A/N: For the prompt "one half of your OTP, inexplicably bringing home an animal and refusing to drop it at the shelter so they and the other half take care of it together."
"No."
"But-"
"No."
Still cradling the dragon hatchling, Evelyn pouted up at Cullen, who had ridden out immediately at Cassandra's message that they had slain a high dragon and she had sustained minor injuries. "He's harmless," she protested, face lit with joy at the tiny creature in her arms. "And besides, technically, it's our fault that he doesn't have a mother anymore."
That, at least, couldn't be denied, not when the corpse of the mother was still lying where it had fallen a few days previously.
"The dragon attacked us first, if you recall," Dorian pointed out, but the smile on his face as he watched the newly hatched baby squirm in her arms was enough to make Evelyn wink playfully at him, ignoring Cassandra's groan of disgust from her other side.
"What possessed you to go hunting for it anyway? It could very well have been a trap, or something else that could have attacked you." She shrugged, knowing full well that Cullen's glare and scolding were more to disguise his worry than signs of true anger.
"Instinct?" she offered and heard Varric chuckle. "He's too young to take care of himself! Aren't you?" she cooed at the small form, which gazed up at her with bright eyes.
She watched as Cullen rolled his eyes skyward and grinned at him before tugging him down to sit beside her on the log. Her smile widened as he slid an arm around her shoulders and she leaned against him. "You're impossible, you know that, right?" he whispered into her ear and she smirked before kissing him on the cheek.
"Yes, and you know you love it."
He sighed, but she could hear the amusement in his tone as he murmured, "No, I love you."
Evelyn hummed with contentment. "I love you too." She paused for a minute. "So, about the dragon…"
She felt him exhale heavily and laughed, twisting around to face him, the creature in question still curled up in her arms. She could see him relenting and sent him a pleading look. "Please?"
Cullen shook his head ruefully at her expression. "Fine, we'll see how well it behaves during the trip back to Skyhold and decide then."
She beamed at him before dropping her gaze back to the bundle she carried. "Do you hear that, Drago? You're staying with us!"
"You named it already?" he asked in disbelief and she smiled at him sweetly in response.
As they prepared to return back to Skyhold, she thought she overheard Varric and Dorian debating the odds of Cullen actually allowing her to keep the dragon and she rolled her eyes at their tendency to bet on anything.
And when, a few days after their arrival back at Skyhold, Evelyn heard the rumors that Dorian had spent the past few days trying to find books on dragon-rearing and Varric had definitive proof that Commander Cullen Rutherford of the Inquisition's Army had an inexplicable incapability to say no to their Inquisitor, she could only grin at the gray-colored dragonling that tagged along beside her.