Change Comes
Notes: Inspired by a photomanip that put Cullen as a Templar and Dorian as an Assassin from the AC games by ym532 on Tumblr. I could not resist writing out this little bit.
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"Do you still turn a blind eye to the atrocities being committed by your superiors?"
Cullen doesn't flinch at the unexpected voice. Accented and as familiar as any of his own men's voices despite belonging to one of his greatest enemies. Or so he's been told all his life. He doesn't look back to where he knows the Assassin will be. Perched on a barrel and obvious to all in his white robes. Cullen doesn't permit himself to look back at the man, doesn't allow himself the luxury of looking away as the fleet Meredith commands continues to set fire to the ships attempting to leave the bay.
He can hear the screams of the women and children aboard as they go under the water in a blaze of fire. One by one the refugees, seeking nothing more than their own lives, fall to the cold embrace of the sea.
"There is no reason for this!" Cullen hears the sound of boots crashing onto the pier and the angry stride of the Assassin striding up behind him because Dorian wants him to. The man is as silent as a breath when he needs to be, and only makes a sound when he wants to be heard. Andraste knows why he thinks Cullen is the one who should listen to him. "They're murdering innocents!"
"We have reports of apostates finding passage with the refugees," the words fall from his numb lips and Cullen is surprised at the bitter strain to the words. It had sounded like such a reasonable plan, he's sure, or his superiors would not have allowed it to go from a plan to action. "It is for the greater-"
"Enough!" Cullen flinches from the shout, right in his ear, as much as he does from the hand that latches onto his arm. Burning fingers that crackle with an eldrich fire that's poorly leashed and a grip that shakes him. The anger in Dorian's voice isn't leashed at all, and Cullen can hear the anguished horror plain as day. "Are you listening to yourself? They're killing children over a rumor of Assassins and you're standing here telling me it's for 'the greater good'?!"
The grip is like iron and Cullen does not -can not- fight it as he's pulled roughly around to meet Dorian's eyes. Dark and nearly invisible under the shadow of his hood, but the white line of his mouth and the rage shaking in his shoulders are very telling all on their own. Cullen flinches under that unseen gaze but doesn't pull away.
"Tell me!" Dorian shakes him again and Cullen swears he can see the flickering of magic out of the corner of his eyes. Something that should send him reeling back for his sword or pistol, but that he's far too indifferent to react to at the moment. "Damn you! Look me in the eyes and tell me the lies you're swallowing whole!"
"It-" Meredith's words ring in Cullen's head and clash with the oaths he took upon entering the Order. The lessons he learned from childhood echoing between the screams he can hear even clearer as the canons stop firing. He stares into the eyes he can't see but can imagine perfectly even now. Dark brown and usually alight with a kind of unholy mischief that makes Cullen both want to smile and groan in frustration. "It's-"
Words desert him, and Dorian is no help. Remaining silent. Every line of his body rigid with a tension that Cullen knows will break one way or another. Absurdly, that's what makes him realize the true horror of the night. Because if the Assassin, his greatest sworn enemy and the one man in the world who perhaps knows Cullen best, cannot abide this action then there is nothing of worth in it. It is a heinous massacre with no good at all and Cullen is standing on the sidelines allowing it to happen. It says something, Cullen supposes, that the moral compass of an Assassin -a mage one at that- is better than his own.
"When did it go wrong?" Slips out of his mouth when he stops trying to repeat the assurances Meredith had given not even an hour ago.
The stiffness drains from Dorian fast and his head bows down in weariness that echoes in his voice. "A long time before either of us were ever born."
It's comforting in a way that nothing has a right to be for him. Not with screams still rolling through the air in counterpoint to the slow rolling thunder that is coming in. The smell of rain nearly nonexistent under the scent of smoke and gunpowder. There's an eerie light in the depths of the hood when Dorian raises his head, and Cullen can't tell if it is magic or simply the reflection of the blazing ships.
"Well, not much use crying over the past," Dorian says in a cheerful tone that matches nothing of what Cullen can see of his face. "What's done is done. We simply have to fix it ourselves now, don't we?"
"That simply?" Cullen asks and there's a tingle in his lips that spreads numbness to his whole face. Making him aware of how wretchedly still he's been.
"Simple," Dorian laughs like the action doesn't hurt and Cullen envies him as always for that seemingly easy mask he pulls on. The weight of what he's just suggested darkens his words only a little. "I highly doubt there's going to be anything simple about destroying the worlds we both know."
Because that is what it would take. Cullen knows how deeply entrenched the Templar order is in their views. He can guess the Assassins are no better. They're all men after all, and men are so very weak to failure.
He turns back to the bay and it's blazing pyres, and doesn't look away again. Doesn't speak or shrug out of the hand still gripping him tight. He can feel the weight of Dorian's eyes on him. Intent and silently willing Cullen to agree. Cullen cannot disappoint this time. Something fragile and bruised inside of him grows because he knows. "It is the right thing to do regardless."
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