So yes, I've done it again. I've gone and gotten inspired to write more Solas and Lavellan fic. For those of you who read 'What you owe', yes this is the same solas and Lavellan pairing, but not the same story. This does not mean that i won't be tempted to make you all reach for the box of tissues again, this story will be quite full of angst, and of course, some eventual smut. I have no idea how long this will be, I only have a few chapters outlined in advance, so i am flying by the seat of my pants here, but i promise to do my best to once again do justice to this most angsty of pairings.
This fic is of course, wholly self indulgent and i make no apologies for it, hard as it is to write from Solas' perspective, the smooth bald bastard makes me work for a good story. I will blur the lines of Cannon mechanics as little as humanly possible for a story that takes place after trespasser, but in some places i have quite clearly thrown out the rulebook and just made shit up!
To be honest if just one person enjoys this story i have done what i have set out to do which is to just share some of the awesome inspiration provided to us by Bioware, a company i have always had a long term love affair with.
But enough of the babble, please enjoy the fruits of my labour!
Chapter One: What you deserve
I know you, we've been here before. No surprises. A settled score.
I know the darkness, from inside. Reckless rage, and poisoned pride
~~I know you- by White Buffalo~~
When he had once sat within the painted rotunda of Skyhold and idly imagined her stepping amongst the ancient shelves of the shattered library, it had not been like this. He'd had an almost perfect impression of her wonderment held in his mind, her expressive face caught in the moment when she saw the tightly bound pages containing words that had lived through countless ages, enough words to perhaps satisfy even her voracious appetite for answers to all the questions of her world. He had envisioned her laughter, both incredulous and perhaps a little sad when she learned the truth of it all in those pages and how it measured against the lies she had been told as a Dalish. She would have spent hours amongst those books, and hours more wanting to hear the same words from his mouth, her questions delighted and probing. Most of all he'd sought to conjure that smile, a single expression that that would speak so many things, gratitude, the cynical edge of her mirth and cautious love. He had seen all these things so clearly, and he had seen himself as her guide, walking beside her and sharing her wonder, which of course only underlined the childish fallacy of such thoughts.
He had not imagined the hot stench of blood and gaatlok cordite that permeated the air and fell in the wake of her determined tread, along with anything that stood in her way, nor the savage path she had been forced to carve her way through in order to get this far. She had been robbed of the time to appreciate the beauty of such a sad place in anything but passing, when she would have gladly spent a lifetime amongst the dusty tomes and ancient artifacts if given half the chance to do so. More importantly, despite the idle fancies of his wandering thoughts both then and now, she was never meant to be here at all. Back then the idea of her ever reaching this place, of reaching the truth about him, had been unthinkable, it had been a private and beautiful lie in his head that would never come to pass
The woman that walked the corners of fantasy in his mind could be tailored to understand all that he was and to withstand all that he must do. But the woman that fought her way to him unknowing, had been told far too many lies for her to even begin to understand. The lies had been born when he could have had no inkling of what she would mean to him and he to her, those lies had gathered momentum until there was nothing left to do but to weave them further into that unseen tapestry he wore about him like a shield as she began to become unbearably real to him and more than a little dangerous to his resolve.
He had torn himself from her side and it had not been painless, he had hardened his heart just as he had once told her to do, only to find that she slipped back in when he least expected it, her ghost touching upon old wants that should have been buried along with the lies. To see her hung within the frame of the eluvian now is all too telling, he has missed her beyond what he could imagine and it hit him all at once, staggering the coldness that has surrounded him in the last two years, that utilitarian cold designed to freeze all but what needed to be done from a heart that held far too much sorrow. Her face was like a thrown lance to that weary heart, it bit deep and it pained him greatly to watch her steady approach because he knew that when she found him, he would once more have to force himself to turn away, and in doing so, hurt her again.
It would be one more pain upon countless others for her to endure, one more bruise that would not fade, another chain to add to the many he had wrapped around her heart. He had meant to give her an eventual peace when he'd left Skyhold. It had hurt her just as it had hurt him to leave her at such a time, but the wound would have scarred over eventually. But now he was forced to use her as a tool, a despicable act towards one he professed to love, not softened by the fact that it might well save her life, it would be a wound reopened for both of them.
She should never have been here, but she is, and she is coming to him with her heart unprepared.
He would call his deceit necessary, even noble, if he wanted to lie to himself as well as her. It was true enough that she would die without his help now, but this was almost secondary to the fact that he needed what she possessed, he had tried and failed to further his plans without it, the anchor had to be returned. If only it could have been done without causing her more than just physical pain, if only he could have been more than just another scar waiting to happen to her soul.
And was there not a guilty sin like pleasure in watching her as she began her journey through this broken place? He had observed almost greedily, her reaction upon unlocking the first strands of truth, finding undeniable satisfaction in her incredulous exhilaration when she understood the meanings hidden in the mosaic's. She has never been more beautiful than when something breathed life into her desire for knowledge, she'd carried unanswered questions for so long that they had chased her from her home with the Dalish and into the treacherous arms of the Conclave. She had all but hounded him for tales of his time in the fade, searching for the smallest crumb of truth amongst the history he had seen, envying him with open awe she had never been self conscious enough to hide.
It was this that drew him to her more than anything else, disarming and wild as she was, she was a child of learning who'd had the misfortune to be born into a world where tradition frowned upon questions that challenged it. With the mysteries of Fen'Harel finally unfurling before her, it should have been a treasured moment, instead her bright enthisiasm for the knowledge only made what he was about to do even worse.
With the threat of the approaching Qunari at his back, he still hadn't been able to tear his eyes away from her as she discovered these long withheld answers, and that was the very root of the danger she has always posed to him. Being near had her made everything else fade, allowed him to call into question what had at first been obvious while he walked among an entire world that seemed tranquil. Witnessing her very personality began to make the ghosts that surrounded him in this world, swim into better focus, while it had made her shine like a beacon until even he couldn't deny its power to challenge his perspective. When he'd touched her, he had felt the almost painful and creaking lurch of atrophied emotions being forced to work once again, it had left him feeling young and almost foolish at first, and as those emotions and their accompanying sensations threw off the dust of ages and gathered momentum, he had felt continuously aflame, both in body and mind.
He see's her now, captured and fascinated by the rows of books, an anguished tilt of her eyes expressing disappointment that she would not be able to dwell here, and he knew the thought of passing by all that waiting history and truth would pain her almost as much as the anchor. It is not the first time that duty has pulled her away from the freedom of discovery and it will not be the last. More truths awaited her path and some of them were bitter or simply downright frightening. He knew her opinions of Fen'harel were both whimsical and questioning. From the way she left small tributes of precious stones and metals at the wolf statues in deference to a shape that had given her comfort as a frightened child, to the questions that had caused her own clan to eye her with growing unease, her view on his re-written past had clashed with all around her. But how would her own questions about his origin stand up against the fear driven stories of the Dalish when she learned the truth?
When she faced the true wolf, would her cynical and pragmatic mind prevail amongst a lifetime of well constructed lies fabricated into truth and then eventually, legend? Or would that instinctual fear of him learned through generations, prevail?
The old shrine beneath the dead stone hand is almost completely darkened save for the dim promise of flickering magical light that floated about the ancient mechanism at its centre, and the bright gleam in her eyes when she see's it. The stylised bronze spheres are unmistakably of his people and he can see she knows it too, the realisation casting a hungry grin to her lips, one that makes the Tevinter groan and Cassandra sigh, both of them knowing she will not be drawn from here until she has been given time to explore this strange contraption. Both already resigned to her whim, for who could refuse the woman who sacrifices much for so little reward? He is silent in her contemplation of the ruins, preferring to watch her mind working behind eyes that flit around the shadows, before her daring yet respectful tread toured the room, stopping at intervals to inspect parts of the mechanism in an effort to guess how it worked.
He remains leaning against a crumbling pillar, watching her progress, all but seeing the clockwork of her mind turning as she moved, inspiration finally sparked when she touches upon a lever and the tall stone hunter turns with a rumbling grind of old gears, jerking to face an unobstructed sphere before launching an arrow, the resulting ringing gong exciting the faintly glowing particles of magic to grow brighter and coalesce within the sphere itself. Cassandra and Dorian are looking about warily, perhaps concerned that the sound might herald the arrival of guardians or more monstrous pests, but Talitha's face is aglow with fierce joy and he quietly drinks it in as one might savour the finest of wines. She seems to sense his observance and turns that joy his way, her blade like grin almost seething with excitement he can't ignore, and he cannot help but allow the softest of smiles in return.
It doesn't take her long to work out that the braziers are of some significance, and she is only temporarily stymied by the one trapped behind a locked gate until she fully takes in his casual stance and narrows her eyes suspiciously while approaching. The familiar scent of pine and lyrium find him again as she draws close enough to place both hands on his upper arms, and he allows himself to be moved one step to his left, the shifting of his frame revealing a second lever. Her eyes are still narrowed and her lips are pressed tightly together in response to his mild trickery, but he can tell that she's biting the insides of her mouth to keep from laughing, the bright mirth in her eyes increasing, for it isn't often that he is playful, even subtly so, and she takes each rare instance as a gift.
"Ass"
He responds with an all too solemn bow as she flips the lever, the locked gate lifting while another closed beyond it's boundaries.
"And how long would you have waited had i not noticed you were looking decidedly smug about something?"
He stares straight ahead, daring to look deadpan and knowing he is more than well equipped to pull it off. "For as long as it took no doubt, how else will you learn if you are not challenged?"
She makes a soft sound, somewhere between a laugh and a snort and gently admonishes him with an elbow to the ribs. "I was right the first time, you're an ass"
He concedes with a faint shrug and the smallest of twitches at the corner of his mouth and she shakes her head , huffing an escaped strand of white blonde hair from her eyes before she points at one of the unlit braziers like a mother sending her child to his bed, her mouth forced into sternness until he bowed again and strode to his place. Cassandra and Dorian are likewise directed to the other braziers while she returned to the first lever , and when all three were lit she once again turned the stone hunter to fire into another sphere, the lights growing brighter in their bronze cages, though the improved view of decrepit walls leaves much to be desired, he could almost see what this place might have once been like.
The third sphere is easier to light, requiring only Cassandra's heavily armoured bulk upon a pressure plate, the obstructing pillar descending for the next arrow to hit its resonating mark. The last unlit sphere takes a little longer to work out, and this time he is hiding no integral levers, but eventually Dorian is hustled beyond the newly opened gate, looking openly bemused until she hit the lever again, the gate closing with a rather defined clang. The Tevinter grips the bars and half glares between them as she approaches.
"If it turns out that i die because you're unlocking some ancient elven lavatory you're going to feel decidedly silly and i shall feel decidedly justified to haunt you for the rest of your days my dear"
She pulls herself up on the bars of the gate, bumping her nose briefly against Dorian's and Solas knows that she could talk a mountain into moving aside if given long enough, the Tevinter's complaints are simply an expected facet of their friendship, and he wonders what her clan would think of such a pairing.
"Dorian...sweetheart, if you die it will be while surrounded by adoring admirers, and i would tell them all of the time you threw yourself into captivity in order to further the pursuit of a great and ancient treasure, I'll even throw in a dragon"
"I don't get out of bed for anything less than two dragons i'll have you know"
Her quiet and low laughter resonates as deeply in his chest as the spheres chime had against these low stone walls, reminding him again that despite a will that could boast thousands of years of training, the question of whether or not he is falling for her, has already been answered. Their relationship is hardly more than a continuous mental sparring, and had she not been his friend first, perhaps they might not have even had that, not when he knew the cost that awaited him and did what he could to keep this slow moving infatuation at arms length. But this simple sound, not even aimed at him, finds it's way to his ears and he can imagine that low laughter in the dim light of a bedroom where the secrets she spoke would be warm and taste of lyrium touched skin.
"The sooner you turn that wheel over there, the sooner we can return to camp and i can tell you about the scandalous poetry i was sent by a former Antivan Crow, it's very...descriptive, Cassandra blushed harder than when she read the last chapter of swords and shields"
"I did not!"
The heated declaration echoes around the chamber, the Seeker's denial only confirming the truth and the Tevinter laughs and claps his hands.
"Oh, now that settles it, anything scandalous enough to make the Seeker deny so hotly has to be delicious enough to warrant me doing the work of an oxman, hold on a moment"
The wheel mechanism turns out to be stiff and unyielding without some applied effort and inventive Tevene swearing, but eventually the pillar begins to lower and she dashes to the lever, timing it's pull precisely for the hunter to swing one last time, his arrow finding its mark and the chamber growing brighter. She takes several slow steps back, her face bathed in the glow of magic that drifted like lazy butterflies, over to the locked door that held her curiosity simply for the fact that it was locked.
The door opened and she peered inside. A moment later she was laughing.
"Of course it would be you old wolf, even down here you follow me!"
Dorian rests his forearms through the bars, still panting while trying to see what she was looking at, "Don't tell me we went through all that for another Fen'harel statue, is this one at least made of gold or adorned with gems?"
She crosses the room and flips the lever to let him out, the tevinter looking relieved to not be looking through a perspective of bars once more, he gives the statue beyond the door a sour look, likely noting the lack of anything shiney.
"No, he's made of stone and adorned with lichen, but we don't know what he might be guarding, so I suppose we should be ready."
"Marvellous, a mouldy statue and the promise of more elven trickery, you never take me anywhere nice these days"
Cassandra clapped a heavy gauntleted hand on the Tevinter's shoulder , "Cheer up Dorian, if you die down there you'll no longer owe Varric 50 sovereigns"
"A veritable comfort as always Seeker"
Twenty minutes later the last of the undead fell beneath the stunning blow of Cassandra's shield, and they were free to pick through the dusty bones and old containers that had once been beautiful in their composition, but now only held the rough patina of so many years gone by. It saddened him to see the place so infested, like many of the things his people had built, it had once been glorious to behold, now it was simply hostage to the ravages of time and things forgotten. A relic, like himself.
As the others search through what has been left behind, he notes that she had disappeared again, a habit he was not fond of and one that nobody could curb no matter the lecture. She had not gone far, only to the first chamber where she stands before the wolf statue, digging about in the leather bag slung at her hip and muttering to herself, or more accurately, at the statue.
"Oh come on, i know i had some pyrite in here somewhere, my apologies old wolf, i didn't exactly expect to find you down here"
She dares to speak to the effigy that was his as if it is an old friend, and perhaps it is, for she has followed this ritual from childhood, ignoring the way it had made her a pariah amongst her own people, daring to challenge the stories with her questioning nature and never seeming afraid. If she knew how closely the Dread Wolf truly followed her, would she still speak with that same fondness he wonders.
Stepping behind her he stalls her fruitless search of the bag with cool fingers at her wrist, turning her hand palm up and ghosting his own across it, leaving a small shard of glittering dawnstone behind in the cupped flesh. His fingers idle against the back of hers for a moment, the impulse born from nothing but the scent of her hair and that small smile of gratitude that thanks him for more than a piece of dawnstone. These displays of affection are just as rare as anything else that lives behind the mask he must wear, and her gratitude confuses him because he gives so little for all that she has offered him.
As always in these rare moments when they are close like this, there is an air of suspended time, as if the very world held it's breath while they looked at each other, waiting for one of them to cross that gulf between them despite how close they were. In reality her dark blue eyes held his only for a few seconds, his thumb grazing the pulse hidden beneath that delicate wrist, feeling it stutter from even this understated affection. He hated this, hated that every move around her had to be negotiated with care, his affections measured out with enough accuracy to prevent either of them to go too far.
Most of all he hated that she knew this and accepted it anyway, did she truly value herself so little that she imagined she received only what she deserved, did she honestly believe she didn't deserve more? If only she had the slightest idea how much he held back. Even now he strikes down a thousand impulses all straining at their leash in her presence, settling for guiding her cupped hand to the dust coated pedestal between the stone wolf's paws, his mouth half an inch from her ear when he spoke in a quiet murmur.
"Tell me, what would you do if the old wolf ever answered you back"
He detects the minor signs of her suppressed shudder, she fears even to react to his occasional whims, letting him toy with her until she would eventually snap and press her advantage, and he would once more find himself at a crossroads that always ended in his retreat from her and the powerful need she evoked in him. He should know better. He does know better, such a question is pure self indulgence and he knows it, if she ever found out who he was then she would hate him for his games.
"Before or after i wet myself because a statute is talking to me?" She tries for amused but he can hear the hint of breathlessness in her voice, it satisfies him like the smallest bite into a fruit he did not dare devour.
"Colourful, but not an answer" His lips now move against the outer line of her ear when he speaks, a foolish test of his resolve but paid for in full when she cannot suppress the next shudder and her stuttering breath fills his head.
"I would ask him the first questions that came to me when I became old enough to grow suspicious of the old tales. Why was a creature so feared when it was given a face that is so wise, and who forced the Dread Wolf's hand, for nothing in this world condemns itself to being alone without reason"
His hand tightens about her wrist briefly in reflex to her answer, her honesty an all too stark reminder of why he felt it so difficult to draw away from her for long. There was no other like her, she followed not her heart but the truth, and she did so with such a fierce determination that one might be forgiven for thinking her blasphemous. Yet she still believed the name Fen'Harel as belonging to a god, she simply refused to bow to it, offering instead the same thing she offered to all she met, herself and nothing more. It is a heady combination for a centuries old rebel, and she has no idea what measurements he must put in place to ignore the desire to show her exactly what she did to him with words like this.
"You truly are terrible at being Dalish" the quiet promise of a kiss hovers at the space just below her ear, it would be so easy…
"You know i rather think you haven't yet gotten the point of treasure hunting Talitha dear, you're supposed to take the shiny baubles, not leave them behind, it's all a bit backwards if you ask me"
Dorian's smooth and cultured drawl shatters the unplanned tension between them and he finds himself drawing away from her a little too quickly, a frown deepening on his lips and between his eyes as he watched them approach, Cassandra's mouth drawn into its usual stoic line, though her eyes regard them both with the avid look he had seen when he'd caught her in the act of reading Varric's ridiculous romance serial. He does not approve of that look, it told him that he was not as subtle as he thought.
Talitha reaches up on tiptoe to scratch behind one stone ear, tactfully ignoring the haste of his retreat, and once again he finds himself acknowledging that she deserves more.
"Dorian, I thought you had more appreciation for the fine art of rebellion."
"Right now I'd have a deeper appreciation of a warm fire and some good wine, are we done here?"
She rolls her eyes but nods and makes an 'after you' gesture, the Seeker filing in behind, Solas giving her one last look as she turns back to the stone wolf and speaks under her breath.
"A little more luck if you don't mind old wolf"
They were coming for him now, no longer attempting to hide their approach, confident in their strength, and not a one of them understanding what it was they truly faced. In the two years since he had turned away from Skyhold and from her, he had placed a heavier mask between himself and the world, one comprised from the iron of his will. To wear such a mask, he'd had to set aside a piece of his soul, the part that would baulk at the kind of things he would have to do to free his people. This did not mean that he sought a massacre with the Qunari, no part of him wanted to shed blood even when he knew that it would eventually come to that, but if they truly intended to pursue him here, then he would strike without the restraint of mercy. He had come too far, given up too much and in the end they were irrelevant to him beyond stopping their advance and guiding her to him.
He had turned his back upon the eluvian now, watching her approach would serve no further purpose but to satisfy an inadvisable greed, she would make it, of that much he had no doubt. He could have used trickery to take the anchor from her without ever revealing himself, but for all that he had done to her, she deserved the awful truth, even if she would eventually wish she never knew. There would be pain, for her and for him, even with the detached nature of his person, her pain would touch him in some way and it could not be helped.
He had refrained from the temptation of invading her dreams, what little comfort he would have found there would have been stolen, and once she knew he was there she would try to reach for him, and that he could not allow. He risked everything in letting her near him now, but he would do so in order to save her life and secure the anchor, he had not risked it simply to satisfy his desire to dwell within the realms of her subconscious uninvited. There had been a time when her dreams were as open to him as any book, and he had read the pages of her life in vivid detail, memory and dream moving together to lay her history before him. To watch her grow had been something to treasure, to witness her pain in that same living colour would have been torture, and yet he had still been tempted in those long pre-dawn hours when he truly missed her.
In the far distance a huge and reptilian scream of triumph snapped through the air like a thunderclap and he allowed a short, grim smile. Of course she had set the dragon free.
Their war cries reach him now, and he can feel the deepening pulse of the anchor's pull, she had little time left and the Qunari had even less. They all stood on a far more precarious position than simply challenging the Dread wolf, they stood between him and her, this was more than enough for his cold heart to deduce that their end was necessary. They bring that blood and cordite smell with them, a tight unit of silvered flesh over highly trained muscle, they would not relent, not until the very last man, but he would spill no more blood upon the pieces of this former world.
His magic swept over them like the hand that clears a playing board of its pawns, silvered flesh turning darker, hardening them into place until they are nothing more than a parody of a battle that never quite happened. That baleful fire died in his eyes as the last of the Ben-Hassrath warriors died with his spear still poised for flight, and he turned away from the tableau he'd created, no regret or sorrow for a thing that did not have to happen, there was no room for it. What little space not yet frozen over in his heart, was filled with the knowledge that she was close and coming closer.
He stares down into her trusting face, hand slipping from the sharp angle of her upturned cheek, and watched love slip into confusion as his last words hung in the air between them like the ringing note of a bell. Just moments before she had been lost in a kiss that spoke more words than he could rightly give her, now her face was unguarded and he sees it all etched on her features. He might as well have driven a blade through her gut for all the pain he see's swimming into her eyes, a hurt so profound that for a moment it seems to steal her breath. Expressive as she has always been, she has had many years of practice at schooling her face when she needed to, and through all the changes of his heart she has been mostly successful at keeping anything but gentle understanding hidden away. Now she is utterly naked before him, a shaking hand lifting to her newly bared face, fingers attempting to trace what she knows is no longer there, her breath hitching in soft gasps.
The Dalish had turned him into a creature of fear many years ago, but he has never felt quite so undeniably monstrous as he does now. The taking of her vallaslin had been important to him, it marred everything she was, her face and her very spirit, and the more she gave in order to preserve this world, the more it had become an insult to him. But his gesture was marred, tainted, because for just one moment while his mouth had been fixed to hers and the momentum of those long forgotten feelings finally hit him hard, he had considered turning from what he owed his people.
Panic had found him quickly, a sharp sensation like buried glass in his abdomen. It sliced through the compelling warmth of her love and he had released her as though she had burned. For just a second she had still been caught in that moment of connection, her eyes still closed, lips still parted and face at perfect peace. He shattered that peace with just a few words.
She cannot stop feeling her face and his gut roils unpleasantly, instead of honouring her buy removing an offensive mark, he has simply made the gesture all the more cruel for what had followed. Now her eyes shine with hurt waiting to brim over, and he does not think he has it in him to see her cry, his body turning coward and itching to turn away from her.
The blow is quick as a venomous strike and it knocks his head to one side, her open palm leaving a stinging burn from cheek to jaw.
By the time he rights himself she is massaging her hand and the instinctual urge to bare his teeth dies the instant he meets those eyes again. The pain is gone, replaced by a rage that sharpened already angular features into a hunter's glare. Now it is his turn to feel that invisible blade, for she has never looked at him this way.
It doesn't last, even now he can see her visibly pulling everything back inside with one long inhale. She gathers up all that had been visible to him just moments before, and swallows it down, places it somewhere else and later he might swear that he had heard the final click of a lock as her face became as neutral as she could make it. She has let him see her true feelings for just a moment, and he deserves it, just as he deserved to wear the imprint of her anger on his face, and now she was going to make a virtue of taking the high road, because she is stubborn, and a far better person than he has any right to know.
" I understand. Whatever you need Solas, as always"
She gives him nothing else and he deserves even less, he knows this and still he has to ball his hands into fists to stop him from reaching out as she turns away from him. It is the right thing to do and he knows it, she is dangerous and never has that been more true than in the single moment when he almost let it all go in exchange for the life she could breathe into this tranquil world. He can still taste her on his tongue and the smell of lyrium and pine still linger in her wake as he watches her leave, her back straight and head high, only the tension of sharply defined shoulder blades showing just how much she is holding in now. There is nothing more that he can do for her but allow her to leave, attempting to soothe the wound he had left would only serve to make things worse for her and not much better for him.
He has always known that he would have to leave her, but it should not have been like this. What made things intolerably worse was that he knew if he'd asked her to come with him, she might well have said yes.
"There isn't enough space, not enough to hide it all , it wants to spill out of her like too much water in the cup"
He hears Cole's voice waver with the weight of what he can feel, asking why the spirit had followed them would be pointless, compassion went where the hurt was keenest. He want's to tell him to stop, that he doesn't want to hear, but beneath his denial is the surety that this, among many things, was the least he deserved.
"Hot, heaving hate, pull it to me like a coat. Why do i still feel his mouth on mine? Churning like a rift inside me, swallow it down and do my duty. Herald. Inquisitor. Hero. Be what i must, be what they need. They won't know that I'm breaking"
He would know, even without Cole's commentary he would have known because the same pain was reflected in his own heart, old and ill used as it was. And like her, he would have to leash that pain in order to do what needed to be done. Leaving now was out of the question, he would not abandon her before the very end, even if it would have made things easier for the both of them. His spiteful mind reminded him that he also couldn't miss his chance to recover the orb, and though he hated that voice some, if not all of the time, it is here that he retreats.
He is ill equipped to deal with his pain or hers, and so he falls to the safe if uncomfortable truth instead, he needed the orb, and to to recover it he would have to follow her to the end.
"It won't last, you can't bury it forever either. She makes it real, won't let them be ghosts, and she is yours"
"It cannot be that way Cole"
"But it already is"
"Solas…"
That one word was so full of relief that already he could feel the rat like creature that was guilt, clawing its way up his spine. He almost didn't dare turn to look at her, there was too much power in that face and just as much in the smooth pervasive tone of her voice, it's edges roughened on some of the words and he knew then how hard she had fought to get here. He would have given anything to just step through the eluvian and close it behind him right then, it would have hurt her but it would be a scratch compared to what he was about to do. If he walked away, stayed, told her truth or lied, he was going to hurt her. He had trapped himself in a web of love, lies and his own duty and in doing so he had trapped her too, there was nothing left to do but to wield the blade that would cut her deeper than Corypheus and all his templars ever could.
He prepared himself to face her, pulling the mask into place because he could not do it any other way, he let the cold seep in because that way he might be able to last the length of this conversation while keeping his resolve in tact. It was too soon, two years had not been enough to find an effective defence against her and he knew it the moment he heard her speak.
Green light flared and bloomed in the mirror's reflection and her scream soon followed, the sound of a far more primal pain than what might have lay in her heart, and he turned to see her on her knees , the mark pulsing in its eagerness to return to its rightful place. He was barely able to stop himself from the natural instinct to reach down and touch her and he clasped his hands behind his back as if to ward himself from doing such a dangerous thing, the grey-blue of his eyes igniting as he touched upon the marks power and bound it as tightly as it could. It would not last long, already he could feel the bonds straining as she panted and tipped her eyes up to him.
"That should give us more time. I suspect you have questions"
It was a poor welcome, he couldn't have spoken with more ice upon his tongue if he tried and was not surprised to see her brow crease together hard as she digests these words. He watched her try and fail to find words of her own and instead she held up the offending hand, her question an easy one to decipher.
"The same way i kept it from killing you in Haven….although i am much stronger now. The mark you bear was bestowed upon you by the orb of Fen'Harel. My orb"
She had been pulling herself to her feet with her staff and almost fell back to her knees upon hearing those last two words, her eyes quickly darting over his face as if to detect a lie there, or perhaps she simply hoped for one, for she was backing away from him now, confusion switching to horror and then...laughter? He gripped his wrist tighter at the small of his back as she staggered under the weight of his revelation, managing to straighten herself eventually though her legs were shaking.
"Of course you are. Of course you're Fen'Harel, because only I could fall in love with the fucking Dread wolf. Talitha Lavellan, the constant bloody accident waiting to happen!"
She laughed harder, her words broken by the jagged sound that isn't amused at all, she's horrified and hysterical and that's so much worse than angry. She doesn't even try to disbelieve it, after all the lies he had told so far and she was still willing to believe him without question, what had he ever done to deserve that?
"And now you know. What is the old Dalish curse?...May the Dread Wolf take you?"
"And so he did" The laughter died in her throat, forcing her words into a whisper, her head bowing slightly.
"I did not. I would not lay with you under false pretences" The accusation had burned him enough that he couldn't keep the touch of arrogance from his voice, as if this one act of chivalry could have cancelled out everything else he had done.
Her head snapped up and he was almost relieved to see her anger finally show itself, even if they had little time for it, he could feel the anchor's struggles, the binding that subdued it temporarily was already fraying.
"That is not what i meant. Refraining from screwing me does not mean you haven't violated me in the most insidious way possible. Did you laugh? Did it amuse you to watch my little rituals every time we came upon one of your statue's? Or was it my vain attempts to unravel the truth behind Fen'Harel that gave you that warm, smug feeling inside?"
Her tongue was a blade now, intent upon cutting him as deeply as he had cut her with the truth, and he knew she didn't believe half of what she was accusing him of or she would have tried to strike him down by now. He would have taken every wound she had to give him but there was no time and he cut in before she could form more heated words to sling at him.
"We have no time for such questions when you already know the answers. You know what I did, when the false gods finally went too far I formed the veil and banished them forever. Thus i freed the elven people, and in doing so, destroyed their world"
She shook her head over and over again, lips pressed together and hands held up as if to ward away his words. Her pale skin paler still, sweat gathering at her temple's.
"That is...i can't even begin to comprehend you locking away the fade, you of all people. It's...too much, I can barely process the idea that our 'gods' were no better than magisters…. what happens now? Your secret is out, the Qunari are dead, what was all this for?"
"My people fell for what i did to strike the Evanuris down, but still some hope remains for restoration. I will save the elven people, even if it means this world must die"
The words fell from his mouth, well practised and almost toneless, and they tasted like bitter ash on his tongue while the horror grows on a face that had only ever looked upon him with respect, devilish good humour, or love. He saw the monster that was him forming in her eyes, and called himself stupid for thinking that she could ever see him as otherwise.
"There it is again…."My people", like we are nothing but vermin or ghosts to you"
"You must understand, I awoke in a world where the veil had blocked most people's conscious connection to the fade. It was like walking through a world of Tranquil!"
She could never truly understand no matter how much he may want her to, and in the end what good would it do but to justify what he had done? All she could see now was a monster, bound to destroy everything she had saved. Talitha Lavellan had given up the only thing she ever wanted in order to save Thedas from the breach, her freedom. A freedom to roam the world without a clan or an Inquisition to call her to duty. Now that such a freedom was in her grasp, he was going to take that world away from her, how would she ever understand the reasons behind that?
"Solas, what you are saying is insane, this cannot be who you are. I would give anything to see things restored but why must an entire world have to die for the elves to return? By the void Solas, you are talking about killing everyone!"
It is now that he realises that she still had so much faith in him. He had walked away from her in the aftermath of that final fight, left with no word or explanation, expecting hate to take seed and grow in her heart. But even now she knew the truth, she still did not fully understand who he was, still thought that he could be turned from doing the monstrous, it was piteous and distressing to witness. The pleading in her eyes cut him raw, they still searched his face as if seeking a way in to the man she knew, not this cold creature who talked of more than just genocide. He could give her nothing, she was far too intelligent for her own good and it was all too easy to give her too much, he did not want her to pursue him. She saw nothing in his face but his resolve and the iron mask he'd been forced to wear, and he bore witness to the devastation this caused, nails digging into his wrist when he heard the small sound she made as that invisible knife finally found its mark at her heart.
"I hear you say these words and mean them, i see the conviction in your face. You truly mean to end this world and do you know what frightens me the most?"
She was pacing now, her hand opening and closing, the anchor tugging harder at its bonds and causing it to spasm. She had so little time and yet he has no right to steal these words away from her, so much has been taken from her already.
"I still love you. You mean to end the world and everyone i care about with it, and all i can think of is how that will destroy you from the inside out. I tried Solas, i tried so damn hard to hate you, and you even made it easy for me! Now you stand there as much a piece of stone as those bloody statues, an even greater threat than Corypheus ever was, and all i can think about is that look of need in your eyes when i first kissed you in the fade."
Her declaration hit him without warning and pried gently at that iron mask, the broken tone in those last few words slipping a dagger up into his ribcage towards his heart. No, it had not been long enough, she had no idea the siren's call that she made with such honest words, she had no sense of the way his resolve tipped precariously in the face of her misery. For such a rare creature as her to be so broken was a crime as insulting and unthinkable as her markings had once been, but it was one that he was forced to commit.
He felt the last thread snap just a breath before she screamed again and green light burst against his closed eyelids as he moved forward, this time catching her before she fell to her knees again. Even in the height of her agony she tried to pull her arm from his grasp, shaking her head and distorting the anguished sounds forced from her throat.
"Please vhenan, you are running out of time"
"Then let the bastard thing die with me then, don't become what the Dalish already think you are, don't become worse than what the Evanuris were!"
She speaks through gritted teeth as the pain abates briefly, her wrist twisting in his grip, slick with sweat and strong with panic and pain. It was his turn to be horrified now and his hand clamped down on her wrist, hard enough to bruise, holding her fast while his words rolled out on the heels of a long and terrible growl.
"I will not allow that to happen"
The irony of refusing to let her die now could not touch him, not when she was here and alive, albeit in mortal agony. It was easier to speak of the death of a world when one could stand from far away, much harder to begin his crusade with her here and now. She still struggled against him, screams strangling her desperate sobs, still trying to save him, only this time she wanted to save him from himself, an impossible task, she would die trying.
She will die if she doesn't.
He snarled at that wicked thought and jerked her up on her knees, no longer having the luxury of handling her gently, the anchor was ripping at her in its efforts to get away. He could not use his words to convince her, nor could he focus on the far too delicate task of removing the anchor while she fought him.
And so he committed yet another sin when he took her mouth with his in an effort to confuse and steal the fight in her. He had always known the effect he'd had on her, for all her calm patience with his indecisive love, she had kept her own well of need tightly bound, and he'd always known he could unravel it at a whim. It was not fair and neither was it right, but it was a tool he would use if he must, and it was a tool that cut both ways.
Even as he stalled her struggles and stole her pleading breath with lips that demanded, he felt the overwhelming want of her rolling over him like a violent wave, causing fingers to dig into her wrist and tighten at her upper arm. She was his, always his, and even after he had gone, leaving the pieces he'd made of her behind, she would still be his. It still wasn't fair and it certainly wasn't what she'd earned, but as she submitted to the urging of his tongue and permitted it's fierce entry, fair couldn't gain purchase enough to matter.
Kissing her again was a bitter ambrosia, a prelude to the self flagellation he would later inflict upon himself when he suffered the refreshed memory of her mouth against his once more. He had lived for far too long and he was once again strong, but there were some things even he was powerless against, their momentum dragging him forward and forcing him to bear down on that kiss as if he intended to devour her from the mouth down.
She returned his kiss with the same desperate nature as her plea, as if her mouth could shape a more convincing argument without words, whimpering between spared breaths when the mark pulsed again. He broke away with a harsh gasp, gravel lining his throat as he fought the urge to reclaim her mouth again, even as she screamed.
"I am so sorry, my love"
"Please don't do this, let me help you find another way"
He felt his magic flare to life and pressed his forehead to hers, closing his eyes against the next short and sudden scream as he touched upon the mark, causing the anchor to strive that much harder to find its rightful place. In the end the process was mundane for all that it should have been dramatic. For all the many ways he had hurt her in the last few minutes, she did not even feel the moment of separation beyond a profound and sudden relief from the pain. He begins to feel the first pull of his own grief now and it is here that he pulls away, before it could bind them both along with the lies and the love.
He was in love with a ghost who refused to stay a ghost, refused to become a forgotten regret, buried amidst another thousand years. He had known the disaster it would bring even as he gave into it, and now here were the fruits of his labor, alone and trembling on the floor of a broken world as he stepped back towards the mirror, her position of defeat too poignant, too naked, his own pain too close to the surface for him to offer more than a few last parting words.
"I will never forget you"
She looked at him with perfect understanding of her loss, she wore it on her face like a brand, shock and anguish following his retreating steps and he finds his feet almost stumbling in his haste to reach the eluvian, the desire to take that look from her face strong enough to make his stomach lurch painfully. Even in her defeat, she was still so very dangerous to him.
In the far background he spied the moving specks of the others, they would find her soon and pick up the pieces he had left behind, and they would be right to call him a coward for that much alone. His courage finally turns traitor now and he turned his back upon her before the idea of changing his mind could become more than a fleeting flash across his mind.
The cold touch of the eluvian enveloped him and turned the world beyond to echoes as he left her with nothing more but the reflection of her own misery.
From her grief, the Dread Wolf fled.
"What in the void do you mean you're done?"
The words beyond his side of the eluvian have been a blur of exclamations and demands for information, most of which he hadn't heard above the repeated slam of an ethereal fist against the stone walls of his sanctuary. Though the mask had slipped just enough to allow a little to slip through, everything he had suppressed on the other side of the mirror now forced its way out in wild bursts of violent magic, his rage and grief merging into fade touched fists as he literally beat at the walls with his mind.
Dorian's heated question captured his attention however, and he paused, body heaving with harsh breaths as it turned towards the somewhat distorted voice.
The Tevinter was kneeling beside her, Varric and Cassandra standing a little off to one side wearing identical expressions of disbelief as they watched her struggle to her feet. Solas winced as she tried to use a limb that was no longer there and slipped, Dorian barely saving her face from impacting the ground before he hauled her to her feet and turned her almost vacant expression to his own.
"Talitha…"
"You know what it means Dorian. I am finished, if the Inquisition is to continue it will have to do so without me"
Cassandra stepped forward now, and for a moment it looked as though her heart had been broken, and perhaps it had, the Seeker had put much of her faith in the wild Dalish woman, the Inquisition would all but limp along without it's figurehead. There was also something truly awful about the calm toneless quality of her speech, as if she were merely gathering her words and neatly filing them out of her mouth in perfect order.
"But he loves you, if anybody could convince him…" Cassandra implored, as only a true romantic could.
He watched Talitha look over Dorian's shoulder with a pained expression, "If love were enough then it would never have gotten this far Cassandra, he will not be stopped and i don't have the power to try."
Dorian shook her, a faint panic finding his words now and Solas knew why, she spoke as if she were already dead, as if they were all dead and simply waiting for the time to lie down.
"Talitha, if there was ever a time to fight…"
"No, no more. No more fighting, no more death, no more deciding who gets to live and who gets to die. No more sitting in golden thrones and deciding someones fate when i don't even have the ability to control my own, not..one..fucking...more"
She pushed at his chest and Dorian stumbled weakly, his usually verbose nature curbed in the face of her sudden determination. She cradled her the newly amputated arm and gave them the same pleading look she had given him, they could barely meet it with their own eyes.
"Can't you see that i have given enough? It is time for me to go home"
Home. A place where she had never wanted to return, that stifling place of false lore and stiff traditions that she had loved and loathed in equal measures. She had longed to be free enough to wear the whole world as her home and now he has all but chased her back to her past. He has done much to earn the shame that follows him, but nothing was quite so sinful as stealing her dream along with everything else. If she wandered the world now it would only be with the knowledge that it would all soon disappear and she was simply staring at another ghost waiting to happen.
He waves a hand towards the eluvian and it becomes smooth and unblemished once more, reflecting nothing other than the petty destruction of his possessions, born from his impotent rage. There were a dozen better ways in which he could have left her, but there had been no time and now there never could be. She was returning home to finish how she began and his road would lead further and further away from her as time went by.
He felt another sweep of fury at the unfairness of it all, that this pain was of his own doing only made it worse and he lashed out at a small wooden table, the ethereal fist reducing it to splinters before it pulled back and slammed into the floor, cracking ancient tiling on impact. His eyes darted to the eluvian and for a moment he felt the reflective twitch of that potential fist.
In the end he pulled his magic back before the impulse to smash the thing to the smallest slivers formed more than a faint gust of magic. For all that he knew it to be the right thing to do, he could not relinquish that last connection. It was the only eluvian that belonged to him, the only one he had poured himself into. That personal connection linked him to more than just the other connections in the crossroads, and so he had dared not use it until he absolutely had to.
The eluvian bore a part of his soul, in the time of his youth it might have shown him the prizes he sought in his arrogance, but he had not possessed it then. Just two years ago it might have shown him the location of his orb if he had been strong enough to reach this place. Now it would show only her if he used it for any other purpose than to travel between the others of its kind. Though this fact alone is reason enough to destroy it, he finds himself to cowardly to do it, he could not relinquish that last piece of her.
And by what right do you get to keep any part of her. Why should you be allowed to frame her life with your magic when she will be alone?
The hated voice would always choose the right moment to slip that very last knife into his thoughts. It spoke truth with no mercy and left him bleeding in the wake of its passing.
"Because she is mine"
The words are a low growl echoing in an empty chamber, and their conviction shames him even in the midst of the possessive heat that overwhelmed him.
Sooner or later the compulsion to use the eluvian again would win, he admitted this defeat miserably as he picked up a blanket and threw it over the mocking glass. Very soon it would be time to harden his heart even further, and when that time came, even her sadness would soothe some of the scars this would leave behind. He did not deserve a single moment of Solace, but what he deserved no longer mattered against two unbreakable facts that were ignorant of the vast distance between them.
She was his, and he was her Dread Wolf.
End Note
Ok so i admit, I may be ever so slightly terrified that i have overreached myself on this one. Solas remains a very difficult perspective to write from and yet i really have enjoyed writing this. If i made a mistake with What you Owe, it was only that i started at the end. Now I'm faced with the daunting task of writing an ending you lot won't be expecting.
If you truly did enjoy this first chapter, please do send a comment or kudos, or even a message should you wish to discuss the story so far, your opinions are highly valued, and they do help when our brains are feeling lazy and useless.
I am well aware that I have toyed with the workings of the eluvians, but this story wouldn't work without the added extras.
Oh yes, and hands up to those who truly wanted the 'slap solas' dialogue choice when he leaves us barefaced in a cave? Probably the same people who wanted to Gibbs slap Anders after his oops-Chantry moment.