stellarvoyage asked: Any character and a magical blade.
It was so quiet in the room as they sat, solemnly considering everything that had unfolded in the last few days. The events from Haven that had scared them both nearly to death — possibly her more, since it had almost meant his — and Eamon's absurd proposal. They'd traveled clear across Ferelden and back again with so much more yet in front of them, things that were bigger and scarier and more important than either of them.
He unsheathed the blade on his back and handed it to her, pommel first, curling her fingers around it with his own, and looking her very seriously in the eyes. "I … think you should have this. No, I want you to have this. I think he would have also."
She looked up at him, eyes questioning. "This is your father's—"
"It's mine now, right? And now it's yours."
Taking it from his hand and turning the flat of the blade up, she ran her fingers along the runes worked into the whole of it. This was a weapon meant to be wielded by a Warden. It was made with their purpose in life in mind, yet it was now named and carried the legend of an untainted King who had used it for the same.
"You know it's ill-luck to gift a blade. I can't accept this," she turned the pommel back and leaned it towards his hands.
Smiling that lopsided, half-smirk of his, he laughed. "Then consider it a trade?"
"A trade for what? What in the world do I have that could make this possibly begin to make this even?"
Cupping her cheek in his hand, he crouched down so that they were eye-to-eye, "A promise."
barbeauxbot asked: A Daddy!Seb and Elyssa talk from her POV :D
She poured the tea and then climbed back up into his lap, as was their custom, and he began combing her hair. He also always did that. She was very fond of this part. It was probably because he only had sons, although William did have lovely hair.
"If anyone hurt my parents I would hunt them down and hurt them right back." She said it so matter-of factly in that way that she used when her logic was air-tight.
"Elyssa," he gave her that sad smile he wore so much lately when they had these talks. It was part of what made these her favorite talks ever. He treated her like she was just the same as him. Not like a child who was going to be a queen some day, even though she was.
"Yes, Sebastian?" she looked up at him over her shoulder as he braided her hair. They didn't use titles, and she liked that too. Because they were the same, he said. Prince and Princess, just two friends, having a nice talk.
"When William broke your toy and hit you the last time you were here, did it hurt?"
"Yes. He's really strong for being so little. Just like my mum," she added, sipping her tea as he coiled her braid around and pinned it in place. He was really good at doing that.
"Did you want to hit him back?" Sebastian reached for his own tea, and took a sip. "It's all right to tell the truth. We're just friends talking."
"Yes," she said, quietly, almost ashamed. It had hurt, and it had made her angry. "But I didn't."
"No, you didn't. Why is that?"
She signed and rolled her eyes slightly, then remembered herself and sat up straighter. "Because all it wouldn't fix my toy. And it wouldn't really make me feel better. Besides, you put him in time-out."
"Hmm. I see," setting his cup down he slid her into the crook of his arm to face him. "That was very merciful of you, and also wise. Elyssa," he paused, brushing a piece of hair he'd missed from her forehead. "Do you think that hurting the people that hurt you and your family is going to fix what they've done?"
"No." She was quiet for a long time. "And it probably wouldn't make me feel very good, either. I don't like hurting people."
She thought she saw him frown just a bit more. "No, it really wouldn't. You are a very smart girl indeed."
She nodded once and smiled, hugging him back. "Thank you, Sebastian."
bellisadinosaur asked: At one point, we definitely had a kitten
Oghren tromped around the cellar, looking for the stone-cursed thing. He wasn't a nug farmer, he had no business chasing down animals, a fine dwarven stallion like him.
Although, he thought, with sudden alarm, if that hairball got into his home brew it would ruin it. The last thing he needed was cat piss in his secret recipe.
Huh, he reasoned. Couldn't hurt, actually. And none of these surfacers would probably notice the difference anyhow.
There was no accounting for taste.
barbeauxbot asked: Kahrin in Orzammar
"Neither of them is being forward with us, Alistair. Not just Bhelen. I need to know what each of them are playing at," Kahrin glared at Alistiar, eyebrow raised high, arching her tattoo slightly, and he winced.
They rarely argued, but it seemed that since they arrived in this blasted city, since they crossed past the massive doors into the hall and walked past the looming statues of dwarven paragons, that they had done nothing else. She was abrasive and distant and looked like a mess. Never had she attempted to make any choice so unilaterally as if it were the final word, but she dismissed all of his concerns on this one thing.
"Riiigh, but you also don't have to run yourself ragged doing everything each of them is asking." She hadn't eaten since Redcliffe — not anything worth mentioning anyhow — and she certainly hadn't slept a full night since they'd arrived. "You're going to make yourself sick and then who will stop the Archdemon?"
"You could just toss me at her as a bribe and ask her to go away." She didn't take her eyes out of the record book she was scanning. "If you nag her enough like you do me she might even listen. Pack up her Blight and go home." She shrugged at him and turned to what she was doing.
He hated it when she talked like that. Somedays he actually believed that she didn't mean to survive all of this. That she was going to go back on her word and leave him alone. "That's not funny, Kahrin." Pinching the bridge of his nose he looked down at her again.
"I'm not being funny. Not in the least. A dead prince is no good to anyone," she grumbled and continued as she sorted through the documents in the Shaperate. "Which these two are going to find out if one of them doesn't step it up so we can get our troops. Now help me find what I'm looking for or shut up."
Pulling out a few more tomes and thumbing the pages he spoke quietly,"We should pick Harrowmont. He's the better man."
"That doesn't mean he's the most fit ruler, Alistair." Grunting in frustration she shoved the book back on the shelf. "This is pointless. We shouldn't even be meddling in this." Shoving her hands in her hair she turned on a heel and made for the back of the long chamber.
"I don't trust Bhelen," he followed after her quickly.
"And when you're king that will matter. Right now we need troops." She didn't meet his eyes again as they continued, because she knew that was also a sore subject. "I just want to get the troops and get out of here."
"That is no way to make this decision." Raising his voice slightly he stilled the book she was pulling from the shelf. "This will impact all of these people here, Kahrin."
"Don't you think I know that?" she hissed at him, shoving his arm out of her path. "They shouldn't be asking this of us. We shouldn't be digging in dwarven politics and we've wasted enough time here already."
"Kahrin, I just—"
"Either help me so we can be finished faster, or get out of my way. We're going to be late for the proving," the last of her words trailed off as she stormed out of the room.
bellisadinosaur asked: Carver and the mabari come to an understanding
The dog was on the bed againwhen he came in to change. Not doing anything special, just lying there, looking at him with great big eyes.
"Down. You know better, Rowan." Instead of jumping down like her master had just told her to she raised an eyebrow at him. "Fantastic, what is that, a requirement to be in this family?"
She was already rather large now, and there was just no way that when she was fully grown that all three of them would fit in this bed.
"I said get down." Rowan responded by rolling over and exposing her belly, tongue lolling out of the side of her mouth. She woofed at him once, issuing her own command.
"Fine, but just for a few moments. Then it's off the bed with you." Carver walked over and rubbed his dog's belly. When she licked his hand he rolled his eyes and laid down next to her, ruffling the fur under her muzzle. "This doesn't mean you've won, you know," he tried to grumble, laughing despite himself as he scratched her ears.
bellisadinosaur asked: Prompt: "Who do you think you are?"
The question asked, Kahrin sat on the stone ledge of the window and stared at the King in front of her. Very much an uninvited guest to her misery here in Weisshaupt, of all the people she'd expected to walk through the door, he was not one of them.
"I think I'm the King, in case you forgot that favor you did for me, and someone had to come up here to remind the First Warden what Ferelden thinks of political prisoners."
"I'm not a prisoner, Alistair, I'm fine." she hissed slightly as she pulled back the ladder made of her shredded bedding.
He snorted. "Clearly. That's quite the clever plan you had there. Well thought out as usual I suppose." He held up her weapons and stated the obvious. "I have your swords. I thought you'd like them, and then we can leave."
"You can't just swoop in here," she hopped off of the ledge and reached out her hand expectantly into which he placed her family sword.
"Yes," he drew it out like he always did, "swooping is bad. At any rate," he looked at the other blade he still held, turning it over, as if the runes along the flat were fascinating, "we should leave now before your gracious host changes his mind."
Glowering at him again her face was incredulous. "I'm not telling them what they want to know, I'll not betray my family."
"Family," the derisive sound that came from him was a mixture of a snort and a laugh. "I heard you were married. Thank you for the invitation. I'm sure you're very happy."
"It was going to happen eventually," her icy voice shot back at him. "Should I have hand-delivered an invitation? Would that have pleased you? It was a rather quick occasion. You probably couldn't have fit it in."
"You had a family once," he spat. "You still do. It's been waiting for you to make up your mind. And now I see you have." he turned for the door, still holding her sword.
Sighing, she followed behind him, almost running into him when he stopped. "May I have my sword, please, Your Majesty?"
"Why not? I already gave it to you once. What's one more time, for old times' sake?" He held it out to her, pommel first, clamping his fingers over hers when she grabbed it. "I guess we never mattered to you, we've been waiting for nothing."
"You have your family, and I have mine. Let's just go back to that."
His eyes narrowed and danced with rage that she should have seen coming. "Dammit, Kahrin. You knowwhat I have. A miserable marriage to a woman who loathes me and a beautiful little girl who is very much yours. Ours."
"It was for the best, it—"
"It's always 'this is for the best' with you! Did you ever stop to consider what I wanted? Out of all of this?" If anyone was in the hallway they were certainly getting a good show.
Looking up into his face, she narrowed her eyes. "You said "picke me". I asked, and that was what you said."
His voice boomed in response. "Me, withyou, together. That should have been obvious!" Alistair ran a hand down the back of his head and glared at the ceiling. "I would have followed you into the Void, Kahrin. Dammit! I still would. I didn't have to bea king, Kahrin, you knew that. Or, you could have kept your promise."
She winced visibly, the barb that he was always able to jab a little further tearing the wound fresh. "I wasn't ready. I was not right for the job." She hugged her sword to her chest and looked away from him.
Quieter now he walked back toward her. "I didn't think I was right for this job, but you convinced me. If I was wrong, maybe you were too." He laid a hand upon her cheek and looked at her long and hard. "Maybe you still are."
Every muscle in her body tensed when he touched her, making a million thoughts explode in her mind. "Alistair…"
solitae asked: I'm not playing Skyrim! Prompt: Elyssa's first love/crush
He was in the square every time they made a processional through the market square. Tall, very tall, and ginger hair like Auntie Saoirse and cousin Liesel. He was still in that gangly stage but he had a greatsword on his back that looked much too big for someone of his build, but people said that about the Princess who wielded two swords. She knew better than to discount his skill. He was a brand new knight and wore his uniform standing straight and tall with great pride. The heraldry of her family proudly across his chest and she gushed slightly.
She knew it would never be allowed. She had duties and responsibilities and that meant giving up certain freedoms — this had never been a secret to Elyssa Moira Cousland Theirin. One didn't grow up the daughter of the King and the Hero and not know that love was not a luxury that was afforded people like her. Her family was a clear example of this, and she always worried that she'd follow in her father's footsteps in that.
However, when those green eyes darted her way as she and her father made their way back towards the Palace district, she locked them for just one moment.
Then she tripped over nothing obvious and grabbed her father's arm to right her balance.
"Are you all right, my Princess?" her father looked down at her, grinning sympathetically as she fell back into step, rolling her shoulders under her swords.
Flushing to the roots of her mass of dark hair she looked back up at him. "I'll be just fine, Father."
lythlyra asked: Kahrin/Carver - Shindig at Vigil's Keep that requires them to dress up and dance. (MAYBE I JUST WATCHED FIREFLY. MAYBE.)
(PEOPLE ARE OBSESSED WITH KAHRVER IN DRESS CLOTHES AND THIS PLEASES ME MUCH!)
She brushed her fingers lightly across the front of his doublet, smoothing nothing in particular away, but merely enjoying the feel on his muscles under the fine fabric.
He was running his giant hands up her arms, causing her to shudder reflexively, before she caught one that was wandering towards other places that were certainly not her arms.
"If you keep that up, dearest Arl Hawke, we will never make it down to the party. We're already late."
"You should probably not ask me to help you dress, then, love," he grinned down at her, trailing a finger across the part of her chest that was not covered and very well cinched in.
Kahrin fumbled for the handle on the door before they got distracted again, and pulled him by the waist of his new breeches after her.
It was the be the first official function they had attended, let alone hosted, since they'd been married, and Kahrin thought it would be a fantastic opportunity to see how the nobility responded to her new husband. To see who respected them. Who would call him 'lord' and who would call him 'arl' and to keep careful track of those who chose the former as a slight —albeit a subtle one.
Though, the music distracted her almost instantly from that thought, from the desire to introduce him to anyone, and in the next instant she was dragging him to the floor to dance as if they were the only ones in the room. In a room full of stuffy nobles and people she didn't care about, the part of her blood that was always itching, always begging her to move sang with the comfort of Carver being near her. The taint that damned them drew them together and calmed her.
There was no magic or darkspawn or chantry or anything to try to come between them in this moment. Nothing that mattered or was even big enough to draw their attention from the other.
Still as clumsy as he was in Denerim, he gripped her waist and pulled her close and tried his best to not trip her as she let him lead in the reel. The beauty of sharing poisoned blood meant that they always knew without a doubt where the other was, somehow even in a room full of other Wardens. They were able to move together and not collide. She held to his arms and looked up in his eyes and their periphery fell away.
The nobility, the formalities, the whole shindig could wait while their blood united them in this one precious moment.
(I MAYBE JUST LOVE FIREFLY AND NOW WILL DO SO AGAIN! 8D HOPE YOU LIKE THIS!)
nerozane asked: Carver's thoughts on Peaches
She made him pieand he really couldn't believe it still. No one had ever made him a pie of his very own before.
Her voice grated on him slightly, and she was indeed, slightly pushy, but… pie. While they sat behind the barn and ate it she nattered away endlessly about this and that, and Carver was amazed that she was still talking to him an hour later, the plate set aside. He leaned back against the boards of the barn and just kept listening, and suddenly her voice didn't bother him so much.
Not when she looked at him like that, and not when her eyes sparkled just a little more when he looked back at herlike that.
The pie, the look, her eyes, her smile. They were all for him.
He liked that.
magesmagesmages asked: Kahrin and Elyssa and babies :D.
"Ewwww!" Elyssa wiped away the drool that had fallen onto her face from Liesel, who had climbed up on the Princess' chest while she was lying on her back. "That's disgusting!"
Kahrin walked over and awkwardly scooped up her niece off of her daughter, holding her out at arm's length as if the child might explode all over her. "That's what babies do, Lil' Nip."
The Princess sat up and gave her mother an assessment. "Mum, that is not how you hold a baby. Like this." She helped ease the girl into the crook of Kahrin's arm. It never quite felt natural to her. About as natural as watching a mabari trying to hump a nug.
"Thank you, Lil' Nip. I'll get the hang of this, eventually." She smiled at the gurgling infant in her arms who flailed her hands about in little clenched fists.
"Is that how you used to hold me?" Elyssa laughed lightly, clearly joking.
Kahrin smiled a bit sadly at her daughter, nearly eleven and still so new to her. "No. Not exactly. I … didn't have a lot of opportunity to hold you."
"Why? Is that because you aren't married to Daddy? Is that why?" she brushed a bit of fiery orange hair from her cousin's forehead.
"Not exactly, no." Kahrin sighed heavily and sat on one of the chairs in the nursery. "It's a very complicated story, but Uncle Finn used to take care of most of that."
"Did you love me?" It was an innocent question, but loaded. She knew better than to think her own daughter would try to bait her.
"I was very confused," she said after a long time. She touched the Princess' chin with one finger, taking in the eyes and brow that were like looking into a mirror. "And scared. It took a long time to realize how much I was missing, not knowing you."
The girl nodded with wisdom far beyond her ten years. "You were also afraid of Daddy."
"Oh, no. No not really." Shifting Liesel in her arm she made room for the girl to slide up into her lap. "And that would not have been your fault, even if that were true. Know that. None of us regret you."
"I know." Simply and clear, she leaned against her mother and rested her head on her shoulder, playing with one of Liesel's feet. "Liesel and I are the luckiest children in the whole world, you know."
"Oh, really?" Kahrin smiled at her face and bopped her lightly with one finger on the nose of hers that was a near replica of her father's.
"Yes. We have more people who love us, who do hard things to try to make our lives better."
A simple statement so full of understanding.
"It's true, Lil' Nip. It's more true than you know." She kissed her brow lightly and hugged both of them close.
keelangan asked: Warden Carver tries to visit Hawke during Acts II/III
Carver growled in frustration, somehow remembering to stand straight at attention when addressing his superior. "Sod the rules. My mother is dead. Surely you can make an exception for this." It was his third attempt in as many years to get leave to see Saoirse. He had respect for Stroud — most days — for saving his life and taking him in. The man had the compassion of an ogre. And only slightly better breath.
"You left your family behind when you chose to drink. This was never a secret to you, Hawke." The man's mustache seemed to move on its own.
He tried to not roll his eyes. He really did. "Some choice. I was already dying. Now I think my sister needs… ugh. I could be there and back in just a few days and …" He groaned in frustration. "Never mind."
"These are not your choices to make. So long as you are under my command, you will follow the rules I have set forth."
"Yeah, well, with all due respect, Ser, maybe I don't want to be under your command anymore, if you can't respect the needs of family."
Stroud met his eyes with a hard glare for several moments. "We'll discuss this later, Hawke." He paused before turning and striding away. "All of it."
nightmaredifficulty asked: Kahrin on tattoos.
Fergus had taken her to get hers in the summer of her 18th year. She'd bested him enough in single combat that he said she'd earned it.
A tattoo like this marked you. It showed your strength and your determination. It set you apart as a warrior. Historically facial tattoos were meant to intimidate the enemy. They would see the woad of the chasined warriors from long ago and their resolve in battle would crumble.
For nobility, it showed that you were capable of defending your lands and the people who depended on you. That you would answer the call to arms. That you weren't just a privileged arse on a pretty chaise. You were Ferelden in every way the word was meant to be used.
To her, it was an acknowledgment by her elder brother of her achievement. Of her prowess with blades. Of her success on the field of battle. Of his pride in her, his little sister in every sense of the word.
He held her hand while the marquist tamped it into her skin and she never flinched, not even once. Not even when the needle tapped against the sensitive skin around her eye.
Tiny, and terrifying. And now the whole world would know.
barbeauxbot asked: Connor and Eilidh in the Tower :3
"Which one of you did that?" The templar turned and all that Connor could see were cold eyes that immediately landed on her. It wasn't either of them, but the bucket-head wouldn't believe it had been one of the other apprentices. They were the right kind of kids. The good ones who paid attention in healing and who showed up to all of their classes. And who didn't get caught in the broom cupboard together.
Oops.
The Pompous Would-Be Lordling and the Raggamuffin Mouth who didn't even know how to use a fork. The whole Tower was against them. Was it any wonder they'd become friends?
"You," he pointed a heavily gauntleted finger at Button, and Connor sucked in silently. She'd had enough "issues with her conduct" since showing up here that there was no way anyone would believe that she hadn't sent the offending paperball hurtling at him.
"It wasn't me you—" she started, glaring lightning bolts at him, but Connor interrupted. This would have been her third infraction this week, and while that wasn't anything unusual, this particular arse seemed to have an eye on her. What Connor wouldn't give to just throw an entropy ball at his stupid face.
The templar came clanking over and yanked her up by the arm roughly, which was completely unnecessary with the size of her. She let out a few choice curses at him and spat at his feet.
"It was me, you stupid git. What are you going to do about it?" To prove his point he threw a paperball at the jerk, bouncing it cleanly off of his helm, then raised his eyebrows in a challenging manner.
The templar hesitated slightly before grabbing him up as well. Sometimes whohe was stopped them from coming down on him at all.
Not today.
"First Enchanter's office, both of you. You'll wait there for the Knight-Commander," he dragged them from the back of their Spirit class, which was boring anyway.
They'd probably be flogged, and he wouldn't even bother to tell his father when he came to visit, if he made it this month. It didn't matter. Even if they were both beaten, at least they were together.
Not that he'd tell her that was why. She probably knew, though.