Ahrue Lavellan walked through the Grand Hall of Skyhold making conversation with the guests and her friends. She'd won. Corypheus was dead, and the breach had been sealed. Nearly a year of constant fighting, struggling, and sacrificing had come to a head, and now it was over. Everyone looked relieved and happy, but for Ahrue, all that had happened over the past months still hung in the air like a heavy fog that wouldn't lift. The festivities taking place around her seemed like a dream. She heard herself speak and laugh, heard her companions talk about the victory and their future plans, but the moment lacked immediacy. It could have been one of Varric's stories: vivid, colorful, and richly elaborate, but always with that hint of the unreal. Just a story being told. The book would close, and everyone would go about their lives as before.

After dutifully doing the rounds, talking to everyone, thanking them for the part they had played in the final victory, Ahrue quietly edged her way to the door to her quarters and slipped out of the Grand Hall. Away from the frenetic buzz of activity, her body became suddenly all too physical. The weight of everything that had happened pressed against her shoulders and spine, and she felt a hollow churning in her stomach, a screaming grief at the ready in her throat. She swallowed it back, and laboriously climbed the stairs to her chamber.

As she topped the stairs, the sight of the balcony gripped her. Part of her expected to see Solas there, waiting for her to escape from the human nobles demanding her attention, as he had many times before. The sound of her footfalls approaching would make him turn, and he'd fix her with an impish smile and dancing eyes. Leaning against the banister, fingers intertwined with hers, he'd speak to her in an Elven dialect more ancient than anything she'd heard or read in all her studies of the old ways. In a breathless prelude to a kiss, they'd exchange those tender words, as they had so many times before: "Ar lath ma."

At first he'd been cautious with her, her Dalish heritage giving him pause; her clan would not accept a flat-ear at the side of their First. It would be kinder to them both if he left. She could still feel the texture of his tunic and the lithe sinew of his arm as she held him back and asked him, for the first time, not to leave. The memory of his words slipped from her lips: "losing you would-." On that day, he'd stayed, and his habitual caution regarding her had given way to an easy warmth. "Ar lath ma, vhenan." In the midst of the chaos, violence, and strangeness, they'd found a home in one another.

She had never for a moment doubted his feelings for her. He'd loved her openly, which had made his leaving all the more confounding. It had ended abruptly. Even he'd looked startled by his decision as a palpable anguish overtook him that he would not permit her to ease. He'd refused to explain, and in the weeks since, she'd been unable to believe it was really over. Yes, he'd hurt her deeply, but she'd remained certain that once the breach was sealed and Corypheus defeated, Solas would come to her, ready to let her in, prepared to repair what he had hastily broken. Yet in those moments after the battle, as he'd crouched over the shattered orb, he'd been resolute in his pain, determined to carry it alone.

She looked at the trunk where she had stowed the orb fragments upon her return to Skyhold just hours earlier. Why the orb had meant so much to Solas, she didn't know. She wondered, had the orb been salvaged, would Solas have stayed, or had he always planned to leave once the chaos had passed? Her grandfather's warning, spoken to her in childhood, pushed heavily on her thoughts: "The flat ears are no better than their shemlen masters; they've forgotten the ways of the elvhen, most of all in affairs of the heart. They will lure a foolish girl to their bed with honeyed words and promises, only to leave her to her shame by sunrise." Had she been so poorly used? A port in a storm, as the humans phrased it? Or worse, a means to an end? Had he manipulated her in order to get close to the orb? She pushed the thought roughly away. No. She had to believe that she was more to him than that. What they'd shared was real. Believing anything else was unbearable.

-x-

That night, she dreamt of the waterfall. It was just after sunset, and a slight cool breeze from the south soothed Ahrue's fevered skin. She entered the clearing to find a dark wolf whimpering in the spot Solas had stood when he'd kissed her for the last time, the spot where Ahrue had once again asked him to stay. The spot where it had ended. Hearing her approach, the wolf turned toward her, his blue eyes flashing in the moonlight. Ahrue froze; wolves were bad omens in dreams, heralding nightmares or foretelling an impending betrayal at the hands of a trusted friend. You've arrived a little late, fen'era, she thought wryly. The wolf whined and lowered himself to the ground, his face between his paws. Their eyes met briefly then he looked away. He was no threat.

At the sight of the wolf, the tears that Ahrue had been holding back for so long flowed freely. She sank to the ground, burying her face in her hands as sobs wracked her small frame. Her life had been crumbling around her since the day she'd left her clan to travel to the Conclave, and she didn't know how to make it right. The woman she was had been gradually replaced by the Inquisitor: a character she had invented to achieve an end. She could not doubt that it was worth it—without her willingness to adopt the role, the world would no doubt have been violently shaped into that dark future she had witnessed in Redcliff—but she had never expected that the personal cost would be so high. The world was safe, but she couldn't help but count herself among the casualties.

In a few moments, she felt the coarse fur of the wolf against her arm. He nuzzled under her chin. Startled, Ahrue recoiled, and the wolf whimpered and backed away, returning to his submissive pose. She regarded the creature. Was he a figment that she had conjured to comfort her in her grief (an odd choice of form, given the specific significance of wolves to the Dalish) or a spirit reaching out to her in compassion? In either case, he was not an obvious danger to her. After a few slow breaths, she sidled up to the wolf on the ground and stroked his fur as the tears continued to flow down her cheeks and neck, and her body shook with barely audible sobs. The wolf rested his head on her lap, whimpering softly. Ahrue wondered if the wolf, like her, was suffering some invisible harm. For a long time, they sat there together sharing their pain and taking comfort in one another.

Hours passed. Ahrue saw the sun rising and knew that the dream would come to an end soon. The wolf seemed to sense this too and whined as he stood up and turned to face her, their eyes inches apart.

Ahrue smiled weakly and sighed. She reached out and stroked his head and neck. "I don't know if you're a figment or a spirit, but you being here tonight… it helped a little."

The wolf's ears perked and he continued to stare at her steadily.

She bit her lip and stiffened as a thought occurred to her. "If… if you are a spirit, perhaps you could pass a message for me to another dreamer."

The wolf broke his gaze and turned his head away.

Ahrue grasped the sides of his head and turned his face back to her own. Their eyes locked. "Please. I need him to know that—"

Ahrue woke up. Her face and pillow were damp with tears. She must have been crying in her sleep. The dream stayed with her, but the message that she had been so intent to deliver to Solas faded quickly from her mind. It unnerved her that something that had felt so significant moments before was now completely forgotten. She thought about staying in bed, taking a potion to return her to sleep. Maybe in the fade she'd be able to recall the message, find the wolf. But it seemed pointless. If the wolf was a spirit, he was certainly not keen on playing messenger. And even if he had been willing to pass notes between them, what could she have to say that she hadn't already said? Solas had chosen to abandon her in spite of everything they felt, everything they might have had together. She could think of nothing that would change his mind, and repeating any plea for him to stay would only hurt them both more than they already were. Underneath her worry and regret, the Vir'abelasan whispered incoherently.