afters were for the fairy tales nannies told the children of Magisters.

Lanaya had never dared think so audaciously of the future.

It suffocated her like the mattress to her new, too-soft, too-clean, too-big bed.

She sat before the fire with her eldest son and drifted in and out of fitful sleep, occasionally staring in astonishment at the constant piling of swift-blown snow outside the windows. 

Lanaya remembered snow from the Marches, but she hadn't seen it since. And it seemed to her now that there had never been so much, nor had it ever come so quickly. It was as if the Maker decided to trap her here with Andraste's Herald.

But was it punishment or blessing?

Part of Lanaya was certain it was punishment. Slaves and elves did not receive blessings.

When she finally had drifted into the Fade, her dreams were terrible and feverish: Hal'lasean and Cullen taking her children, Hal'lasean and Cullen fucking, Lord Pavus and the huge Qunari walking through her room at the Dragon to reach Danyl, talking about being spoons. And the red pouring without ebb from between her mother's legs. Red that became a river and then an ocean. Red that she drowned in.

Lanaya woke up a gasp to find a little hand on her face, patting her to consciousness.

"Mother? Mother!" Tully was growing number impatient in his attentions.

In the doorway to their shared room, Tama watched with overlarge eyes. Elven eyes. Alerion eyes. 

Even Spurban was awake, though he was frowning at his lap.

"What is it?" Lanaya demanded in a whisper, already springing to her feet. "What's wrong?"

Something always was.

Was it light out? She couldn't tell for all the snow.

"We can't sleep," Tully complained in the sweet, muddled whine of young children in the middle of the night. 

"There's too much space," added Tama.

Tully's expression changed into a sincere but exaggerated pout. "I had a nightmare the bed ate me."

"We want to sleep with you, Mother!"

"All of us, like always! My sides are too empty! Please, Spuri!"

In his isolated chair, Spurian suddenly looked relieved.

"Come on then," said Lanaya, and took the twins to the massive bed that was supposed to be hers.

She tucked them into the center where they held one another just as they had as infants and climbed in beside them. 

Spurian slunk in last, holding a folded piece of parchment and looking stoic to hide his embarrassment. He dusted off his feet and crawled in on the other side of the twins. It was how they had slept every night since the little ones had outgrown their crib.

"Mother," Spurian murmured as the twins fell almost instantly back into a deep sleep, "this was by the door. Cullen and Aunt Hal are coming to breakfast, if you don't mind. He says you can decline if you like and they'll understand."

Lanaya couldn't breathe.

"Mother?" asked Spurian. "If we don't want them to come, I'll tell them."

"Do you want them to come?" Lanaya heard her voice say.

"Yes," Spurian admitted apologetically.

"Then they'll come."

She curled up on her side with her back to her babies so they couldn't see the way the muscles of her face clenched and quivered.

Lanaya would suffocate in this bed because her children needed her beside them.

Then she would suffocate in the morning because she was making her children a home.

Perhaps the Maker was punishing her after all.

Chapter Text

The morning was a scramble. Water for washing arrived outside their door as if by magic, and it was magic that kept it hot. The basin that held it was already runed, as were the various wash stations throughout their suite. 

The whole affair reminded Lanaya of Amantius' occasional visits to the slaves' quarters, everyone rushing to be cleaned and presentable -- especially her. Especially her children. 

And so it was this morning. The twins were agony to wake and Spurian was determined to shave his peach fuzz for the first time in his entire life. 

Spurian was only just cleaning up and the twins were arguing over which of their new clothes they wanted to wear for Cullen and "Aunt Hal," when knock on the door heralded the arrival of a human girl. A human girl with all the tools to tend the fire for them. 

And in the midst of all that activity, they all stopped dead to stare.

A human. Serving elves.

She was a pretty young thing, no older than twenty, with short dark hair, brown eyes, and the tan of a person used to hard labor.

"Beggin' your pardon, ma'am," greeted the girl. "I'm Greelie. I'll be your room attendant from here on out. Breakfast is on its way and the Herald and Commander with it."

Ma'am. Ma'am.

Lanaya's jaw was clenched too tightly to stand gaping.

"You're human!" Tully accused.

"Catullus!" Lanaya hissed.

"But she--" he protested, eyes wide with his confusion and the injustice of her admonishment.

Greelie, however, just laughed. "Aye, so I am! Nothin' gets past you, does it, young serah!"

"I'm not a serah! I'm Catullus Iustor! I was a slave!"

Then even Greelie didn't find it funny. Lanaya thought she might vomit.

"Aye," the girl said again, looking up to meet Lanaya's eyes instead of Tully's. "I've been told that. I don't mean to be forward, ma'am, but that's...why they chose me. My parents were slaves in Tevinter as well. I serve this suite and the Champion of Kirkwall's suite. Only those two. And if ever you have need of me," she crossed to a group of rope pulls on the wall by the door and picked the middle one, "you just give this a tug. It's my pleasure to help however I can. Skyhold's a bit scary at first, but I promise it's the kindest place in all Thedas."

Tamalin had been hovering in the doorway to her room, clutching a simple woolen dress in a thistle purple as though it were the most precious thing she'd ever owned. But now she stepped forward timidly to Lanaya's side, seeking her mother's hand.

"Do you know our Aunt Hal?" she asked, barely above a whisper.

Greelie gave Tama a gentle smile. "Ah, little miss, everyone knows your Aunt Hal. She's the one what chose me to tend to your family."

Tama held out the purple dress. "Do you think Aunt Hal will like this?"

The young woman's smile grew. "I think she'll love it. But I imagine your aunt will love you in anything." Greelie moved to the hearth and set down the metal log carrier before turning to bob her head at Lanaya. "I'll see to the fire, ma'am, and then I'll help you with whatever else you need."

Lanaya was still in shock. A human serving elves. A human who called her "ma'am". One whose only jobs were looking after her family...and the Champion of Kirkwall.

Was she so important here? The very idea was preposterous. Was this some kind of joke?

And yet Greelie was true to her word and built a new fire with practiced ease while Lanaya got the twins into their new warm clothes and fixed their hair. 

Spurian saw only to himself, another luxury, and by the time the fireplace was clean and roaring, everyone was prepared but Lanaya. She stood now in the master bedroom -- a room she had no right to occupy -- and stared at the warm winter outfits the Inquisition had provided for her.

"May I help you dress and pin your hair, ma'am?" Greelie asked, touching delicately at her elbow.

Lanaya jerked away, recoiled, scandalized by even the suggestion. This was a joke. This had to be some kind of sick joke.

Greelie responded with an understanding smile, her lips pressed into a thin line. "How 'bout I keep an eye on the little ones instead and see to setting the table."

In Tevinter, servants did not talk so much. Did not address so freely, nor touch their masters.

In Tevinter, servants were slaves, silent and stealthy. And their masters ignored them but to whip them or fuck them.

But this girl was no slave and Lanaya was no master. And she was completely at a loss as to what to say or how to act.

She chose a heavy dress in a royal blue with silver threading that picked out lilies along the hems. There was too much fabric in all the wrong places, too conservative by far, but it was warm and it fit well. Lanaya lined her eyes and colored her lips and cheeks, spun her hair into an intricate series of twists that she gathered at the crown of her head.

But when she looked in the mirror, she didn't recognize herself. Couldn't recognize herself. She saw...

Her mother.

Her father.

Her sister.

Bile rose in her throat.

And then there was a knock at the door.

Chapter Text

Spurian had rarely seen his mother so nervous.

The last time she'd been so concerned with everyone's appearance, with their living quarters, with her own presentation, had been when Amantius visited on the twins' second birthday.

Before he took sick. Before he was bedridden and stank of waste and cancer. Before he died and they moved to the Gilded Dragon.

So his mother was trying to impress, but whom? Was she after Aunt Hal's approval? She already had that. Was she blind to the way she'd crushed Aunt Hal only the day before with her comment about savages? Aunt Hal wanted his mother's approval; there was no need for her to seek the Inquisitor's. But in the past week and a half, Spurian had learned quickly that there was much about his mother he never knew, had never thought to ask. Not that she would have answered him anyway. Lanaya didn't talk about things that happened before Amantius. She just didn't.

Until Cullen.

Spurian knew his mother had been born Dalish. He hadn't know she'd ever had a sister. He'd assumed she must have had parents, but to hear her tell it, she simply appeared at Amantius' side as a girl without a past. Without even a last name. Because slaves did not have last names.

Except she did. She'd had one all along. Alerion. Lanaya Alerion. Was that his last name too? He would never wear his father's name, so why not his mother's? Was he Spurian Amantius Alerion? Were the elfblooded even allowed to have Dalish last names?

He wanted it for Tama and Tully even if he didn't have it for himself. Catullus Iustor Alerion. Lavana Tamalin Alerion. They deserved to have an identity. Deserved to be real people. And Skyhold...these people and this place were going to give those things to his siblings. And to his mother, if she was willing to go along with the rules here. Strange rules. Rules that weren't rules. Neither he nor his mother had any experience with that. It confused him. It unsettled him. It didn't scare him. Spurian didn't get scared. But it...felt wrong. Right but wrong.

Impossible and right but wrong.

Was that how his mother felt? She'd named her daughter after a sister she hadn't seen in over two decades. Some part of her must have wanted to remember that life, right? That life before Amantius. Had it been so terrible before him? It was certainly terrible during and after him, even if his mother would never admit it.

So maybe she did think she needed to win Aunt Hal's approval. And not just Aunt Hal's, but Cullen's. 

Spurian was not a little boy anymore. He knew men always wanted his mother. She was beautiful. She was popular. Men saw his mother and they took her. That was how it worked. And yet Cullen said no. Cullen saw his mother and had that look in his eyes like all the men who saw her and yet he said no. So his mother wanted Cullen's approval too.

His mother did not want things. And now she did. This place made her want, possibly for the first time in her life.

Spurian decided then and there he would make certain his mother got precisely what she wanted.

So while the woman Greelie set out an absurdly large and decadent breakfast on the table in the main room of the suite and his mother saw to her hair and face in her bedroom, Spurian took the twins into the room they shared and closed the door behind them.

"I'm hungry," complained Tully immediately. "I want to eat!"

"You can't eat until Aunt Hal and Cullen arrive," insisted Spurian seriously. "It's rude. Go sit on the bed. I want to talk to you both."

They wore nearly identical looks of confusion, but they did as they were told as they usually did. They chose Tully's bed and climbed up beside one another, their little legs dangling half a foot off the plush rug that spread across the floor. It was on this rug that Spurian squatted before them, his arms draped on his knees and his expression severe in its intention.

Tully's first reaction was predictable and stubborn. "I didn't do it!" 

Spurian almost laughed. Almost. But this was too important. "You're not in trouble."

"Are we leaving?" wondered Tama. Her teal eyes went round and overlarge in her babyish face and Spurian's heart clenched vigorously. She was already attached here. She had never grown attached to Amantius' manse and he had never allowed her to grow attached to the Dragon. But here, in one night, she had decided. They both had.

Tama and Tully wanted this to be home, if such a thing existed.

"No, sweet one," Spurian assured her as gently as he could as Cullen's words echoed in his head. Children listen better than you think. "I don't want us to leave, do you?"

They both shook their heads with slow, childish conviction. 

"So we have to make sure we help Mother and Aunt Hal and Cullen. We have to make sure we're very good at all times. We have to be quiet and respectful and polite. We won't touch what isn't ours and we won't speak unless we're spoken to. But most importantly, we have to not talk about things that upset Mother. Do you know what those things are?"

They thought hard about the question. Tama was the first to answer. "My name?"

"Yes," Spurian agreed with a little encouraging smile. "What else?"

"Saying 'slaves' makes people here go real quiet," said Tully.

"Mother doesn't like Elvish things."

"Or the past."

Tama chewed on her bottom lip, her brow furrowed comically over her worried? eyes. "If we're very good, we can stay at the castle?"

"We're going to try." Because Spurian couldn't bring himself to make promises he didn't know if he could keep.

"I'm the one who gets in trouble," mumbled Tully slowly, coming to a careful, significant realization. "I'll be the most good."

Spurian cupped his hands behind his siblings' heads and brought them both forward, pressing firm kisses to their silver hair.

And then there was a knock at the door outside. And voices. Aunt Hal. Cullen. 

"Best behavior," Spurian reminded them with stern eye contact. They both nodded their understanding and he held out his hands as he took his feet. "Okay. Let's go have breakfast."

They were a silent trio indeed when they snuck through the bedroom door and stood waiting by the wall to be called on. 

"Did you sleep well?" Aunt Hal was asking Mother. "If there's anything you want changed, anything at all, we'll see to it."

"There they are!" Cullen cried when he saw them. He crouched and held out his arms with a grin that lit up his face like the sky above the harbor on festival days. 

Neither Tama nor Tully ran to him, though they tugged at Spurian's hands with the impulse. Instead, they looked up uncertainly at their brother, who frowned thoughtfully at Cullen. And Cullen...

Cullen seemed...

Disappointed? Sad.

Spurian's pulse raced with alarm. It was well-trained against doing things like this. Reckless things. Things that could jeopardize their safety. But Cullen made them happy. He made them so happy. And what if...what if they could have safety and happiness?

"Forget everything I just said," he murmured to the twins. "Be polite. Be respectful. ...But go on."

They hesitated only briefly, but Cullen grinned at them again and they took off on their little bare feet to throw their arms around his neck and get wrapped in a bear hug. 

Spurian couldn't breathe. Spurian's chest ached.

But it seemed to him in that moment, when the twins were giggling, that the tension in the entire room eased.

Chapter Text

They wanted Lanaya to choose the seating. It had taken her several long moments to understand, and in that time they all stood awkwardly around the breakfast spread.

"Please," and Cullen had gestured politely to the table and chairs. "We're the guests here. This is your home, your rooms. We'll sit where you wish."

Lanaya stared stony-faced, first at Cullen, then at Hal, as if suspicious of their motives. "Who else is coming?" she asked finally.

Hal'lasean lifted her brows at Cullen in question. "I thought it was only us."

"It's only us," Cullen assured Lanaya.

This seemed only to confuse her even more. Her mask was so carefully neutral that it was obvious to Hal they were only increasing her sister's anxiety. But what was it they were doing wrong now?

It took her only a glance at the twins and Spurian, eyes wide as they looked at their sudden overwhelming options, to understand. To remember.

It was the food. There was so much of it. More than ever Hal had seen during her years of hunger with her clan. How quickly she had forgotten what it was like.

How quickly she had become used to the luxury of Skyhold. The privacy, the woolen mattress and blankets, the down comforters and feather pillows. The warm fires. The servants.

When had it become so common place that she forgot to be amazed?

"This is for us," she admitted, and felt her cheeks heat with shame when the little family stared at her as though she'd grown a second and a third head.

Dear, sweet Cullen was quick to come to her aid. "It won't always be so much; though there will always be plenty. I thought...it's a special occasion, a family coming together after so long. In my family, there's always a feast for these things. And of course I didn't know what each of you liked, so I ordered...well, I ordered everything."

"Are we going to eat it all?" asked Tully, his eyes round with wonder.

"Eat what you like," laughed Cullen.

"And what your mother says you may have," added Hal quietly.

Lanaya's eyes met hers, vivid teals and violets that made it impossible to forget their blood was the same. Her sister didn't so much as twitch her lips. But they did look at one another. Hal hoped it meant...something. Some kind of understanding.

"What will happen to what we don't eat?" asked Lanaya, her voice carefully controlled appraisal.

Hal opened her mouth to respond, but Cullen got there first. "Hal is very particular about never letting anything go to waste. It's Inquisition policy." He grinned at her, lopsided and teasing, and her heart flopped lamely against her ribs.

"What isn't eaten but can be kept will be kept for others or for later," said Hal. "What will not keep, if no one else wants it, will be used to feed the dogs or pigs. Or the gardeners will compost it for fertilizer." Her ears were gently pink with embarrassment. She gave a tiny, helpless shrug. "After living with the Dalish, I couldn't bear to see so much food be simply tossed away. Not when so many people in Thedas are starving."

"Do the Dalish get to eat like this?" asked Tully, but his momentary excitement was quashed with a worried glance at his mother.

Lanaya, whose face was utterly unreadable. Whose eyes were as subdued in this situation as Hal'lasean's anxious heart.

As much as Hal wanted to respond to her nephew, she dared not. Not with Lanaya in the room. Not after the events of yesterday.

She was infinitely grateful then to Cullen, who had somehow become the buffer between the sisters. The mediator. He touched her elbow with rough soldier's fingers and her breath caught.

Lanaya's rocky turquoise eyes narrowed at the gesture and now it was panic and not thrill that stole Hal's air.

"No, Tully," said Cullen with a patient smile. As though there was no tension at all. As though this were a perfectly casual, familiar experience. "The Dalish--" He glanced at Hal, smiled knowingly. "Every clan is different, of course, but the Dalish as a people usually have a very difficult time finding food. And they don't have basements or smoke houses to keep their meat, so they often can't store much for the future."

It was, surprisingly enough, observant, serious Spurian who spoke about the Dalish next. With the kind of weight that suggested he knew he was crossing a line for his mother. "But they have those deer. How can they starve with a whole herd of--"

"Halla." Lanaya nearly snapped it, blurted it so forcefully that she apparently surprised even herself.

Spurian took a protective step backward as though struck.

"They're called halla," his mother said again, her gentleness tainted by an oppressive darkness that dragged at her words like a ship's anchor. "We don't--"

Lanaya blanched. She was struggling. She was scared. She was hurting. Hal couldn't stand it, couldn't be witness and not bear some of the load herself if she could. It took her two small steps to be at her sister's side, barely a shift of her arm to touch her fingers lightly to the backs of Lanaya's.

Her sister turned to regard her in closeted surprise, in open wariness. Hal's magic -- Fen'Harel's magic -- tickled against Lanaya's aura where their skin met.

Hal'lasean smiled, sweetly, hopefully, tenuously. Lanaya did not. But she did not pull away.

"The Dalish do not eat halla, Spurian," said Hal like she might speak to a wild animal. Slow, deliberate, non-threatening. Not for his sake, but for Lanaya's. "They're sacred creatures. Our friends and guides. It's not...unheard of to sacrifice one of the herd when the children are..."

Her stomach is swollen but empty. Mamae cries into her hands. Mamae is always crying these days. Her back shakes beneath Babae's strong crafter hand. Naya presses bark between Tama's parched lips until she opens her mouth and accepts it.

"Chew, hallabell," says Naya. "Babae says it will help."

Cullen cleared his throat. He touched first Hal's elbow then Lanaya's, and with fingers light but firm, guided them closer to the table.

The Alerion sisters both seemed to have gotten lost, were mildly addled and unfocused to find themselves in a warm room with so much food. Safety. Shelter.

Their eyes met once more. Hal only became aware that her mouth was hanging slightly open when she noticed Lanaya's was doing the same.

Why did this have to feel so raw? It was so long ago, why couldn't it just...why couldn't...? Why...?

The Commander pulled back three chairs while they readjusted to their surroundings. He left the center one empty and skillfully set both women in the two outer seats. Neither was present enough to protest. He pulled out the chair next to Hal then, and genuflected with a flourish as he put a giggling Tamalin into it. Spurian took his mother's side and put Tully between himself and his sister.

Cullen paused then, delicately untangled Naya and Hal's fingers from one another, and sat in the empty chair between them.

"Enough talk about the Dalish," he announced cheerfully. "Why don't we talk about all the things you three want to see and do now that you live in a castle. Tully, you first."

The room filled with children's chatter. But Hal and Lanaya had still not returned to it. Instead, as though driven by magnetism or instinct or some long-forgotten habit of childhood, they reached for each other over Cullen's knees, hands hidden beneath the table, and twisted their fingers back together.

The Commander pretended he didn't notice.

Chapter Text

"Fenris."

"Fenris?" Cullen and Hal echoed as one, coaching their surprised amusement into mild interest.

Lanaya's expression was completely noncommittal as her children spoke, but her fork hesitated in the pile of eggs and cheese on her plate when Spurian spoke the escaped slave's name.

"Yes," said Spurian with all the humorless gravitas a fifteen-year-old could muster.

The twins had listed desires from the heartbreaking to the absurd: they wanted to go to the highest towers and into the lowest dungeons (Tully was very enthusiastic about the dungeons), to ride horses and see the battlemages and the healers and the soldiers training. They wanted to see bears and wolves and lions--

"The only lion in Skyhold is sitting with us at the table," Hal had noted with a wry smile--

They wanted to learn, to see the Qunari and the elves and the dwarves, to hear a story from Master Tethras--

"Good luck getting him to stop telling you stories," laughed Cullen--

They worried that the Templars in the castle, because they were Southern Templars, would come for them. They wanted to meet Hawke and go to the new school for mage children.

After some coaxing, they began to admit desires for material things, things that would have been unimaginable for them only days before. Tully wanted a custom sword and stave, to have armor like Cullen's "but with a big lion on it what's eating a Dumat!" He wanted chocolate for every meal.

"No," said Lanaya firmly, with a gentling hint of fondness.

Tama took more encouragement, but soon she was confessing she wanted to learn to garden and plant flowers and she wanted dresses like her mother's and tunics like Aunt Hal's. She wanted a stave and "a pony like Herald!"

"Me too!" cried Tully, indignant that he hadn't thought of it first. "I want Herald too!"

But Spurian hadn't said a word. Just frowned severely while he listened and thought, watching the twins' excitement and his mother's reticence and Hal and Cullen's pleasure in the conversation. He seemed especially interested in watching Hal each time one of the children called her "aunt". Hal didn't mind at all; she wanted him to see how her cheeks heated and her smile brightened reflexively.

it was one of the sweetest sounds she'd ever heard and she couldn't help but hope one day her child would be greeted by such warmth when it called out for "Aunt Naya".

Just the thought was enough to nearly bring Hal to agonizingly joyous tears.

A family. She would finally have a real family.

If everything went well. If she was patient and understanding. If she waited, still and quiet, for Lanaya to see the storm was over and finally decide to emerge in the wreckage.

And if not...well, she had a family of her own making. A family who already loved her. A family she would die for, who would die for her. What need did she have for a family who shared blood with her when she had one who had spilled blood with her, for her, spilled their own blood at her side?

And yet...

And yet this was what she had always wanted, always dreamed. A sister who looked like her, a niece and nephews she adored. A child within her by the man she most loved...

And Cullen.

She set down her utensils and reached instinctively under the table to touch his hand, only to find the one nearest her missing. Instead she grazed his thigh and they both glanced at one another in alarm. They blushed at each other, but when Hal let hers melt into a lopsided grin, his stayed panicked.

Had she done something horrible without realizing? She only wanted to show gratitude for being here with her, for setting this up, for keeping the tension low. Was that too much? 

Where was his other hand anyway?

It was only then that Hal noticed that Lanaya's left hand was in her lap. Both she and Cullen were using only their right hands to eat. Their left...

For a moment, the room became unbearably hot. Too small, too enclosed. So quickly? Had her sister ensnared--

No, that was unfair. Ensnared. Cullen was too canny for such manipulations and yesterday with Josie, he'd said--

He had insinuated that he'd-- that she'd--

But so quickly! And he'd told her he was still in love with her just outside the door!

But then she was hardly the person to judge an interest in two people at the same time. And if she couldn't be with Cullen, if she couldn't make him happy, why not her sister? Why not let them both be happy together?

Would they...could they be happy together? Would Lanaya just hurt him? Hal had no worries that Cullen could ever hurt a woman he loved. Would ever hurt...

Except he loved Hal. He loved Hal and he was holding Lanaya's hand and it hurt!

He was watching her so carefully, watching her with those endlessly kind amber eyes, searching her expression for...what? To see if he'd succeeded in making her jealous? He had. No, that wasn't...

Cullen was looking to her with fearful hope in his gaze. Like he was...asking...

As though he were asking permission.

Apologizing, but asking permission.

Hal'lasean didn't want to give it. For one manic moment she wanted to grab his hand back and...and...lick it like a five-year-old claiming a toy.

A toy she wasn't even playing with.

Why did it hurt so much?

So instead she pressed her palm against his thigh, purposefully this time, and then took back her hand to finish her meal.

She hadn't seen Cullen look so grateful since she used to hold him when he woke up screaming, sweaty and shaking, from his nightmares and withdrawals. 

Maybe nothing would come of it. But how...how could she say no? How could she not set him free?

Ar lasa mala revas.

Hal braced for the agony of a well-made smile and was about to pretend everything was fine when she saw Lanaya studying her from the other side of the Commander. Stony. Unreadable. Eyes narrowed. And Hal couldn't tell if it was challenge or uncertainty. If her sister was puzzling out her acceptance of the situation or feeling territorial. 

Or maybe she was just furious that she was holding Cullen's hand at all.

"May we have them?" asked Tama. "May we have ponies?"

Hal smiled more easily then. "You'd have to ask your mother."

Lanaya's face shifted in surprise, softened and hardened and softened again. And she smiled just a little at her sister. Smiled and removed her hand from the Commander's under the pretense of picking up her teacup and saucer.

It was such a small but meaningful gesture of kindness Hal nearly wept.

"Why don't we wait until we've settled in here to start asking for things," said Lanaya quietly.

The twins fell back to their meals with silent, sweet (but disappointed) patience. And beneath the table, Cullen's now-free left hand squeezed Hal's knee, a strong but brief contact.

"And you, Spurian?" he prompted, as though asking an expert his opinion on important Inquisition matters, "What do you want?"

Spurian did not hesitate.

"Fenris."

"Fenris?" Hal and her Commander repeated.

"Yes."

"Care to say why?" asked Cullen.

"He escaped slavery. He killed his master. He kills slavers! I want to meet him."

Lanaya went still beside them, blanched as though waiting for someone to leap from the walls and arrest them all for such seditious talk.

Nothing leapt from the walls.

But something hard and loud slammed into the glass panels of the little window overlooking the courtyard.

The children screamed.

Chapter Text

Thunk.

The second hit knocked the piled snow from the glass. Pale morning sunlight came streaming in, broken up into warped diamond shapes where the panels were joined.

"What in Andraste's name...?" asked Cullen. 

He was on his feet in a moment but Hal was smaller and faster. She was already unlocking and pushing at the bottom of the window when she felt his warmth hovering protectively behind her.

The hinges of the window screeched in protest as she shoved it outward, and she had to lean most of her body out of it to properly latch the heavy rectangle into position so it wouldn't fall on her head. This meant she had to lift herself off the floor entirely, leaving her toes dangling several inches above the stone.

Cullen's large, steadying hand found the wing of her hip and Hal's breath caught. It was not only in her cheeks she felt the heat. She knew the fire running through her body was mutual when his firm grip twitched in hesitation. But neither dared pull away. Or neither wanted to.

Cullen cleared his throat. "Can you see--"

A large white projectile came hurtling toward her from below. She prepared to dive backward into the room and slam the window shut, but the assault was badly aimed. It slammed wetly into the wall a good ten feet beneath Hal and stuck to the stone. Whatever it had been before, it was now a sloppy half-sphere.

Hal let out a surprised laugh.

It was a snowball.

She followed its trajectory to its source and found, standing up in a little gaggle in the courtyard below, a Qunari, a dwarf, two humans, and an elf. The snow came up to the knees of the humans, which meant poor Varric was buried up to his waist. And still his tunic splayed open, exposing that infamous mass of chest hair.

"Oh, Mythal's mercy!" cried Merrill unhappily.

"At least you got closer than I did, Daisy," laughed the dwarf.

"That crossbow's made you lazy," teased Bull. "You gotta work on your reach."

"I'm a dwarf," said Varric drily. "The only reaching I do is for ale."

Hawke shuffled awkwardly through the snow to plant herself behind the consternated elf. She slowly went through the motion required for throwing. "You have to really bring your arm back, Merrill. And release a lot earlier."

"Tell me again why I can't just use magic?"

"Magic is cheating."

Bethany snorted her disagreement. "It's only cheating because you can't do it."

Hal'lasean took in a deep breath and shouted down to her people below. "What's going on here?"

It was only then they noticed the open window and the Inquisitor hanging precariously out of it.

"Hey, Boss!" Bull called, waving one massive arm over his horns. "How's breakfast going?"

"It was going just fine before our window came under attack!" replied Hal. "You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you, Bull? See any Avvar with goats about?"

Bull and Varric laughed heartily at that.

"What's this about goats?" asked Hawke. Hal couldn't see her expression in much detail from so far overhead, but there was a hint of something small and irritable in her tone.

Varric gave her an appeasing grin. "Now that's a story. See, early in the Inquisition--"

Hal rolled her eyes. "Tell it later! Why are you attacking my sister's window?"

But as soon as she asked the question, she realized exactly what was going on.

"First Snow," murmured Hal, and Cullen echoed her in slow understanding. Suddenly they were both grinning.

"First Snow, Boss!" laughed Bull. "And you're the one who declared attendance is mandatory!"

"I did declare that, didn't I," said Hal'lasean with amusement.

Varric smirked. "There was an official writ and everything! So get your ass down here, Rosie! And bring Curly and the family! If I have to be out in this shit freezing my balls off, so do you!"

"Joke's on you, Varric! I don't have balls!" Hal crowed. "And don't call me Rosie!"

Varric snorted. "Get down here or I'll call you a lot worse!"

Cullen laughed low in his chest behind her. "This is entirely your fault. You know they're not going to leave us alone until we go out there."

"I know." Hal sighed as though she bore a great burden, but already her heart was singing for her friends, for the outside, for First Snow. 

There could be no better time for her sister and her children to arrive. This would show them what life was like in Skyhold. It would let them see the community and feel welcomed. If they participated. Lanaya would agree if it made her children happy. And what child could resist fresh-fallen snow?

So. She had a plan. It would work. She just had to convince them to go outside.

Hal slid off the window and Cullen stepped aside to let her pass. Together they turned, smiling foolishly, to face the bewildered and skittish family still at the table.

"Nothing to worry about," Hal began cheerfully. "The blizzard last night buried the courtyard in several feet of snow and some of my people are out making mischief in it." She hesitated a moment, taking in the still-worried faces that looked back at her. Her smile sweetened. "It also happens to be the very first real snow of the season. And it's tradition in Skyhold that on the first snow of the season, we all go out and play in it for a few hours, then come back in for hot cocoa and mulled wine and soup."

Already the twins' eyes were rounding in their sun-kissed faces. Lanaya remained impassive, but Spurian looked intensely alarmed.

"Several feet?" he echoed, his voice cracking as only a young man's can.

"Of snow," Cullen agreed wryly.

"I've never seen no snow," said Tully slowly, as though testing out the idea. "What's it like?"

"Cold," was Lanaya's frank reply. "And wet."

"Like ice magic?" Tamalin asked softly.

"Softer," Hal assured her. "Like powder. Each one is a tiny crystal, totally unique, and they melt on your hands and hair and tongue. And you can shape it like wet sand into balls to throw at your friends or you can make people out of it and dress them in scarves and hats."

Tully and Tama made their mouths into 'o's of wonder.

Cullen smiled nostalgically. "When I was a boy in Honnleath, we would build mazes through it and at the center we'd make a castle. My sisters would be princesses and my brother and I would be knights errant, battling imaginary dragons to rescue the girls."

Hal let out a scoffed laugh. "We used to make an army of snowshems and play at war. There were no princesses to be rescued in Lavellan."

"Clearly," said Cullen. He met Hal's eyes and they tried not to beam at each other.

She was so distracted by his quirked smile and the fond way his amber gaze found her lips that Hal almost missed the way Lanaya's chin set. The way her brows pulled low over teal eyes that no longer saw the room in front of them.

"In Alerion," Lanaya said quietly, and her voice was so constrained she cleared her throat and began again. "In Alerion, our father and his apprentices would build us crenallated walls and tall towers with trees at their center. He called it Elvhenan and each winter he would build it a new way and we would help. And the storyteller would light a fire inside and we would gather for molasses candies shaped like vallaslin. The storyteller would tell us all the stories of the glory of The People. We played in it for months. Every spring it would melt. It was how we knew it was time to move on, when the last tower fell. The storyteller would gather us in the ruin and tell us about the Dread Wolf's betrayal and the fall of Arlathan. And that night as we packed up the last of our things into the aravel, Babae would sit us on the steps and tell us to remember that, like the winter, Elvhenan would come again."

When she finished, Lanaya shook her head as though to clear it of some other life, some other woman. She seemed lost and uncertain. Hal, on the other hand, was a wreck. She was bent slightly forward as though she'd been punched in the gut, her heart pounding, her face on fire. 

She'd thought hearing about her parents would make it easier, would give her a connection she had always yearned for and always lacked. And it did. Oh, she had a sense of connection so strong it strangled her soul. But with that, there was an ancient, spirit-rending sense of loss, older than even Elgar'nan. Hal had known it all her life, a dull ache that was occasionally a keen dagger to the chest at moments when a parent was most needed. But she didn't remember the people who had given her life. She knew them only as the two Dalish corpses in the woods.

And then that dream, the pungent memory of death and despair. Her father, broken and weak, giving up. Not just on his life, but on the young lives of his two daughters. A coward's choice. Inaction. Surrender: the greatest of Dalish sins.

Hal had resolved to hate that man, their father, without even realizing it. It was easy to have spent her life bereft of his love when that love seemed so worthless.

But the man Lanaya described...the man her sister named Babae...

What would her life have been if that thoughtful, dedicated man had raised her?

"I don't--" Hal gasped out. "I don't remember--"

Lanaya's expression tightened and soured, as though she finally recognized just what it was she'd said. How gently she'd said it. 

"Of course you don't," her sister snapped. "You only lived through two winters with Alerion before we left and you couldn't walk for the first one." Her features shadowed, making her appear gaunt. Even her hard eyes seemed angular and hollow. "But I remember." Her voice softened, haunted. "I remember everything."

It took all the will power Hal had to hold back the sudden urge to weep. "I remember the end," she confessed in a whisper. "I remember how you took care of me. I remember how you saved my life."

The room was silent. Not even Tully made a sound. He didn't so much as fidget.

"Of course I did," Lanaya said, hugging her arms around her chest like a tightly-laced corset. Her words lacked their earlier force, though, and she stared at the open window rather than see her sister struggling with her feelings. "What choice did I have? I'm not our father. I'm not him."

For one breathless moment Hal'lasean didn't know what to say. What could she say? She didn't know her father. Didn't know Lanaya, really. There was no comfort she could give her sister to--

Yes. That was it.

"No," agreed Hal with a tremulous smile. "You're my sister. And you didn't give up on me." And then, before she could think it through, she vowed, "And I won't give up on you."

Lanaya's face turned stony and unreadable, and Hal watched her yet again retreat from the present and her body, hiding from herself, her sister, her past. Slipping away.

"Cullen and I have to go down to First Snow," Hal said with sudden weight and weariness. "We would be delighted if you came with us, but you don't have to. Or, if you'd like, we could take the children outside and give you some time alone."

Lanaya stared at her blankly.

Spurian stepped forward, chest first. "I'll take care of them, Mother. You should rest."

There was a flicker of light in rocky teal and Lanaya stubbornly shook her head, looking even more like Hal than usual. "No," her sister stated firmly, a command to herself. "You've never seen snow before. I won't miss it."

And beneath her determination Hal thought she heard a silent vow. Lanaya would not be their father. She would not give up.

Cullen smiled broadly, infusing careful calm with his steady presence. "Excellent. You've all got the proper gear for it in the clothes you were given last night. You'll want oiled leathers and furs. Gloves and thick socks--"

"I remember," said Lanaya, and forced a small, taut smile. "I'll make sure they're properly dressed."

Cullen gave a little bow. "Of course. Then I'll close the window and we'll give you some privacy. We need to change as well. We'll meet back here and show you down? We can all go out together."

Lanaya's smile relaxed just a little. "Thank you. That would be...nice."

Cullen turned back to the window and stuck his head out so he could better reach the release latch.

A snowball exploded into his face.

"Ah! I did it! I hit the window!" Merrill gasped in pleased surprise.

"You hit more than that, Daisy!"

The laughter from the courtyard was rich and uproarious. Cullen, who had gone very, very still, dragged his hand across his hair and face, wiping white fluff from his eyes and nose. His curls fell across his forehead. 

"Oh!" Merrill cried. "Oh, I'm so sorry! Oh, Commander, I'm so-- I didn't see you!"

"Your aim would suggest otherwise," said Cullen drily. And then he grinned. "Run while you can, Kirkwall. The Inquisition is coming."

Chapter Text

The cold was not what Lanaya had expected. The cold of her childhood in Nevarra had been a damp, clinging sensation that sank into bones and set up camp there until the flowers were pushing up through puddles of half-melted slush. It had been miserable, inescapable.

Skyhold was freezing, but the high, thick walls kept out what little wind remained from the raging storm of the night before and the air was not heavy with moisture despite the deep drifts of snow that covered everything. It was crisp and dry and strangely invigorating. It nipped at cheeks and cuddled up like an insistent child, but the clothing the Inquisition had provided was more than sufficient to keep out the worst of the chill.

The army of industrious servants and low-ranking soldiers had already been out working for some time as evidenced by the meticulous way the numerous outdoor staircases had been swept clean of snow and coated with thatch meant to prevent the busy inhabitants of the fortress from slipping as they went about their day. It was on just such a step that Lanaya sat with Spurian, both silent as they considered the mayhem in the upper courtyard before them.

It had taken Cullen and “Aunt Hal” less than two minutes to convince Tully and Tama that snow was the most wonderful thing they had ever experienced. Lanaya hated that she was jealous. Hated that the joy on her children’s faces could be accompanied by such a sharp pang of hot resentment for the circumstances of their happiness.

Lanaya could not recall a time when the twins had been so…free. Even shy Tama was shrieking with laughter as complete strangers passed her around in the snow like a sack of flour. If Aunt Hal and Cullen trusted these people, so did little Tamalin. It was yet another reminder of how Lanaya had failed her children. Barely a day after meeting the Dalish Inquisitor and they were bright and joyful, testing boundaries she had drilled into them all their lives to keep them safe from the notice of those who might harm them. They had experienced things -- she had experienced things! -- that she had never even thought to dream for them: horses and a world beyond Minrathous and their own rooms with real beds, hot chocolate and a variety of impossibly luxurious foods and full stomachs, a servant to see to the fire and their basic needs, as though they were the children of merchants and not bastard slaves with a whore for a mother.

Lanaya watched the festivities from a faraway place within herself as Merrill and the Hawke sisters built a throne of snow against the tavern wall. When it was nearly finished, Master Tethras climbed up on it as though he were the ruler of a thaig made of diamond dust. He turned to bellow in the nearest door and was soon quite happily huddled around a steaming stein of something that had him making a face each time he drank it.

Hal’lasean knelt in the snow with Tamalin, teaching her with laughing teal eyes how to shape the snow into balls and pack it smooth. They were making a stack and setting them aside for some nefarious future purpose. They looked alike. The two Tamalins. They looked so much alike, despite her daughter’s dark skin and her sister’s pointed ears. Even their smiles…

Lanaya felt her breakfast coming back up at the thought. But now her mind was reeling with sudden horrible longing. She had missed so much. She had missed everything! What had her sister been like at ten? Who told her bedtime stories and held her when she cried over skinned knees? Who made sure her braids were kempt and her face and hands washed? And when she was twelve, who had explained her monthly bleed to her? Who had shown her how to count the days between and what to wear? Who was her first lover? Were they kind to her when they entered her? Had she enjoyed it?

Lanaya’s hands gripped into fists in her fur-lined gloves, her jaw clenched until her molars were grinding together hard enough to fill her ears from inside her skull.

Tully was like her sister too. He was asking a thousand questions of the massive Qunari while dangling by his knees from one wicked horn. Fearless and inquisitive, just as her hallabell had been. Wanting to be good but always finding trouble anyway.

All those times they’d had to search everywhere for her, terrified that her little feet had slipped and sent her tumbling into the swift river to be delivered into the ever-waiting arms of Falon’Din. Lanaya and Merrill always found her eventually, tucked away in a log asleep or playing with a new dangerous pet.

Lanaya and Merrill always found her eventually. Even now. After twenty-three years.

And still Lanaya couldn’t tell whether she was pleased or worried, if this was a gift or a curse. She would have to be vigilant. She would have to do whatever it took to keep her children safe. Safe first. Happiness was expensive for people like them.

“Where’s Cullen?” Spurian wondered, frowning severely at the strange but jubilant Inquisition crew before them.

Lanaya sat up a little taller and followed his gaze, searching faces and shapes in the courtyard for sign of that shock of blonde curls, for that solid frame and bright red cloak. But he had slipped away without her even noticing and for a moment Lanaya’s heart gripped and sank in her chest, which only served to irritate her. Why should she feel pain at his vanishing? He was nothing to her.

But he was important to her children. He had insinuated himself into their lives and then to just leave them like--

“BEAR!”

The snow-faring party erupted in alarmed preparations. Lanaya and Spurian leapt as one to their feet, were already rushing into the snow heedless of the danger to themselves, clumsy in the thick powder but desperate to reach the little ones, to whisk them inside to safety.

She was aware only of the pounding of her blood in her ears and the way everything around her seemed to slow, to gain a sharp clarity, to the way her world narrowed to the three children she’d birthed: Spurian beside her, racing toward the Qunari and his brother, Tully wide-eyed as he scrabbled to sit up on the horn from which he hung, and Tama, horrified, standing frozen beside Hal’lasean.

Hal’lasean, who was not protecting her. Hal’lasean, who tugged Tamalin down into the snow again and pushed a snowball into her hand. They all had snowballs now, taking from the hefty pile her sister had raised, passing them to each of their companions with wicked grins on their faces.

Lanaya saw Spurian freeze in confusion with an expression of intensity edged in betrayal that she knew she must share. These people were not worried in the least. They were pretending to be upset, pretending at danger…

“Is this really necessary!” came the indignant cry in the accent of noble Tevinter.

“First Snow is mandatory, Pavus! You know the rules!” shouted a voice that was unmistakably Cullen’s.

It was only then they came sprinting into sight, the well-coifed Altus bundled into an ornate but massive parka tripping over himself down the battlement stairs with a werecreature fast on his heels, huge and lumpy with thick black fur and long fangs--

No. Not a werecreature.

Cullen.

He wore the head and coat of a Great Bear as a hood and cloak as he chased after Lord Pavus in a most undignified manner, crowing victoriously each time the Tevinter mage swore oaths at him in several languages.

“You will pay for this, Rutherford! On my honor!”

“What honor!” laughed Cullen.

But a little voice from behind him lifted in protest. “Bears don’t talk!”

“Ha ha!” said the nobleman over his shoulder. He didn’t see the final step and promptly fell face-first in the snow.

Hal’lasean and her fellows laughed until they wheezed, but Cullen did not stop to claim his prey. Instead, he dove past the downed Vint and into the courtyard proper, shadowed by two dark elven children with masses of curly hair between them. They brandished wooden swords over their heads and shouted Dalish hunting cries at the man in the bear fur.

Lanaya sat down abruptly on whatever was nearest -- a bag of something that felt like sand -- and hid her trembling hands together in the long, warm sleeves of her coat. She floated somewhere within herself, not quite touching her body, not quite seeing or hearing what surrounded her.

At Hal’lasean’s insistence and with great encouragement and support, Tama and Tully began to throw snowballs at the passing bear, and soon they too were chasing him in their little lined boots, two wild Dalish children and two elfblooded Tevinter bastards. And Cullen played along, sometimes turning to growl, sometimes hiding around a corner and leaping out to surprise them, and finally trudging through the snow on his hands and knees, trying to hide how winded he was by the weight of four preadolescents hanging from his neck and back.

The others watched and laughed, calling out helpful ideas to the children and sarcastic comments to the Commander. And though Lanaya was only vaguely aware of her fingers or her quick breathing, she did not miss the way Hal’lasean pushed a snowball into Spurian’s shocked hands and smiled while she murmured into his ear until his brows went up in surprise. She did not miss his uncertainty when she nodded or his hesitation when his aunt turned on the snow throne by the tavern, pelting Master Tethras right in his exposed chest. She did not miss that though Spurian was too uneasy to join the assault, he handed Hal’lasean his snowball...and began to make her more.

She did not miss it when he laughed.

“She wants what you want.”

Lanaya jerked up from her thoughts to find an awkward young man with a very large hat crouched beside her in the snow. His scraggly blonde hair fell into his face, but his eyes were strange and overlarge behind the veil of his bangs.

“Safe, steady, sheltered, special...saved. She wants what you want. She--”

“Leave, spirit.”

The boy blinked up at the looming figure of a muscular elf, his arms crossed firmly over his chest.

“Yes,” said the young man. “You can help better. Besides...I like First Snow.”

He stood and wandered dreamily out to join the others, leaving Lanaya uncomfortably alone with Fenris, grim and infamous.

Chapter Text

For a long while -- an awkward eternity, it seemed -- neither freed slave said a word. They simply stood together, Lanaya numb and stiff on piled burlap sacks half-drowned in snow, Fenris leaned against the wall beside her, arms still crossed. They each bore the same stony non-expression, the kind that only their sort developed, to avoid beatings or worse because of a stray smirk or a lifted brow at the wrong time. In Minrathous, it would have given away their station as surely as their pointed ears.

Not even their faces had been their own.

Beyond them, in the open, glittering snow of the upper courtyard, the party was expanding. Children -- human, dwarven, elven -- in all manner of clothing, bundled up expertly against the winter weather, emerged from doors Lanaya had not even noticed before, like ants spilling from a mound. Toddlers and teenagers and everything in between raced out to meet their friends and enjoy the occasion, parents or older siblings or family friends accompanying them with weary smiles. Some of the adults joined in the play while others began to roost like pigeons on the steps and eaves, wrapping their gloved hands around mugs of hot drinks or oven-warmed bread and talking amiably to one another with a familiarity that Lanaya did not understand. As if they were all one race. One clan.

And in the center of all this were her children. The snowball fight between Kirkwall and Skyhold had quickly become a dogpile and then dissolved into teaching the younger children to make snowdragons. Tully and Tama were holding hands with the little Dalish boy now, gleefully racing from one spot of untouched powder to another, despoiling them with exaggerated flops onto their backs, where they waved their hands and feet with gusto.

Hal’lasean, meanwhile, had set her companions to the task of creating some kind of ambitious edifice using the wall of the long main stair. So far it was only a low outline of many rooms, like the last gasp of an Elvhen ruin. More had joined the effort and Lanaya even recognized some of them -- the muscular human woman with short-cropped black hair and an abrasive manner whose serious mien rivaled even Spurian’s (Lanaya could not recall her name) and the beautiful human ambassador with a richly embroidered cloak and gloves, her dark hair pinned up in ringlets -- and again Lanaya was baffled by the ease with which they fell into a rhythm as a team. They shouted and joked with one another, occasionally argued semantics and physics and ordered each other around, but mostly they seemed a comfortable company of equals. Even the Inquisitor herself was down on her knees in the snow with two dwarven women, carefully shaping large brick and handing them over to the mages.

The mages were a strange group as well. They consisted of a merry but constantly complaining Lord Pavus, a laughing Bethany Hawke, a very chipper Merrill...and quiet, concentrated Spurian. Hal’lasean and her dwarven helpers would finish a block and hand it to whoever was closest, whose job it was then to find a spot for it and set it there. Then one of the mages would come by and heat the joint between blocks, followed quickly by refreezing it. The outer wall was already just above knee height.

Lanaya distracted herself from the unease of Fenris’ silent presence by making careful study of the way each of her sister’s magical allies drew their runes, wielded their power. Each mage’s art was as unique as a fingerprint, as handwriting, and Amantius had taught her long ago just how much could be gleaned about an opponent through something as simple as the way they hold their staff. She made note of the well-trained collegiate foundation of the Altus’ casting -- a style she knew well -- of his ease, his flourished gestures, the little extra something he added to each spell. He barely paid attention to what he worked, but his actions were never lazy or thoughtless. Rather, that air of his was entirely put on. The Hawke girl was a little more rustic, a little less precise. It was intuitive for her rather than skilled, which made sense when Lanaya recalled that in Master Tethras’ book, he mentioned she’d spent most of her life as an apostate. Her gestures were small, reserved, likely from years of trying to hide what she was doing.

And then there was Merrill.

Her cousin’s runes and movements, even her spells, were unlike the other two almost entirely. They were organic but studied and measured. And Dalish. So very, painfully Dalish. Lanaya suddenly could not tell if the lump in her throat was tears or vomit. Perhaps it was both. Merrill laughed and tossed her head and the morning light caught the tattoos inked dark on her pale skin. And Lanaya hated her. Hated her for having all the things Lanaya should have had. Hated her for being what Lanaya should have been. But hated her most of all for having those things, being those things, and then throwing it all away and for what? A mirror to make travel easier? It was not so special, Merrill’s Eluvian, not when there were so many more already connected, open and waiting for the Inquisition to make use of them.

It should have been Lanaya. Lanaya should have gone to Sabrae. She would have been a hard-working and loyal First. The Keeper would not have died and perhaps Hal’lasean would still be Tamalin. Perhaps her parents would have come with her to Sabrae and they could have been safe and together and happy as they always should have been. And Merrill could have been exiled to the wilderness to starvation or enslavement.

Lanaya should be Sabrae. Merrill should be dead.

And her children would have always been free and joyful. Spurian would be her First and--

No. No, she realized with a sickening plummet of her heart. Because if she had been Keeper and all three of her children had been mages…

She would have lost at least one. Or all of them. To that stupid, savage tradition!

“If you don’t breathe,” said a gravelly voice behind her, “you’ll pass out.”

Fenris.

“Mind your own business,” Lanaya snapped. But she breathed.

Fenris made a disgruntled scoffing sound. “I usually do.”

Lanaya’s lips twisted downward with fury frosted in irritation. “No need to change on my account,” she replied shortly.

“You’re angry,” Fenris said approvingly. “Angry is good.”

“I thought you usually minded your own business.” Unless, Lanaya thought suddenly, Merrill or Hal’lasean had sent him to try to...what, gain her trust? As though just because they were both former slaves they had anything in common! The fury began to pour through cracks in her irritation. “Which of them was it.”

“What.”

Lanaya exhaled, spinning the anxious part of her agitation into kindling for her rage. When she finally turned to glare her indignation at the lyrium-lined man, she found him studying her with an intent disinterest that was almost as infuriating at his bothering her in the first place.

“Which of them,” she said, very slowly, in case he was simply an idiot, “sent you over here. Merrill or Hal’lasean?”

This earned her an expression of consternation from Fenris. “No one sent me anywhere. I go where I please.”

“Well, please go anywhere else,” Lanaya fired back. “Whatever it is you’re hoping to accomplish, it won’t work. I’m not some stray slave who doesn’t know any better you can convert to your cause. I’m not interested in being fixed or saved or bonding over stories about how things were. I loved my master. He saved my life. He was my life. I never wanted this, I never wanted my freedom.”

She expected Fenris to fight back. She expected him to glow and scowl and stalk toward her as he had done to Dorian the day before. She expected him to argue and insult her. He would not have been the first freedman to call her traitor or fool. And for a moment it seemed that would be exactly his reaction. For a moment. An exhilarating moment.

Finally, her blood seemed to sing, finally someone she could fight!

She didn’t have her staff, but there were runes she could draw, spells she could cast that did not require an amplifier. And if she needed, she could call for the one Spurian was using.

And then his expression clouded and he frowned damningly down at his boots.

“I understand.”

It was so quiet and the celebration around them so raucous that at first Lanaya wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly.

“Sometimes I still--” But Fenris’ mouth twisted into a sneer and he shook his head to clear it. “Your master was Amantius?”

Lanaya’s fists clenched in her gloves, as though she could dig her nails into her palms despite the layers of leather protecting her skin. How dare this rebellious murderer speak her love’s name! How dare he!

Her voice was cold as the air around them. “Everyone knows your master’s name. And yours.”

Fenris hesitated. “Your children are his.”

“Yes,” was all Lanaya said.

The other elf released an audible sigh, but it was some time before he spoke again. When he did, he was looking not at Lanaya but at the Champion of Kirkwall. “I can’t save you. Or fix you. I don’t care to try. But I thought I should warn you. That it gets worse -- much worse -- before it gets better. And you can’t do it alone. Believe me, I tried.”

“So, what, I should make friends with my sister and my cousin,” guessed Lanaya with dry dismissal.

“I didn’t say that,” replied Fenris darkly. “I know nothing of sisters, much less cousins. But you should find someone. Someone you trust. You’re going to need them. Whoever you choose.”

Lanaya felt herself disengage from her body. She didn’t reply.

In the silence that followed, they watched Lord Pavus put a hand on Spurian’s shoulder and compliment the steadiness and power of his magic. Spurian jerked away in disgusted shock, presenting the Altus with his chest out and his shoulders squared, daring the noble to try it again.

“I’m not your slave!” Spurian yelped, his voice cracking. “You can’t hurt me here! I’m equal! They said we’re equal!”

Pavus’s face faltered, what looked like guilt and pain, horror, and held up his palms as he backed away.

“My apologies,” the man murmured, his cheeks draining of color. “I didn’t mean-- fasta vass! My apologies.”

He turned on his heel and made quickly for the closest stairs, heedless of where they led, and Hal’lasean hopped to her feet and darted after him, grabbing for his elbow to stop his retreat.

“Dorian!” she called, all concerned compassion. “Dorian, wait!”

There was open hurt and shame in his visage when he turned to face the Inquisitor, and the two of them stood nearly as close as lovers as they spoke quietly, intensely. She touched his cheek and jaw, they rested their foreheads together, and then he shook his head, gave her a tight smile, and fled into the keep. And while Hal’lasean stood staring worriedly after him, Cullen gently led Spurian off to the side, where they too had a hushed conversation.

Lanaya stood abruptly, prepared to march over to the Commander and her son and demand to know what was being said. What he was telling Spurian, who worshipped him already. But behind her, Fenris snorted.

“It seems your son doesn’t share your views.”

Lanaya whipped around to face Fenris, presenting her chest with her shoulders squared in defiance, in threat. She took one dangerous step toward the other elf, letting her magic spark into life over her hands and arms. He pushed off the wall and assumed a fighting stance, and what tattoos were visible through his winter wear lit in blue-white lyrium glow.

“You stay the fuck away from my children,” she snarled, and wind whipped in a sudden whirl through the snow around her, “or I will rip those expensive marks from your skin and choke you with them and then I will ride back into Minrathous with your carcass across my horse like a butchered stag, do I make myself perfectly clear.”

“Naya.”

Her sister’s voice -- her adult voice, not the little one that haunted Lanaya’s darkest dreams -- from just behind her shoulder, gentle and filled with a raw empathy that felt like someone pulling her ribs apart one by one.

“Naya, you’re safe. They’re safe.” When neither Lanaya nor Fenris so much as shifted, Hal’lasean stepped closer. “Naya,” she pleaded earnestly. “Come inside with me. It’s okay. They’re okay. Come inside, Naya. Please.”

Lanaya hesitated, swallowed painfully. Shifted with her chin lifted in stubborn pride. “Do I...make myself...clear.”

Fenris’ green eyes narrowed even as his lips formed a vicious sneer. “You’re enslaving yourself, mage. Don’t make your children slaves too.”

Lanaya lunged.

Someone was screaming.

No, she thought with distant amusement as her sister tackled her to the snow, I'm screaming. I'm always screaming.

Chapter Text

The Commander stood just inside the final door between Hal’s tower and the Main Hall, tugging uselessly at the clasp of his cloak and trying to remember to breathe. His blonde curls fell into his eyes whenever a draft blew through the castle walls, reminding him just how badly it needed a trim. But that would have to wait.

He had left the children, anxious and upset, with Varric and the Hawke sisters, who had promised to distract them with stories and hot chocolate before a roaring fire. This might work with the twins, but Spurian would not be so easily turned from his worries. Cullen’s heart broke for the serious young man he had comforted in the snow. He was such a brave and good lad, Spurian. He tried so hard to be a man when he was still such a little boy inside. And the things he’d yelled at Dorian…

Maker’s breath, but the way Spurian was shaking with terror and fury when Cullen pulled him aside was enough to make the Commander want to swaddle him in old quilts and rock him to sleep with lullabies and fairy tales until he learned what it meant to be a child.

And then just when Hal had sent Dorian inside and turned to help with the boy, just when Cullen had begun to convince Spurian that he was safe and protected and equal, Lanaya leapt at Fenris like a wild animal. Cullen had rushed to Hal’s side to keep Lanaya restrained as they pulled her to her feet. But she was out of her mind, shrieking and kicking and hurling magic. Someone -- likely Merrill or Bethany Hawke -- cast a sleep spell on the woman, and she crumpled into Cullen’s arms.

So Cullen found himself carrying her prone form draped across his arms as he had once carried Hal’lasean in the snow after Haven, as he had carried her when she collapsed on the battlements from the force of the orb’s power. And he found himself wondering just why it was he only seemed to have women in his arms when they were unconscious.

He’d followed Hal to her tower and draped Lanaya across the Inquisitor’s canopied bed, carefully positioning her arms and legs so she would be comfortable in her sleep. Or at least as comfortable as anyone could be with whatever demons she battled raging in her head.

Cullen could sympathize with that. Maker, just the thought of it brought back images of the Fereldan Circle, of--

That was all he could do for her. He’d assured Hal he would have a servant fetch everything for a hot bath and a change of clothes, that he would send to the kitchen for tea and soup and anything else that was filling and comforting and good. He wanted to be up there with them. He wanted to sit with Hal and hold Lanaya’s hand and assure both of them it would be all right. But he also knew he had no place in that room with those women. He had sisters; he knew there were some things they needed to sort through together.

He just hoped they could remember that they were sisters long enough to sort through them.

And in the meantime, someone would need to look after the children.

That…that Cullen could do.

So he adjusted his cloak one more time, fixed as cheerful a look on his face as he could muster, and shoved open the door to the Main Hall.

They were just where Varric said they would be, gathered around a table by the dwarf’s favorite fireplace, surrounded by piles of wet coats and cloaks and gloves. Tully and Tama sat on either side of the author, mouths hanging open, already too enthralled in whatever story he was telling them to spare a worry for their breaking mother. They would remember soon enough, but for now they were warm and entertained and unaware even of the chocolate foam that stuck to their upper lips.

But Spurian was standing behind them, back to the fire, arms crossed over his wool tunic with an expression like the Storm Coast when the wind is high. His teal eyes -- so like his mother’s, so like his aunt’s -- were locked on Cullen. He had tried to come with them. He had nearly picked a fight of his own in his insistence, but Tama was crying and Tully kept shouting for his mother, and soon Spurian understood where he was truly needed.

The moment he met Spurian’s eyes across the hall, the boy was stalking toward him, shoulders hunched, chin lowered, as though he were a bronto about to charge. He would make an imposing man one day, especially with proper meals and some real muscle on his lanky form. But for now Cullen saw him for what he really was: a scared, angry little boy, bravely demanding answers.

It took the Commander several tries to hide the pity from his face, but by the time he met Spurian in the middle of the Main Hall, he had schooled himself into sympathy instead, one hand out to calm his adolescent temper.

“She’s resting,” he said before Spurian had a chance to ask. “Hal’lasean’s with her. We’re going to order her a warm bath and some fresh clothes and some tea and food. She’ll be up in Hal’s tower; it’s the quietest and most private place in the castle. Hal’s there with her now--”

“She doesn’t like Hal!” Spurian protested immediately, taking an urgent step around Cullen. “I should be there with her! She needs me!”

Cullen knew better than to grab at an agitated teenaged boy; he remembered all too well his own altercations with his father and then with his teachers in the Chantry when the world seemed unfair. And the world had been infinitely kinder to him at that point than it had been to Spurian. But he did step along with Spurian, not quite blocking his way, but slowing his progress.

“Do you think she’d want you worrying about her or keeping the twins calm and happy?” he reminded Spurian gently. “Your mother is going through...a lot right now. I can’t pretend I know exactly what, but I have…some understanding of what it’s like to…” Cullen took a breath and pushed his hand through his already messy curls. “Maker’s breath...of what it’s like to not be sure of what’s real and what isn’t, to spend your whole life believing something because you must and then suddenly finding that thing was never true. To forget what it feels like to be safe and then, when you finally are, to find you can’t remember how to trust it.”

Spurian’s features twisted and scrunched into the scowl that Cullen now recognized immediately as his serious thinking face. It was an endearing expression, adorable really, though that wasn’t something any fifteen-year-old boy wanted to hear.
“She should be with things she knows are real then,” Spurian decided with the certainty of his youth. “That’s me. That’s Tully and Tama. She doesn’t know if Aunt Hal is real. I didn’t even know she existed until…!”

“Spurian,” Cullen sighed, and though the manly thing to do would be to clasp his hand on the boy’s shoulder, the Commander found himself reaching instead to cup the back of his head.

Spurian’s gaze jerked up in alarm and uncertainty, but Cullen met it with steadiness and weight, with a small, melancholy smile that he hoped spoke of some little measure of his understanding and care. Once again Spurian’s face became that puzzled glower.

“Do you trust me?” Cullen asked, searching for some hint of connection in those familiar Alerion eyes. “It’s fine if you don’t.”

The boy fidgeted and squirmed, but made no attempt to back away or to eschew the Commander’s touch. He sought the answer anywhere but Cullen, looking to the rafters and the throne and the tapestries and apparently still not finding anything that satisfied him. “I…” Suddenly the fight went out of Spurian’s shoulders and they dropped several inches. Where he had looked angry before, now he was only...tired. Anxious. This was a child with the weight of all Thedas bearing down on him.

And then, Andraste help him, Cullen could think of nothing better to do for him than to pull him in close and wrap his big soldier’s arms around Spurian’s gangly body, crushing the young man to his chest until the rigidity left his spine and he pushed his hands into Cullen’s cloak, making fists in the red wool. Spurian gripped Cullen like his life depended on it. He buried his face into the Commander’s embroidered overcoat and gave no sign of ever willingly letting go of their embrace.

Cullen breathed a helpless laugh because otherwise he might tear up. “Hey,” he murmured, ruffling Spurian’s dark silver hair. “It’s going to be okay. I give you my word. Everything’s going to be okay.”

And as the sudden seeping warmth in Cullen’s chest spread through his veins, he felt for the first time in months that maybe, just maybe, that could be true for him too.

Chapter Text

When the world came back into focus, Lanaya was being stripped naked.

This was not so unusual for a woman whose whole life had revolved around sex, but the hands that tugged at her wet winter wools were uncharacteristically gentle and kind. They were also feminine, which was not unheard of, but rarer by far for Lanaya. She did as the hands bid her, standing or shifting her weight or holding up her arms, but she couldn’t remember how to make her fingers work to help, nor could she find the will. She didn’t want to have sex. But that never mattered. And since the hands did not seem to protest her stillness, she made no effort to change her behavior.

Besides, she thought wistfully, perhaps the hands would be angry with her and kill her and then she could finally rest. That would be nice.

But who would care for the children? asked a pained voice in the back of her mind. Your babies need you.

No, said another part of her, bitter and angry but right, you will ruin them. It’s better for them this way.

A sound in the room like the panicked song of a trapped whale or a wayward Despair Demon made her heart seize and her skull rattle. It increased in volume until it was unbearable, until it tore at her soul with jagged, putrid nails, and something broke in the dark places inside her.

It wasn’t until the hands became arms that wrapped around her and clutched her tightly to a body with long silver braids and a head that cooed comforting things at her in a voice full of pain that she realized her mouth had been wide open.

That keening sound was coming from her mouth! That anguished moan was coming from Lanaya!

“Naya,” said the silver-haired voice with a great depth of empathy, “oh, Naya, I am so sorry. Ir ab-- ah, I’m so sorry.”

Who was the voice? Was she finally dead? Had she been dead all along? Perhaps she had died in the woods with her sister and her parents and her unborn brothers and this had all been a strange fevered dream but she was finished now, she had embraced Falon’Din and was carried to the Beyond where her mother undressed her for robes made of good dreams and now held her and comforted her.

“Mamae,” she croaked, her voice unrecognizable to her own ears. Had she grown up? What was that awful sound she couldn’t stop making? Her face was pouring from all its openings like those horrible malformed creatures in the fountains of Amantius’ courtyard, like her little sister when they drank the bad water because they lost the river and almost lost her.

Her boisterous little sister. They saved her from one cruel death only to give her to another. Falon’Din must have wanted her badly. He must have wanted them all so badly.

“N-no,” stammered her mother’s strained voice. “Naya, it’s...it’s me. It’s...Hal’la--” Her mother faltered and pressed her forehead to Lanaya’s hair. Silver hair like her mother’s. Like her sister’s.

“It’s Tamalin, Naya. It’s...it’s your hallabell.”

Lanaya shook her head with slow, stubborn swings, unwilling to believe because believing felt like a hundred stabbing pains deep within her, like the human slavers she dreamed once had bent her over and battered her insides until she bled. It hurt all the way to her heart and sometimes she thought maybe that’s what was leaking from between her legs. Her heart had broken in the woods and the slavers had shaken it loose and now her hope and innocence was draining down her thighs in thick red-black liquid.

Like her mother.

Mamae, her spirit cried out inside her. I want my Mamae!

But it wasn’t Mamae. It was Tama. Her first Tama.

No.

“Tamalin died in the woods!”

Lanaya felt the words rip from her throat but she hadn’t said them, she was sure she hadn’t said them, even though they were right. “Tamalin died! I left her to die!”

“No, no, Naya,” the voice insisted, “she didn’t die, I-- I didn’t die! You saved Tama, Naya! You saved me!”

Suddenly the hands were clasping at her cheeks and making her eyes look at their own reflections.

No, not reflections. She knew those eyes. They were her father’s eyes. They were her eyes. Alerion eyes.

Her sister’s eyes.

“Tama?”

“Yes,” gasped the voice fervently, and the hands moved fingers over the ridges of her ears to comfort her the way her mother used to. “Yes, Naya, it's Tama and you’re alive and you saved me and you’re safe, asha’ma--”

Her sister’s too-old face cringed, squeezing withheld tears out from the corners of her Alerion eyes.

“My sister,” she said instead, dark brows like their mother’s lifting and knitting with the intensity of her words. “My Naya, you’re finally safe, you’re safe and you’re free and your children are safe and free and no one...no one is going to hurt any of you anymore and you won’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, not ever again. You can leave if you want, you can stay, whatever you want for you and for your children, okay? And I’m going to take care of you. You’ll always have more money than you need and a place to live all your own and your children will be fed and educated and safe. Naya, you’re all safe now, I swear it on...on our blood. I swear it on my life.”

How could she swear it on her life when she had been dead so long? Crusted eyes and crusted lips and a belly swollen with hunger and parasites, clothed only in flies and falling leaves because she was a grotesque doll, hollow of the spirit that never stayed still.

And yet here she was, Tamalin, her baby sister, grown and solid and warm and real. She felt real, but how could Lanaya trust anything her senses told her? How, when she had amputated them in messy desperation to survive the slavers’ relentless assaults?

She had only ever been able to trust herself. And now she could not even trust that.

She had nothing.

This was a dream. Or death.

But if...if her life had not been a dream -- a nightmare -- if she had three beautiful children, who would...who would care for them if she was…?

“My babies?”

Her voice sounded like a baby’s. Too high. Too tight. It cracked with strain and need and helplessness.

No, an ironbark voice shouted from inside her. Not helpless! Never again!

“They’re safe,” her sister said like a vow. Tamalin’s voice was trapped in between like hers, part child and part woman. “They’re safe, Naya. No one can hurt them here. No one can hurt you here. They’re just downstairs. Cullen is with them. Do you want to see them?”

Yes! her whole body cried.

But her mind controlled her mouth.

“No!” she gasped, the sound grating against her already-raw throat. “No, keep them away! They can’t see me like-- they--”

How could she care for them when she didn’t even know how old she was or where she was or whether she was alive?!

She couldn’t.

She couldn’t.

Danarius’ slave was right.

She was poisoning them.

Her bones melted like magma in her body and she collapsed in on herself.

Lanaya knew the floor and Tamalin with her arms around her saying sweet things, always such a sweet girl, but like the time she left her with the halla, there were some places her little sister couldn’t go with her. Down, down, down into the dark stillness that had been waiting inside her all her life. Only Lanaya could go there.

It was peaceful. Like the end of drowning. Like death.

“Promise me,” she heard her mouth say without her, “promise me you’ll love them. Promise...you’ll be what I can’t for them.”

She watched those Alerion eyes widen and wet from deep under the water of her soul and thought distantly how strange it must feel so many things so freely.

Tamalin was free. Tamalin could teach them.

“I already love them,” Tamalin said earnestly, “I loved them before I even knew they existed. As I have always loved you, Naya, even when I couldn’t...remember. I--”

She shook her head, messy silver braids jangling silently.

This time all she said was, “I promise. I promise.”

Good.

Now Lanaya could finally let go.

“Naya?” Tamalin called from far, far away. Then, panicked, “Naya!”

But Lanaya was sinking deep down below the light, falling forever and, for the first time in over twenty years, weighing nothing. Bearing nothing.

“Naya!”

No, my hallabell. I am too far gone.

Chapter Text

Someone was screaming, loud and terrified. A girl. A little girl.

Someone else must have heard it because the door downstairs burst open and heavy footsteps came racing up the two flights, through the next door, and into the tower proper.

Hal was aware of this only vaguely. Mostly what she knew was her big sister slumped in her arms, both of them collapsed on the ground, and Naya…

Babae shakes Mamae harder and harder each time he yells her name. Not her Mamae name but the one grown ups used.

“Liall! Liall! Vhenan!”

Her eyes are closed. Her mouth hangs open.

Babae shakes her harder. So hard her teeth snap.

Tamalin wants to tell him Stop! Stop! She doesn’t like it, she wants to bite you!

But Babae told her for once in her life, be silent.

Babae is not. Babae is howling.

“Vhenan! Vhenan! Liall! Don’t leave me!”

“Don’t leave me!” the young girl was shouting, sobbing.

Someone was shaking Lanaya.

“Don’t leave me again!” shrieked the girl.

Then someone was shaking her.

“Inquisitor! Inquisitor!”

“Don't leave me again, Naya!” the girl cried. “Not again!”

A hand -- rough, calloused -- grabbed at her face and jerked her chin up and sideways and through the warped lenses of salt tears she didn’t even know she’d been crying, she was forced to meet worried brown eyes.

“Hal’lasean, please!”

Cassandra?

“Enough! Enough, Hal’lasean! Hal’lasean, please, you must stop screaming!”

She wasn’t screaming! It was the little girl! The little girl who was scared and alone and silent--

Oh.

Like snapping suddenly back into her own body from somewhere else entirely, Hal became abruptly aware of the rawness of her throat and the unintelligible sounds coming from her gaping mouth and her desperate grip on Lanaya as she shook her as her father had once shaken her mother’s corpse.

She wanted to throw up.

“Hal’lasean!” Cassandra tried again, and this time she caught Hal’s arms and held them still with muscles meant for massive swords.

Hal only used daggers. She soon stopped struggling and watched like an empty vessel as the human woman carefully removed her white-knuckled hold on Lanaya’s limp, naked body finger by finger.

She watched Cassandra study her sister, touch her neck to feel the blood pumping in her veins and leaned in to feel the breath move in and out of her slack lips.

With only a disconcerted frown at Hal’lasean, the Seeker gathered Lanaya into her arms and carried her to the bed, laid her out as though she were only sleeping, gently tucked her into the covers and pulled her hair out from beneath her back and shoulders.

When Cassandra had finished, she turned again to regard Hal with her hands on her hips and concern in her scarred face.

“Hal’lasean…” she began, but trailed off as though she were at a loss for words. She took in a deep breath and sighed it out. Finally, she decided, “I will fetch a healer.”

Cassandra turned to go and something inside of Hal burst.

“Don’t go!” she gasped, reaching out in panic. “Cassandra! Don’t-- please--”

The Seeker’s shoulders drooped as she turned around to look once again at the pitiful form of her Inquisitor, hunched splay-legged on the floor, still in her thick wools and furs.

Cassandra held out her arms helplessly and shook her head, her brows climbing her forehead in disbelief. “What can I possibly do, Hal’lasean?”

What could Cassandra do?

She had no words.

Only please and don’t and go.

A distant, reasonable voice in Hal’s head told her she should let the Seeker get a healer for her sister. It said this was not the behavior of the head of the most powerful force in all Thedas. It said she was not the little girl who was abandoned with the halla, silent and nameless. It said Cassandra of all people didn’t want to see her weakness. Her hysteria. It said she was not helping Lanaya by falling apart.

She hadn’t even fallen apart when Solas left.

Solas left.

Merrill. Mamae. Babae. Lanaya. The old woman who first took her in and gave her her name. Then her Keeper sent her away. Blackwall lied. Solas left.

And even knowing he would not leave her again, knowing his true name and that he would bind his spirit to hers, that wound bled in fresh sympathy with the scared little girl she to whom she had reverted when Lanaya collapsed in her arms.

That reasonable voice could not compete with the size of her terrified panic.

“What, Hal’lasean!” Cassandra demanded, her agitation sparking vehemence in her already gruff voice.

That’s when the words came.

Suddenly Hal and the little girl inside her named Tamalin had just the right words.

She wailed them in agony.

“Everyone leaves me!”

The words, like everyone she had ever loved, left her in desolated shock. But at least with that came a sort of calm, even if it was a numb one.

Cassandra’s expression softened and fell. Her face looked like Hal thought her own must.

Abandoned. Brutalized. Broken.

“I know, my friend,” the Seeker said with none of her usual certainty and a great deal of intimate understanding. And then, for the first time, “falon.”

Cassandra gave a smile that was both brave and bitter. “Everyone leaves me as well.”

Chapter Text

For a long time, Hal’lasean and Cassandra steeped in the silence of their pain. The Seeker stood by the stairs and the Inquisitor sat messily on the floor and they took each other in as if for the first time.

They had been like this once before, but Hal had been in chains.

It was, as usual, someone else’s hurt that gave Hal’lasean her clarity. Or at least enough of it that she could calm the panicked toddler within her, even if she was still lost and scared and helpless.

At least she wasn’t alone.

Cassandra was here in this with her. Cassandra knew what this agony felt like. And Cassandra was willing to be in it with her.

Gratitude and respect swelled in Hal’s otherwise empty chest.

“Cass,” she said in a strained whisper when she could speak once more.

She meant to keep going, to say something, but that was all she managed.

It was enough.

“I know,” the Seeker said with another difficult smile. “I will go get a healer.”

This time Hal nodded numbly.

Cassandra turned to go, stood facing the stairs, but hesitated. She glanced back at Hal over her shoulder, her expression somehow even more serious than usual.

“Fight for her, Hal’lasean. If you can. If I could-- if my brother--”

Hal’s ribs ached and creaked in echo of the other woman’s hurt. She nodded again, but it was not numb now.

“I know,” Hal whispered.

Cassandra gave a firm downward jerk of her chin, her effort to maintain her composure turning her face severe. She was on the first step down to the castle proper when Hal called out again.

“Cassandra?”

They paused again in their heavy, knowing silence.

“Thank you,” Hal said with great sincerity. “Falon.”

Cassandra shook her head but didn’t look back.

“You have done no less for me.”

“She is deep in the Fade,” Fiona said when the healer could not find anything amiss with Lanaya’s unconscious body. “Some mages, under great duress, can retreat there. So they do not have to be present in their bodies.”

Hal could not help but imagine all the many, many reasons Lanaya might have used such an ability in her short life. And she felt sick with it, with imagining and with guilt and with hurt for the big sister who had saved her. And she felt, not for the first time since coming to the Conclave years before, stupid and clumsy and useless for not realizing that was what had happened immediately. That her sister had fled to the Fade.

She should have known. Fen’Harel would have known. Dorian would have known. Merrill would have known. But she, Hal’lasean, Tamalin, with her accidental power and groping understanding of it, had simply panicked.

What good was this power if she couldn’t remember to use it when it counted?

“Hal’lasean,” Cassandra prompted as gently as Cassandra could.

Apparently it had been some time since Hal had spoken. She finally looked up from her sister’s body to take in the other two women in the room with her.

“Will she come back?” she asked. Her voice was young and distant even as her heart constricted painfully in her chest.

She had asked herself that question before. Watching Lanaya walk away in the dark. Left alone with the halla to be renamed by strangers.

Will she come back?

But she hadn't. Until now. And Hal was not about to let her go again.

Fiona shook her head uncertainly. “It’s difficult to say. There have been cases of mages waking up in a few hours, but there have also…”

The Grand Enchanter and the Seeker shared a grim look instead of saying the grim thing.

That panic flared.

“We could wait and--” Fiona began.

“No.” Hal didn’t bother to look at the other two women anymore. She settled more comfortably in her chair by the bed, her eyes on Lanaya’s face. “Thank you, Fiona. You may go. Cassandra: fetch me Dorian and Merrill.”

“Hal’lasean,” Cassandra said warily, already catching on. “What is it you mean to do?”

“What you told me to, Cass. I’m going to fight for her.”

Dorian was pacing dramatically across the tower floor.

“Are you sure we hadn’t better fetch your wolf for this?” he asked again. “There’s no telling what sort of damage her old master did in there, if he was the sort to dally in dreams, and none of us here are experts in the Fade.”

Hal rubbed at the bridge of her nose and closed her eyes. “Dorian, you and Merrill have both already done this. But this time we’re fairly certain she’s not being held by any demons besides her own and we definitely don’t have to worry about Mythal’s interference or the silanavhen. This is just search and rescue. We find her, we make sure she can get back. That’s it.”

“Yes, yes, I know all that,” Dorian argued, and from the sudden silence of his steps, he apparently decided to stand still. “But you’ve no idea how complicated your mind was and she’s-- well, let’s just say we really don’t want to touch anything in her dream. I’d certainly feel better with our crotchety apostate leading the charge and I doubt very much your sister wants me anywhere near her head.”

“I doubt very much she wants any of us anywhere near her head,” Hal murmured. She was already exhausted with battling her earlier panic but now it was joined by the image of Fen’s carefully hidden anxiety from the night before.

Dirthamen. Something about Dirthamen. Something he feared too much to share with her.

“He’s busy. I don’t want to bother him if we can avoid it.”

“You bothered him plenty last night,” Dorian grumbled under his breath.

She let out a long sigh and forced her shoulders down from her ears before opening her eyes. She glanced first at Dorian to see where he stood -- sort of in the middle of everything, as usual -- and then at Merrill, who perched birdlike on the foot of the bed, worrying at her bottom lip with her fingertips.

“You haven’t said much, asa’var’lin,” said Hal softly.

Merrill nodded her agreement, still actively contemplating the situation. Finally, uncertainly, she looked up with large green eyes to meet Hal’s.

“Fen’Harel has been teaching me a bit about Fadewalking,” she admitted shyly. “And I know a bit from my Keeper, especially about...well, about modern mages and our relationship with the Fade. I think...I think we can do it ourselves.”

Hal’lasean felt herself making the motions of a superficial smile. “Are you sure?”

Merrill let out a tittering, nervous laugh. “Never. Surety is dangerous.” Her jaw set with determination. “But she is your sister and my cousin. And we-- well, we left her alone too long already, even if we didn’t mean-- It’s our duty. Yours and mine. Don’t you think?”

Yes, Hal’s heart said simply.

Hal’s mouth said, “Are you in or out, Dorian?”

Dorian rolled his eyes and dropped into the nearest chair.

“You know I’m always in,” he sniffed. “You’re my Hal.”

Chapter Text

Survive the storm, find the bunny.

Hal had assumed Cole’s storm was metaphorical. Her assumption was wrong.

Before them raged a storm like nothing Hal’lasean had ever seen: it had all the violence of that first massive Breach -- the electricity, the sound and fury -- but instead of jagged, sickly green, it was blades of ice blown in gales.

Dorian and Merrill joined barriers on either side of her to keep them from the worst of the squall, but still the freezing rain buffeted relentlessly into their magic so that the two mages were straining with their efforts.

Survive the storm, find the bunny.

But nothing so small and fragile could survive this.

You did, said a voice inside her, You were small and fragile when she left you with the halla.

“Dorian?” Hal wondered suddenly. “Are you sure this is how you got through last time?”

She had never really asked what her mind had been like, what her dream had required of them. Fen and Dorian had given her only the basics -- temple of Mythal, silanavhen, the Well of Sorrows, tiny Hal, Mythal’s magic, rift skeleton -- and she had been much too distracted with her lover’s return and their new plans to really stop and consider the world in which those things occurred. Or rather, she had never really stopped to consider that the world in which they occurred might be any different from any other part of the Fade.

Certainly they had never mentioned a storm.

“Your Wolf made a unique barrier,” Dorian answered distractedly, his concentration on his magic. “I asked him to teach me, but he -- well, you know --”

“Ancient Elvhen magic he learned from a spirit,” Hal agreed flatly.

Dorian grunted his agreement.

Hal pressed her lips together. Her chest was tight with anxiety, her jaw perpetually clenched, but they had no choice.

They had to get to Lanaya.
“Was it like this when you came for me?” she wondered, in part just to fill the silence.

Dorian made a small sound of distress that he pretended was a scoff. “Not quite like this, but...yes. You were a different sort of storm. It kept...turning me away, turning me about, which was why Fen’Harel had to use his fancy barrier.”

Hal’lasean twisted her head around to look behind them, at the raging blizzard that now surrounded them on all sides.

It hadn’t turned them away. That meant they were getting somewhere, right?

They had to be getting somewhere!

“But we’re getting through,” Merrill pointed out hopefully. “...At least I think we are.”

Both barriers creaked and shook with a sudden violent blast of whirling ice that only seemed to grow in intensity as they pressed stubbornly onward. Merrill and Dorian were leaning into their casting now, their muscles cording with their efforts.

And the storm showed no mercy. It took each shuffling step forward like a personal challenge, a squall battering at their bubble like they were inside one of those snow globes in the shops at Val Royeaux.

Dorian breathed a strained laugh. “We’re certainly in the thick of it now.”

“Are you alright?” Hal asked her companions apprehensively. “Do you need…?”

But she was as helpless now as she had been in that halla pen, watching Lanaya leave her behind. What help could she possibly give them? She was too shaky in her own form of magic to interfere without making it worse, but if they didn’t think they could hold out much longer…

No. They could not turn back.

Or the others could leave and Hal’lasean would continue on through the storm without them.

Naya needed her!

She could not be helpless anymore.

She wasn’t helpless anymore!

She was Hal now. Hal’lasean Lavellan, hunter, Herald, Inquisitor, consort of an Elvhen god! And no damned Fade storm was going to keep her from reaching the only family she had left. Not now. Not when she’d just gotten her back!

“Ah, no,” Merrill said, stopping so suddenly that Hal nearly tripped over her. “I think we might be here.”

In the tumult of her own thoughts, Hal hadn’t even noticed that the storm raged only on three sides of them now. Before them was not a blizzard, but the remains of one. Thick snow coated the world in glittering white dust that reflected cold moonlight beneath hoary pines and naked oaks.

“Where exactly is ‘here’?” Dorian wondered.

Hal’lasean reached through the barrier, fingers outstretched toward a series of ropes tied to posts and trees.

A pen. Full of halla.

“Home,” Hal breathed. She was surprised to find her eyes stinging and her throat tight with both great sadness and immense relief.

It had been so long since she’d seen the Free Marches.

“We’re home.”

Chapter Text

Hal didn’t wait for the others.

Not because of the unreasonable but instinctive feeling that this place was safe for her, but because her very being insisted upon it. She needed to be out there with the halla, needed to be surrounded by those familiar aravels as surely as a river needs to find the sea.

And, fenedhis, the scent of the place -- crisp snow and wet bark and halla fur and campfire and the herbs! It made her mouth water and her chest ache with longing.

Because of course it was no more real than her own dreamed-up versions of Lavellan’s camps, no matter what Fen said.

The snow crunched and squelched beneath two sets of feet: Dorian’s thundering and clumsy human noble’s gait, and Merrill’s delicate Dalish steps, still audible because she’d never been taught to sneak like a hunter. They moved away from each other to take in their surroundings.

“Is this supposed to be Lavellan or Alerion?” Dorian wondered.

“Lavellan, I think,” Merrill decided softly. “Certainly not Alerion.”

“Why ‘certainly not’?” he asked.

“Because I remember Alerion,” Merrill murmured. “This isn’t it.”

“Is this Lavellan, then, Hal?”

But it seemed wrong to be ‘Hal’ here. A human nickname. They’d never called her that in her clan. Always Hal’lasean. Always. Like a title. Nicknames were for children with parents and siblings.

“Hal?” Dorian asked again, and she heard the snow shift and a soft gasp.

When she turned to make sure he was alright, Hal’lasean found Dorian staring at her with rounded eyes and one hand clasped almost daintily over his astonished mouth.

“What?”

She did a quick scan of the area in case he was seeing something or someone behind her, but it was just the three of them. Just the conspicuously human Dorian, gangly prepubescent Merrill, and--

Wait.

What?

“Merrill?” Hal demanded in horror.

But her cousin was gaping back at her with a mixture of shock and awe.

“Awwww, Haaaaaal!” Dorian practically squealed.

When did everybody get so tall?

Hal’lasean frowned her consternation up at her cousin, then offered it to Dorian as well.

And the bells at the ends of her braids jangled brightly.

“Oh no,” she groaned, but it was a child’s voice.

A toddler’s voice.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”

Merrill finally looked down at her own body and let out an equally miserable sound. “Is this really necessary!”

But Dorian was practically gleeful. “I know this is a very solemn occasion and of course we will find and rescue your sister, but I would very much like to take a moment to express how darling you both are!”

Those big clumsy human legs were coming straight for her and Hal was much too small to properly run.

No. No no no no no!

“Dorian Pavus, I swear on all that is good and just in the world, if you pick me up--”

He scooped her into his arms with an extra little toss and she squeaked despite herself, which only made her indignant. She tried not to think too much about how petulant she must look scowling at Dorian when he held her out in front of him.

“I’m going to murder you,” she told him with all the fury her toddler voice could muster. “Slowly. I’m going to cut off all your favorite parts first.”

“Oh, you tiny curmudgeon. I’ll likely have to carry you anyway unless you can think yourself big again.” Dorian didn’t bother to hide his delighted smirk. “Wouldn’t want to lose you in the snow!”

“We won’t lose her,” Merrill pointed out helpfully. “That’s what the bells are for.”

“I will never forgive either of you for this,” Hal grumped.

“Yes, yes, you’re a very fierce little Dalish sprig,” Dorian agreed in a patronizing coo that ended with a wet kiss to her forehead.

Hal’lasean made a noise of disgust that would have impressed even Cassandra. “Stop! Fenedhis!”

But she didn’t bother struggling to get down. Because no matter how much it galled her, Dorian was right. She was much too small to walk through this snow. It dwarfed her.

A child could easily lose their way in the drift.

Which is when her surprise wore off enough for her brain to kick back in, and Hal suddenly realized just why it was they were where they were. Why Merrill was no more than ten. Why she was four again with halla bells in her braids.

“I know what this is.”

“What what is?” Merrill wondered.

“This place,” Hal’lasean said with a malignant lump forming in her throat. “This is where Naya left me.”

And she had a pretty good idea of where they had to go next.