Earth with a hint of cinnamon and vanilla. Sweat from work and worry that could never quite be washed off. Winter air on grass. The scentless smell of a radiating body. If she could bottle it, she would keep a vial around her neck.
She wondered if he was up yet, or just laying there like she was. It was morning, that much she knew. Blame it on years at the Circle. A quick glance at the sky was enough to tell time. The room was filled with the blue light of morning that makes everything appear to have indefinite edges - like visions from a dream. She was awake though. The chirping of birds, the carefully hushed noises of workers and servants getting an early start on their days chores assured her of it. She sat up, her tunic - no, his tunic - falling past her shoulder, resting precariously on her breasts.
Nothing he hasn't seen she thought.
Her lover often left her littered with reminders, and last night was no exception. She considered the one above her left nipple that had bloomed in the night. He was rough because he knew she liked it. After, when they lay above the covers, he would always run his hands down her side.
I wasn't- I didn't-
No, love. she would reassure him. You could never.
She turned to look down at his sleeping form. Her commander. Her knight. Her Templar. She remembered the banned tome that someone had snuck into the dormitories when she was 19- some mage who had bribed a junior templar with promises of trysts in the Chantry. It was old, falling apart, and by the time it was cycled round to her more than a few pages were missing from falling out or being too tempting and delectable to relinquish. Nevertheless, she devoured the book - a love story of a mage and templar, reunited after a childhood meeting years later at a Circle. It was smutty, romantic, and sickeningly tragic. She cried at the end - the affair discovered, the mage made tranquil, the templar throwing themselves out of the barrack's window in often wondered if the story had not been snuck in at all, but rather smartly hidden by one of the sisters - a warning for love sick and lusty bunch of mages eying the muscle that watched them day and night.
Mages can't afford to love, one of the sisters had told her once. It's a small price to pay for access to all other magic.
Staring down at him, his golden hair springing free of the day old pomade he secretly combed in, she knew the sister could not have been more wrong. She reached out and ran her fingers through his hair, unintentionally waking him up.
"Mmmm," he groaned, before reaching up to stall her hand.
"Go back to sleep," she hummed.
"Not if you're up," he brought her fingers to his lips, pressing a chaste kiss to the knuckles.
She laid back down, inching towards him. Sensing her movement, he lifted his arm, making room for her at his side. She began to run her fingers through the hair on his chest. "I'm not,"
He smiled, and turned his body to encompass her in his arms - stupid, big, muscley arms - and pulled her closer.
"You smell like sunshine," he said into her ear. He kissed her neck, and breathed her in.
Outside the world was falling apart, and in a few hours, they would have to go face the destruction and begin to pick up the pieces. But then she would get to come back, climb the ladder up, and fall back into him.
Earth, with a hint of cinnamon and vanilla. Strong arms. Lazy kisses.
Tragedies weren't made of such things