Dragon Age: Inquisition
Title: It's Good to be Champion!
Pairing: Adaar/Josephine
Rating: T (Mild Language/Sexual Content)
So I'm a big gamer but this is my first & only video game/Dragon Age fic. Posted part of it months ago on A03, then got busy and neglected it, so I'm finishing it up before Tresspasser is released and gives me all sorts of ideas I have no time to write. If you have no idea who these characters are, play the game...or better yet, look them up on youtube :)
Intrigue
The tattered great hall of the Inquisition bustled with whispers of affairs, alliances, and the haughty boasts of the largely Orlesian nobility who'd taken refuge in Skyhold as civil war raged in their homeland. Her eyes glued to her ever-present clipboard, Ambassador Josephine Montilyet navigated through and around the castle's ever changing assortment of guests with ease to reach her destination – a scaffold that should have been dismantled over a month prior when major repairs to the hall's arch work was completed.
Unacceptable.
Lashing her fountain pen like a whip across a fresh sheet of parchment, she began the first lines of a strongly worded letter to the foreman of Skyhold's renovation.
"Stone-met, Ambassador."
Josephine stilled her growing annoyance as she turned to see the foreman in question approaching her with a stack of mosaic tiles that nearly halved him in height.
"Messere Gatsi, I was hoping to speak with you about the scaffolding. As you know-"
"No time, Ambassador, I'm to have these puppies installed within the week - Inquisitor's orders. Don't know where she keeps finding them…or why, but an order's an order."
"Indeed," Josephine agreed tactfully, already making note of her next task. "Would you happen to know where I might find Her Worship?"
A familiar voice cried out from the courtyard just outside the great hall before Gatsi could venture to guess the answer to Lady Montilyet's question.
'Yes, yes, it's good to be champion!'
"Another time."
Nodding courteously in the stonemason's direction, Josephine took her leave.
Following the boisterous clamor of metal clashing against metal, she descended the stairs to the courtyard practice ring where the Lord Chancer de Leon was instructing his latest and greatest pupil on the art of fortification. Pale eyes scanned the large crowd that had gathered around the ring, looking for a sign of the warrior who would have towered above the Human, Elven, and Dwarven spectators.
"C'mon, Inquisitor, on your feet!"
Josephine recognized the voice as Ser Blackwall's and realized with a start that the Inquisitor was on the ground. Her footsteps fell faster as she drew closer with a sense of urgency that confounded her. The Inquisitor faced down aberrations on a daily basis. She was once forged a living as a mercenary who risked her life to fight at the whims of her wealthy employers. Surely she could handle Lord Chancer's elaborate combat drills.
Couldn't she?
Her heart pounding in her chest as she pushed through the crowd, Josephine made out the striking, albeit dusty figure of the Inquisitor as she climbed to her full height. Her tan skin shone with perspiration in the unseasonable heat of noon sun, while the drab taupe fabric of her clothes was darkened from exertion and dirt. Although she wore nothing in the way of protection, Josephine thought she looked every bit as confident as Commander Cullen in his full suit of armor. And though her dark hazel eyes squinted from the sting of sweat, her determined glare was reminiscent of the fearless Qunari warriors she'd read stories of in her youthful studies.
Against her better judgment, the diplomat pushed forward for a better view until she was standing beside the man behind the spectacle.
"Lady Ambassador," Lord Chancer greeted her from where he stood, arduously flinging rose petals into the ring in front of him.
"Ser," she answered him absentmindedly. Or at least she thought she had. So caught up with the sight before her, Josephine hadn't so much as glanced in the flamboyant lord's direction. One by one a seemingly endless line of opponents stepped forward - templar heavy infantry wielding shields, axes, mace, war hammers and great swords. And one by one they attacked.
Wielding a cleaver as though it were as light as a child's toy, the Inquisitor drew a line in the sand, ground her heels into the dirt and prepared herself for each onslaught.
"Few get the privilege to watch the birth of a champion. A glorious sight, is it not?"
"It is…a lively one, to be certain," Josephine answered diplomatically. Glorious was not the word she would she would use to describe the harrowing ordeal playing out before her. She flinched as Ser Blackwall was knocked to the ground with such force that his helm flew off his head and rolled across the yard.
"Standard procedure, my lady, do not be troubled," Lord Chancer reassured a wide-eyed Josephine as the Inquisitor blocked and repelled every hack and slash that came her way. "When your mistress is finished she will be a champion in the bedroom as well the battlefield."
Inhaling sharply, Josephine's face darkened with embarrassment at the blatant insinuation. She was well aware that there were whispers of a romantic entanglement between her and the Inquisition's leader, but none had ever been so bold as to imply such a thing to her face.
"Goodness!"
Before she knew what was happening, she found herself shrinking beneath the intense gaze of the Inquisitor, her brows raised with…what was it, concern or merely confusion?
Josephine had barely opened her mouth to reassure her when a stout figure charged across the practice arena to collide violently with his momentarily distracted opponent.
"Umph!"
"Be careful!" Josephine chastised the Iron Bull as he unceremoniously dropped the Inquisitor onto her sofa. What the Qunari lacked in finesse he more than made up for in strength, as the warrior had been the one only capable of lifting, let alone carrying 260 pounds of dead weight on his broad shoulder.
"Don't worry, Ambassador, Qunari are born with thick skulls," he reassured her before he made his way out of the room.
"So I've gathered," Madame Vivienne jibed, timely as ever as she ascended the stairs and bypassed Bull. "But let us not tempt fate-Oh, my! The poor darling."
Josephine blanched at the Imperial Enchanter's reaction to seeing the Inquisitor lying unconscious.
"Is there…nothing you can do?"
"Of course there is, my dear. We mages are capable of quite a bit more than being corrupted by demons, you know?"
Wasting little time, the enchanter placed a small phylactery into Josephine's palm.
"Exactly twelve drops on the tongue and our burgeoning champion shall wake within the hour."
Josephine eyed the glowing blue liquid skeptically as Madame de Fer took her leave. She had no reason to believe the mage's intentions were dubious or that the potion wouldn't work as claimed, but she was uneasy nonetheless. For the briefest of moments she considered asking the surgeon for help, but thought better of it when she surmised the woman's help would involve sharp instruments and bloodletting. A slight chill ran up her spine at the thought.
Murmuring idle prayers to Andraste in her native tongue, she knelt by the Inquisitor's side. Her left hand was steady as she readied the vial but her right trembled as she moved her fingers to touch the warrior's full lips. They were far softer than she'd imagined.
Josephine!
It was scary how much the voice in her head sounded like her mother. For a moment, Josephine could almost see House Montilyet's matriarch, lips drawn tightly in disapproval, judging her all the way from the far reaches of her Antivan homeland. The mental image was more than enough for the diplomat to regain her focus, even if she now felt like a naughty teenager.
Tilting the vial, she let the surprisingly thick liquid fall in languid drops, counting them all the while. When finished, Josephine corked the concoction and waited for any sign of movement. But save for the deep rise and fall of her chest with each breath, the Inquisitor did not stir.
Her desperation growing with each passing minute, Josephine was on the verge of seeking the surgeon when suddenly her patient began to move.
"Inquisitor?"
Shaking her head as if the action might clear it of pain, the Inquisitor glanced around the room as though it were completely foreign.
"Where am I?"
"In your private quarters," Josephine responded as calmly as she could muster through her burgeoning panic. "You were injured while training."
Rising slowly to sit upright, the Inquisitor raked a hand through her neatly cornrowed hair before going stock-still. She stared at Josephine in abject confusion.
"I have horns?"
Grey eyes blinked in disbelief. Surely, she wasn't serious.
"You mean you don't know?"
The Inquisitor stared at Josephine blankly, as if she couldn't even fathom what it was that she didn't know.
"What exactly do you remember?"
The strong ridge of the Qunari's brow knotted as she thought long and hard for an answer.
"I remember fighting. There was a crowd all around…and I saw a woman, the most beautiful woman I've ever seen…"
The Inquisitor paused in retrospection while Josephine silently thanked the Maker that she was too wrapped up in her piecing her thoughts together to see the blush she'd unwittingly drawn to her cheeks. She wondered how could anyone's words sound so sweet without even trying.
Her voice wavered when finally she found the courage to use it.
"What happened next?"
"I was charged by a bearded bronto."
"A…bearded bronto?"
The Inquisitor nodded as though there was nothing out of the ordinary about what she'd just said. It was only upon seeing the mirth in her eyes that Josephine realized the truth.
"Of all the-"
Without thinking, she plucked a pillow from the sofa and flung it at the Inquisitor, who dodged the fluffy projectile with ease. Dodging Josephine Montilyet's surprisingly fiery temper, however, was another matter entirely. Her words were interspersed with Antivan as her voice rose multiple octaves.
"Do you have any idea how worried I was for you? For the Inquisition? If you'd truly lost your memory, then..."
The Inquisitor's amused expression fell away as Josephine trailed off emotionally.
"If it makes you feel any better, my head is throbbing and I can see two of you," she admitted with a pout that made her look like a chastised pup.
Suddenly Josephine couldn't remember a moment where she felt cross, contrite, and charmed all at the same time. So great was convergence of emotion, that she felt an overwhelming urge to distance herself from the very source of them.
"I'll fetch Madame Vivienne at once," Josephine offered weakly, standing abruptly only to be stilled by a hand that was as large as it was gentle.
"No, wait! I mean, please, keep me company. Both of you."
It was a blatant plea that even humor couldn't temper. And as such it proved impossible to resist.
"Well," Josephine trailed off before reluctantly taking a seat on the sofa. "I suppose we could stay a while longer."
It wasn't that the Inquisitor lacked for charm or conversation. On the contrary, the she excelled in both arenas. In that way she'd been a rather pleasant surprise. The Qunari Josephine had met at court while in her native land had been hard, brooding types who spoke little of anything other than the merits of the Qun and the dangers Tal-Vashoth 'savages' posed to them all.
But from the first moment the Vashoth warrior Adaar stood before her, Josephine believed almost instinctively that she was none of those things. She found her to be direct, yet well mannered; good humored and thoughtful in equal measure. In fact, the only commonality she seemed to share with the Qunari was her height.
She was, Josephine noted immediately, extremely tall.
"Honestly, Josie, you have the worst taste."
Their first meeting concluded, Leliana had patiently waited until Commander Cullen and the so-called Herald of Andraste left the Inquisition's newly minted war room to chastise her old friend, whose reaction to meeting the Qunari was almost comical in its inelegance.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Josephine denied adamantly. She knew, of course, exactly what her friend was talking about.
"You're…even taller than I'd heard," Leliana mimicked good-naturedly in a surprisingly passable Antivan accent. "You forget how well I know you."
Ever the diplomat, Josephine chose her next words carefully.
"She is…impressive," she admitted finally, her tone nothing if not neutral. Certainly no one could take issue with her assessment of such an imposing figure.
Leliana smiled then, a smile she wore when she knew was right but wanted desperately to be wrong.
"She's also a mercenary and a suspect in the murder of Divine Justinia," she reminded Josephine solemnly. "I only ask that you tread carefully."
"You seem distant," a low voice in the present remarked, softly coaxing Josephine from her reverie. "Does something trouble you?"
"Yes, actually," she lied skillfully, desperate to hide the true subject of her musings. "I must apologize for my behavior earlier. I reacted poorly."
"I've had far worse than pillows thrown at me, Lady Montilyet, I can assure you."
"Still, it was…undignified."
The Inquisitor tenderly took hold of Josephine's hand and brought it up to touch her broad and heavily freckled nose. The diplomat frowned when she felt a slight knot where her bridge curved ever so slightly to the right, as if it physically pained her to feel the long healed injury.
"flying nug."
"You were struck by a flying nug?"
"I was sitting in a tavern in Rivain when someone who apparently couldn't handle their mead got the bright idea that I'd come from Kont-aar to convert them to the Qun. I used my wit and feminine magnetism to reason with them, of course, and next thing I know there's a wooden nug flying at my face."
Good breeding and years of finishing school informed Lady Montilyet that the proper reaction upon hearing one's personal tale of misfortune was to lament. Yet she instead found herself giggling like a schoolgirl at the warrior's tale.
"I'm so sorry," she apologized through her sobering laughter, embarrassed by her lapse in etiquette. "That...must have been painful for you."
"Don't be," the Inquisitor reassured. "I only wish that all of my indignities could serve to make you laugh."
There was that charm again, Josephine silently noted. She was growing so fond of it. Too fond, perhaps, but she was beyond caring at that moment. Overtaken by a sudden rush of boldness, she shifted her fingers to rest upon a small scar running vertically along the warrior's temple.
"What about this?"
The Inquisitor indulged her curiosity without a moment's hesitation.
"When I was a girl my father and I moved to a small village not far from Starkhaven. We were left alone, mostly, but a gang of older kids made it a point to provoke me whenever possible."
"So you fought them?" Josephine asked, eliciting an amused laugh from the Inquisitor in the process.
"I was twelve years old, six feet tall and so skinny I could barely stand the weight of my horns. One day one of the larger bullies grew bored of mere teasing and tripped me as I was carrying tinder back to our shack. This scar was the result. I ran home with my tail between my legs and begged my father to show me how to be a warrior like he'd once been."
"And he did?"
"No," the Inquisitor answered, smiling ruefully. "My father may have been Tal-Vashoth, but he was very much in agreement with the Qun when it came to certain ideas."
"That women shouldn't fight," Josephine furthered, increasingly eager to hear more.
The Inquisitor nodded silently. It wasn't quite the reaction the ambassador was hoping for.
She pressed on.
"Then how did you ever learn?"
"I'd just turned eighteen when I began to hear rumors of the Blight in the South. I decided then that it would be best if I learned to defend myself, if worst came to worst. And, as an added benefit, I could make good coin defending others as well. So I left my father's home and sought out someone who would teach me."
The Inquisitor's expression grew pensive the more she spoke, and Josephine decided it best not to push for more details of her somewhat enigmatic past.
"I am…exceedingly grateful to whomever it was that did so," she admitted, almost shyly.
Her face a perfect mixture of confusion and amusement, the Inquisitor revealed her own propensity toward obliviousness. She tilted her head in confusion.
"Because it led you here," Josephine explained simply .
If she'd been expecting such a telling answer, the Inquisitor certainly didn't show it. Instead she marveled openly at the woman before her, a living testament to her good fortune, the fortune she failed to recognize before that very moment.
"So it did."