A/N: If you have read Inquisition, Indiana, this takes place after Eleanor & Co. have come back from Thedas but before the final push for soldiers and Wardens to end the Blight in Indiana.

When exactly? The hell if I know. It's a Christmas special. It doesn't matter.

If you haven't read Inquisition, Indiana, go back and start there. We'll try not to get too far ahead before you get back. The revised version is up on Archive of Our Own.

Eleanor rubbed her eyes and stared out at the snow, tinted blue in the early dawn light. The last thing she wanted to do today was go to the store - any store - but she had hungry troops to feed and her errands wouldn't run themselves. But between the snow and the cold and the madness she knew she was about to face on the roads and in the aisles, Eleanor's back hunched more and more by the minute, even her posture unwilling and unmotivated. She clutched her coffee tighter and pulled her gaze away from the window in the kitchen's back door.

"Mm, good morning," Cullen's voice came from the doorway. He was drying his hair, still wet from the shower, rubbing his head vigorously with a towel. Little drops sprung free and flicked themselves toward Eleanor, splashing her gently on the cheek. On another morning, she might have laughed, but on this morning, Eleanor didn't even turn her head, only turned her eyes dully toward Cullen, lifting one eyebrow as if asking, "Really?"

Cullen slowed the motion of his arm and gave her an apologetic little smile, flinging the towel over the back of the chair where he then sat. His hair stood up at all angles, the curls doing their best to in no way form a cohesive unit. He leaned on his left elbow, jaw resting on his knuckles, and asked, "Something wrong?"

"I have to go shopping," Eleanor muttered into her cup.

Cullen's eyebrows furrowed. "Well, that's…"

Eleanor sighed and stood, walking to the coffee maker to refill her mug and fetch Cullen one of his own. "It's…" she started to say, but instead said, "You're coming with me."

"Of course," he said, eagerly accepting the cup. Eleanor sat back down in her chair, facing the commander who still had an air of bafflement about him, but also an air of ease. Eleanor sat down her cup and rubbed her face, then reached out to adjust the hood on Cullen's red sweatshirt - his second one, the first having been lost to the darkspawn - and let her arms stay around his neck when she was finished.

His hands in his lap, cradling his mug, Cullen carefully bent forward and kissed Eleanor. "Is everything alright?"

After a moment, Eleanor nodded, because truthfully, it was. Holiday crowds and traffic and weather weren't awesome, not at all, but she could get - was getting - an early start on the day, and she could use Cullen's size, if nothing else, to cut a path through the store if the aisles were too jammed. Indeed, the visual of him plowing through holiday shoppers the way he plowed through darkspawn made Eleanor smile a reluctant smile, and she gently bumped her forehead against Cullen's, some of the tension she had felt dispersing.

"Lemme take us out for breakfast," she offered. "Dorian and Varric can fend for themselves."

A/N: Look! A special present for you! It's Christmas in July!

But wait, Paperclippe - isn't it June? Aren't you Jewish? Didn't you finish Inquisition, Indiana two years ago?

The answer to all of your questions is: yes.

But.

My beta suggested this to me as she was finishing up reading Inquisition, Indiana, and I always thought that it was a really good idea. I thought I might do it for this past holiday season, but the time got away from me, as time does. And since time frequently gets away from me (as well as the fact that I'm still actively writing Once More unto the Breach, and that I'm posting to the Dragon Age parody twitter - sfmstories, and I'm sort of slowly working on Dragon Age: AD), I figure this won't be finished until July, and then it'll be like a Christmas in July! Even though I don't celebrate Christmas!

So, yeah, this is just gonna be some fluff but I thought we could all use some fluff right now.

HO HO HO HAPPY FLAG DAY