Notes: This is a remix of SignCherie's story Still Here, the link to which can be found on my profile.

She could have left the dragon alone. Ran knew that. It had been tucked away in the corner of the Emerald Graves, a threat only to giants and the odd group of Red Templars. She'd been fully prepared to do so, until she'd come across the elven burial ground. The humans might not care, but her people had so little of their past and she wanted to give them as safe a passage to this bit of it as she could make.

Bull never needed convincing to fight dragons, but Cassandra had loudly expressed her reservations about taking this one on without a healer nearby. Rightly, as it turned out. In its death throes, one of the dragon's claws rent Ran open from shoulder to hip. The shock of it was so great that she'd hadn't even felt the pain before she passed out.

She'd woken briefly on the way back to Skyhold, with Dorian bent over her, a look an intense concentration on his face, and her entire body screaming in agony. She thought she must have started screaming too, because he winced and reached up a hand to her forehead. He said something, his eyes worried and apologetic, and then she went under again.

When Ran woke the next time, she was back in her quarters at Skyhold. Dorian hovered over her in so much the same position, that for a moment she thought he had rediscovered some ancient Tevinter magic and moved them through space the way they had earlier moved through time. He smiled at her.

"Welcome back."

"How long?"

"A week." He stood and pressed a fist into the small of his back. "Vivienne and I have been trading off since you got back four days ago. I told her you would wake on my watch. Who wouldn't want to wake to this handsome face?"

Ran laughed weakly, her breath coming shorter than she anticipated. "I feel as weak as a newborn halla."

"That should fade in the next day or so." Dorian looked across the room. "And here's someone to see you." He leaned down and whispered conspiratorially, "I'm very glad you woke up today. He's been making quite a nuisance of himself." He squeezed her hand and left, nodding to Cullen as he went.

Cullen. Ran didn't even bother trying to dampen her welcoming smile. She'd missed him during the last few weeks, and she wanted nothing more than for him to come and put his arms around her. When they first met, she'd found his solid largeness—his humanness—intimidating, but now it was comfort, a place where she could stop being the Inquisitor and just be herself. When he made no movement towards her and the silence between them grew, her smile faltered.

"What were you thinking?" he finally said.

"I was thinking that the dragon was a danger. It's hardly the first."

"The others were near populated areas. I understood. This…" Cullen waved a hand over her in the bed. "Why?"

Ran struggled to sit up, feeling disadvantaged and vulnerable flat on her back. Cullen immediately came to help, rearranging the pillows to support her back. She wondered for a moment if she should try to pull him down for a kiss and save the argument for later, but his expression was closed off.

"There was a ruin," she said instead.

"Yes, it was in Cassandra's report."

"An elven ruin, Cullen. We only explored a bit of it, but when the clans are told, they'll send others to explore."

"I thought your clan was gone."

Gone. As though they'd merely up and left, not been slaughtered by shem, a sacrifice to her early attempts make nice with her advisors. "Murdered," she said, and something vicious inside her enjoyed the way he blinked and paled. "I may not have a clan anymore, but I was meant to be a Keeper, and I will fulfill those duties."

"We all had duties we had to give up. Yours cannot take precedence over the needs of the Inquisition. The Dalish could wait."

Ran was suddenly tired. Angry and hurt, yes, but also bone-deep tired of the willful blindless humans. Even this one. Especially this one, since she'd been foolish enough to fall in love with him. "Of course," she said. "The Dalish should know their place. In the back. Behind humans and their needs."

"That is not what I meant. If the Inquisition fails, no one is safe. Even the Dalish. No one else can do what you do. The Inquisition needs you."

"And the Dalish have no part in the Inquisition. The Inquisition will make treaties and take help from everyone else, but not the People."

"They're hardly welcoming. You know they ran off our messengers the first few times we tried to-"

"Stop talking like I'm not one of them!"

Cullen stared at her. He took breath, but she interrupted before he could say anything further. "As you said, we all have duties to the Inquisition. You should get back to yours, Commander."

Her use of his title shocked him. "Ran-"

"That was not a request."

Ran thought he meant to argue with her, but after a short silence, he bowed stiffly and left. Feeling exhausted in more ways than one, she was trying to move the pillows back when the door opened again.

"I don't want company," she ground out.

"A healer isn't company, he's a service," Dorian said lightly. He ran critical eye over her. "I warned Cullen you would tire quickly. I hope it was worth it."

"Not now, Dorian."

Dorian gave her a sympathetic glance. "Made a nuisance of himself to you, too? Typical Ferelden. Can you stay awake long enough to eat if I have food sent?"

"I'm tired, not sleepy."

"You might be surprised. Eat as much as you can and don't fight it if you find yourself nodding off."

Although she didnt feel hungry, Ran surprised herself by finishing an entire bowl of soup, half a bird, and two whole loaves of bread. She felt better physically after, but her heart hurt as much as ever. Had she only been fooling herself with Cullen? She'd thought he understood what her people meant to her. Her Keeper had warned the clan about the dangers of human liaisons. The Dalish were a novelty to most humans, rarely seen and poorly understood. If a long term attachment did form, on the human's side it was in spite of the elf's Dalish heritage, not because of it. Ran didn't want to think that was how Cullen saw her, as an exception to her people, but she couldn't forget the way he'd spoken earlier.

She did doze after eating, drifting in and out of consciousness until it began to grow, never quite shaking the underlying sadness she felt. She was wondering if someone was going to come light the candles when she heard the door at the bottom of the steps open.

Cullen sought her out as soon as his head cleared the bannister, and his step slowed as he realized she was already watching him. Ran simply waited. A part of her still leapt with gladness to see him. A larger part of her was wary and not sure she wanted to hear anything else from him. She made fists in the bed covers as he came nearer without speaking.

He came to a halt by the side of the bed. "Would you like to sit up again?" he asked.

He wanted to continue where they left off. Ran turned her head away. "I don't want further conversation with you."

There was a sharp intake of breath, and then she felt the side of the bed depress. Ran whipped her head back around. Surely he didn't think he was welcome in her bed right now?

"I'm sorry," Cullen said. He had not sat as she had thought, but knelt by the bed, elbows propped on the edge. "I should not have...I should not have."

"No, you should not have." Ran didn't know what to do. He was sorry, but did he understand? "I am Dalish," she said. "I am always going to be Dalish."

"I know," he said. "I thought I knew what that meant. I was a Templar. It was everything to me. And then I learned to serve another way. I thought being Dalish was the same for you. But it's not, is it?"

"No."

He laid his hand down next to hers, palm up, but not touching. "Forgive me?"

Oh, but she wanted to. "I asked before if my being Dalish mattered. Did you say it didn't because it truly didn't, or because you didn't think of me as Dalish?"

The fingers of his open hand curled. "Because you were you. Nothing else seemed to matter."

"Cullen, it matters."

He did not speak for a long moment. Ran felt as if her heart balanced over the edge of cliff, and the wrong words would see it shattered on the rocks.

"I knew you were Dalish," he said slowly. "But you were not just Dalish. You were our only hope against the Rift. You were the woman who sacrificed herself to let us escape Haven. You were a friend to me, believed in my strength when I did not. You—I love you. You are Dalish. I don't know everything that means. I know it's important to you, so I will learn if-" Here he paused, unsure. "If you will still have me."

Ran put her hand in his. "It won't be easy. We'll fight about this again."

Cullen brushed his mouth over her fingers. "I have experience with difficult roads."

"Then kiss me and come get in bed."

"An order from the Inquisitor?"

"A request from the Dalish who loves you, too."