Timeline: Dragon Age 2, just prior to Act 2
Pairing: f!HawkexCullen (heavy reference to CullenxWarden Amell)
Summary: Knight-Captain Cullen has heard rumors concerning one Serah Hawke. She has read some heartbreaking things concerning his time in the Circle of Fereldan. Sometimes the truth is too complicated, too saddening and too great a burden. Sometimes it's kinder to be silent, for everyone's sake. Will he keep silent for her? Will she trust him with her secrets?
Disclaimer: The only thing that's mine is the idea for this chat. Everything else belongs to Bioware. (Along with my soul... come on you know they own yours too)
Note: This is an un-beta'd piece. If you or someone you know is interested, please let me know. I'm always interested in improving my work
She was sitting in the sun, enjoying one of the quieter courtyards on the estate. It was still something to marvel at, that she had an estate. She absently traced the edge of an envelope with her finger. She often came outside to read, the afternoon light was easier to read by than those lamps her mother insisted were fashionable. Not to mention the setting often softened the blow of more unpalatable news, and this day was hardly an exception. The sprigs of summer blossoms and fragrant fruit trees did little to quell the anxiety pooling in her stomach.
Hawke didn't look up at the muffled sounds of boots on the rug. Her friends were about often enough for them to know both the estate and her habits. Her musing was interrupted when Bohdan's voice carried from the doorway.
"Knight-Captain Cullen to see you, meser."
She blinked her surprise.
"Hawke," Cullen barked the word as he strode toward her. She could feel his animosity already- this was no social call. She'd seen the Knight-Captain in various emotional states over the years, apparently today he was all suspicion and accusation.
She closed her eyes a second, trying to even appreciate the sound of a familiar accent in this place. This city that was home-not-quite, but home-never-the-less.
"Knight-Captain," she replied, refusing to look up. Instead she turned the envelope in her hand over and over; trying to see some meaning in the blurring image.
"You do not show reverence to a Templar?" he asked, clearly incensed by her lack of manners.
"You come here with unfriendly tones and palpable ire, and yet demand reverence? What have I to be grateful to you for?" she answered, finally turning an icy look his way. Her voice was precise and polite if not a bit clipped.
"There are suspicions against you, serah," he said. "Whispers that you are an apostate."
Instead of an answer she measured him with her gaze for a moment.
"You remind me of someone. Someone I read about once."
Cullen frowned that she did not answer his charge. In fact her evasion was as good as a confession.
"I think it was in a letter."
Her eyes lingered on him, and Cullen began to feel the first stirrings of anxiety; as if ghosts walked among them.
"I have had many letters in my time here, but none have I cherished as much as the ones from my cousin," her tone was growing softer, as if her mind was drifting toward the ethereal.
Cullen blanched and a muscle in his jaw twitched.
"Perhaps you know my cousin," she pressed. "Genova Amell? Sometimes they call her the Hero of Ferelden; sometimes the Commander of the Grey." She gently lifted a curious brow at him.
Cullen scowled at her for speaking such a name to him. That part of him was long ago, and dealt with. Long dead, long buried!
"She wrote to me of what life was like in the Tower," she continued, now turning her gaze to the scenery around them. "She was grateful my beloved sister had gone to the Maker's side, rather than to such a prison as the Circle. She said it was a place of abuse and torment. Yet not all her memories are so terrible; she said there was good there too. She told me of a man, a good, kind, upright man."
He wanted her to stop talking. He wanted to shake her by the shoulders till her teeth rattled in her head. Till she showed herself for the blasphemous apostate that she was! How dare she know such thing, how dare she speak of them!
"Yet when she writes of him it is with such sorrow, such regret."
Hawke closed her eyes, and the expression on her face was as though she too felt the pain her cousin did. "Genova told me that this man, this wonderful kind man, this man that she loved was dead. Apparently, she recruited before she could tell him so, and when she'd returned the Tower was in shambles."
Hawke fell silent for a few heartbeats, allowing her words to reach him. She watched the shadows of sparrows dancing across the paving stones. At length she turned to look at him again.
"She said she wanted so badly to save him, but when she finally found him... it was already too late. The tragedy being that he still lives, even though he is dead. The man she loved had died, and a man of cold malice wore his face."
The world was spinning a bit too quickly, and it felt as though he'd been doused with frigid water.
"Her advice to me? Beware of giving your heart to Templars, for they will invariably give it back to you in little pieces." Hawke let the envelope slip through her fingers and flutter to her lap. "She doesn't know yet that Carver's left us for the Order. I don't know how to tell her. What would you advise, Knight-Captain?"
She finally turned to look at him, a look of innocence and cunning. It was a question with ten thousand meanings and as many answers.
He opened his mouth a few times, but found he had no voice. It took a few tries before he was able to speak.
"The truth, Serah Hawke, is the greatest honor we can do another."
She nodded her head absently. "The truth is a noble ambition, Knight-Captain. But it is also a weighty one. It is a cruel, heavy thing of steel and claws. The truth frees us, but it also is the millstone that drags us flailing to our death. My cousin already carries such a burden. How could I, how could anyone, add to that burden? Is not silence kinder?"
The look she gave him was complicated. It was no question they now spoke of more than letters to family. They were each silent a long moment. They heard the muted sound of the Chantry bells tolling the watch.
"Those who receive the truth must labor under its weight, knowing what that truth costs us all. Is it not better to carry that weight for her in silence?"
"Is that not living a lie, serah?" Cullen didn't mean to whisper, but the moment felt so charged that any loud noise might shatter it.
"If no question is asked, then no lie need be spoken," she replied just as quietly.
"You would labor in silence then, knowing one day the truth might come to light anyway?" he asked.
"Yes," she whispered. "If it spares her, I would carry it alone."
"You care much for your family, serah Hawke," he said very gently.
"Yes," she replied, her hands clenched in her lap.
"You do all you have for their benefit? No thought for yourself?" he asked.
"I assure you Knight-Captain; I would that my life were quiet and dull. That I might be back in Lothering, with no thought of titles and fortunes. As I'm sure my cousin wishes there were no Blight, no armies or nightmares," she told him. "Some say the Maker moves us as it pleases him. If that is so, then who are we to resist him?"
He frowned at her, frowned at himself, frowned at the entire situation. He felt on every shaky ground, with no idea of how to retrieve his righteous indignation and fervor. When he'd left Kinloch Hold he'd sworn never to question the Order or the Chant. But Hawke managed to defuse his anger, just like her cousin did. With a sigh he capitulated to what he suspected he'd always do in this situation. It seemed the Amell women were designed simply to ruin him.
"I did know your cousin," he said. "She was a special woman, still is I imagine. To hear of her grief pains me. Would that none of our troubles had ever happened; but we three know that is the Makers province, don't we?"
She watched him with silent wary eyes.
Her look, he'd seen Genova wear a similar expression. One that clearly wanted to beg, but was too proud to submit. He'd been weak about a mage before, could he be so again? Her expression gave no quarter, and her words zoomed around his head. Like brightly colored balls, echoing through his mind and tugging at emotions he believe long buried.
His frown deepened before he nodded and his shoulders slumped ever so slightly. This was weakness and folly, but it was also a leap of faith.
"Do not add to her troubles with this news, serah. Now is not the time for more heartache. Some souls have suffered enough. It can rest for another day, perhaps when things are better."
She bowed her head for a second, and he could see she was struggling to contain her emotions.
"Thank you Knight-Captain, there is wisdom in your words, and kindness. I will do as you recommend."
With that she stood, and extended her hand. Tears were in her eyes, much like that had been in Genova's the last time he looked upon her. They slowly shook to seal the bargain, unspoken but understood.
"You are a good woman, Hawke," he said. "Much like your cousin."
"Thank you Cullen, you are a kind man. Just as she said you were," she replied earnestly.
It felt like they'd each aged years as he turned, retraced his path across the courtyard and disappeared from sight. Hawke pressed trembling fingers to her mouth to stop the sob that threatened. A moment later she heard the gentle tread of her mother's expensive new shoes.
"Who was that, dear?" Leandra asked.
"Messenger from the Keep," she replied, forcing the tremble from her voice. "Apparently the Viscount's requested my presence."
She held the envelope out for her mother's inspection. Before Leandra could ask the questions clearly burning in her eyes, Hawke stood and reached for her staff.
"I'll be back before dinner," she called, smiling slightly over her shoulder.
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