The never ending source of his frustration sat across the campfire, carefully avoiding his eye contact as usual. This was their unspoken pact- no interaction beyond necessities. It seemed hard to believe that just two weeks ago he was the only thing keeping her tied to this world under the angry watch of Cassandra. Now he wished Adan had not been so fortuitous with hodgepodge potions and salves and given him a chance to let her slip from this plane of existence without suspicion.

Solas exhaled forcefully at the rush of… something that arose every time he caught sight of her. Every movement, every word, seemed to mock him with his own power and failings. He decided that something was rage and it was righteous in these circumstances. He became acutely aware of the sting in his palms and uncurled the fists he had made. The loss of the perfect control he had spent the better part of a century on only furthered his fixation on the woman just ten feet away. He considered how quickly he could wrap his fingers around her throat at this distance and felt the internal scratching of his beast at the thought of the hunt.

As he had several times in the last month, he indulged himself in the fantasy while he stared through the flames into the face of his prey. Her mouth would look better agape than the conniving grin in which it was currently held. A shudder went down his spine as he thought of her face, pale skin flushed from exertion as she fled, her voice ripping through an otherwise still forest with his name. Unexpected eye contact tore him from the scene as she regarded him with a grim expression. Her golden eyes were boring into his and quickly darkening as the pupils dilated. Her expression took a new name in his head. Fear. Had she heard the wolf howling?

"Herald," he said. The camp and its inhabitants grew impossibly still at the acknowledgment. The only sounds were the crackling of the fire and the roar of blood in his ears leftover from his daydream. The absolute reverence stroked the wolf's ego just enough to put a smirk on the man's face. The indulgences in these wanton thoughts were eroding his normally stoic nature, he thought fleetingly, they would have to be brought to heel before he submitted to his wants and whims like a common dog. Perhaps later.

At the formal title hurled like a curse, the woman's eyes narrowed into angry slits. Her lips were pressed so tightly together they blanched white and her teeth could almost be heard cracking under the pressure of her clenched jaw. He had only just learned how easy she was to engage and thus far had yet to disappoint him with reactions. She might have his power and unwittingly derailed his plans, but she was nothing more than the product of misfortune. The thought comforted him.

She stood abruptly and crossed the ten feet faster than expected. Despite the naturally lithe form of elven women, she towered over him in this moment. He casually looked up at her without shifting his relaxed posture and was rewarded by seeing fury slip across her face like a shadow. At this distance he could almost taste the anger pouring out of every inch of her skin, a heady drought he was beginning to crave more often. He wondered briefly if he could taste his power if he were to press his mouth to the wrist extended towards him.

Her hand jerked in a vague sweeping gesture to the right. "Solas, with me." Her words barely cleared her lips before she was moving towards the forest edge outside of camp. A pointed look at the qunari and tevinter mage sent them scrambling for their tents before she was outside the fire's light.

She was making this too easy, he must have fallen asleep and entered the Fade. No other scenario could present him this quarry in such a neat package. Here he could loosen the boundaries on the wolf a little more and perhaps ease some of the persistent frustration that clouded his mood while awake. The restraint within snapped like twine tied too tightly and rushed to the surface.

Now he was all too quick to follow her into the dark. He couldn't stop the need to flex his hands as he neared the woman who was leaned against a tree just inside the forest. When would she run? All of his remaining focus went into willing the Fade to send her sprinting so that he could chase and capture. His power sang to him with encouragement to drink it from her palm, her heartbeat was deafening as the blood rushed and colored her face and ears in a mottled blush, he wasn't sure which he wanted to address first. His imagination ran wild in careless abandon now.

"I want you gone by morning."

Her voice pulled his hazy thoughts into loose focus. For a moment he was taken aback and paused in closing the remaining foot of space between them. How odd of the Fade to be slow to respond to his will and then press him with distress. Her back was partially turned to him as she stared into the night and he noted with a flash of annoyance that he could not watch her reactions now. He would remedy that.

The thin bones of her wrist seemed even finer in his palm as he closed his hand around it. His power hummed just beyond his reach now, sending tendrils of electrical currents up his arm. So close. With one quick jerk, he brought her to face him and delighted in the uncertainty in her eyes. Oh yes, she would run now if he released her. His fingers didn't loosen their vice grip.

Drunk on power and freedom, he wasn't prepared for his Fade Herald to react with such vigor. One moment he was in control of her, finally, and the next his back was slammed into the tree. "Do you suddenly not understand me? Leave!" the Herald snarled at him, pressing him harder into the bark with a pointed finger at his throat. Her shoulder was rammed into his solar plexus with enough force to knock the wind out of him.

"Herald…?" Solas started, the confusion quieting the wolf enough to slam the cage closed again. The realization this was not the Fade washed over him like ice. This was not a dream, he had actually lost control, he had almost…

"What part of 'I do not want you here' are you confused about? You hate me, right? So take this opportunity to escape my presence if it's so intolerable." She spat the words like venom at him, pressing into him harder with every syllable. The fog in his head cleared as she spoke and he opened his mouth to defend himself. The words would not come as beckoned and so he snapped his jaw shut instead, resigned to his fate.