You would think after the months they'd spent sharing a bed, Ellana would have become used to Cullen's nightmares. Perhaps even grown accustomed to him thrashing around, muttering, occasionally even shouting, in his sleep. Maybe you'd predict that after such a length of time her body would automatically ignore it, maybe even allow her to sleep through it. You'd be forgiven for expecting any of these things to be true, but you'd be wrong.

She'd never become used to it and, at this point, she was fairly sure she never would. If anything, she'd become more sensitive to it as the months had passed; it took barely a murmur from his side of the bed to rouse her now. When her eyes flew open this time, it was due to more than just a murmur. He was moaning loudly, a few garbled syllables escaping his lips. His legs kicked, bunching the blankets down near his feet, his hands formed loose fists before releasing again.

Gods, not again, the thought was almost a lamentable groan.

She didn't think she'd get used to how it made her feel either; her breath still caught, her gut still clenched as painfully as it had the first time.

Reaching out a tentative hand to touch his arm she felt the cold clamminess of his skin, something that only occurred when the nightmares were particularly bad.

What horrors is he revisiting tonight? She wondered, Gods know there are enough of them.

As bad as things had sometimes got with The Inquisition — and it had got pretty bad from time to time, there was no use in telling herself differently — Ellana had never felt alone. More than Dorian, Cassandra or anyone else, Cullen had always been there for her, but the things he'd suffered, he'd suffered alone.

The urge to shake him awake was sharp and almost overwhelming, her fingers contracted on his arm slightly, she bit her lip as temptation taunted her,

Don't, you swore you wouldn't, she told herself firmly.

She withdrew her hand and curled it into a tight fist, her short nails leaving small half-moons on the flesh of her palm, after a few seconds the worst of the impulse passed.

He'd never forgive her for waking him, she knew, not after he'd made her promise.

The blurred line between nightmare and reality was always at its longest when he wasn't permitted to come around naturally and, as they'd discovered, that blurred line could be dangerous.

That revelation had come at a price; they hadn't been sharing a bed for very long when Cullen had had a very bad night, even by his standards; he'd been calling out in his sleep, threatening to wake half of Skyhold. Ellana, still new to his restless nights, had been terrified for him. She'd very carefully woken him by gently shaking his shoulder. Cullen, still asleep, still fighting the demons — in both the literal and metaphorical sense — that haunted his nights, had lashed out, bruising her ribs. She'd tried to hide the bruising, wanting to spare him the guilt that would inevitably follow the discovery that he'd accidentally hurt her. The deception hadn't lasted long; she had never had much success with hiding things from Cullen, he'd found out and pulled the truth from her. He'd been horrified. Her ribs had healed in no time, healing him had taken a lot longer. He'd treated her like spun glass for weeks, and she suspected he still felt guilty about it. It had taken a very long, very persuasive, argument before he'd returned to their bed. He'd agreed only on the condition that she would never wake him in the middle of a nightmare again, regardless of how much she might want to. The bruised ribs didn't bother her in the least; they'd injured each other far worse in the training ring after all, but this was different. Under normal circumstances Cullen would throw himself from the tallest tower in Skyhold before hurting her, but even he couldn't control how he behaved when he was asleep. She knew him well enough to believe his threat to return to that dilapidated room over his office, and that did bother her.

To combat the blurred line between nightmare and reality, she'd done everything she could think of to make his transition as brief and easy as possible.

She'd die before telling him, but she didn't pull the drapes in their room for this very reason. With the amount of travelling they did, it made it easier to wake up in a familiar place. Even without a fire burning in the hearth, or the flickering light of the candles, their room never got fully dark. Large windows took up two whole walls and the moonlight reflected off the snow on the mountains filled the room with a bluish light, the splashes of colour in the stained-glass painted ghostly trees across the floor.

She'd also taken to leaving small bushels of dried herbs under their pillows; a concoction of her own design consisting of various healing roots and, strangely, a dash of cinnamon. That particular recipe had taken countless hours of research, but if it provided him with even the smallest amount of relief then it was worth every minute.

Now, all she could do was wait it out and do what she could for him when he awoke, but Creators, it was hard to watch and listen to him suffer. Though as painful as it was to watch, was she eternally grateful that she was a light sleeper so he didn't have to wake up alone.

Cullen's entire body tensed on the bed next to her, Ellana held her breath as his muscles bulged, his joints seemed to almost creak with the strain. Violently his head thrashed on the pillow, the force enough to make her own neck ache in sympathy,

Is it any wonder his neck aches all the damn time?

"Ellana," he muttered aloud. A lump rose in her throat and her heart clenched painfully, "Ellana, don't — don't. I'm sorry, love. Please."

Tears instantly prickled in her eyes, her chest ached for his pain, while her jaw clenched in fury for what he'd suffered.

Damn Uldred. Damn the lyrium. And damn the fucking Chantry for allowing any of it to happen.

He jerked awake on a small cry, panting heavily and beating at the mattress; fighting something she couldn't see. Though his eyes were open, they were wide and unfocused, darting around the room as though seeing it for the first time.

Very carefully, and as gently as she could manage, she reached out, tracing the line of bunched muscle across his shoulders. Faster than lightening he turned, his face contorted in fury, and pinned her wrists to the bed on either side of her head. She lay still, letting him come back to himself and saw his expression turn from hatred to surprise to horror as he recognised her,

"I — I'm so sorry — I -"

His hands vanished from her wrists as he yanked himself away, reeling from her. She caught his arms before he could throw himself from their bed,

"Hush, ma vhenan." she soothed, brushing one hand along his jaw before tugging him back down to her, "It's not your fault, you never need to apologise for what they did to you."

"But I -"

"You didn't hurt me, I'm fine." she reassured him, "We're here, we're safe, and I'll never let them hurt you."

"How would you stop them?" his voice was shaky as he took his turn in the small mantra; one of their rituals that kept the demons — mostly just the metaphorical ones this time — at bay,

"However I had to."

She tugged him further on top of her, wrapping her legs through his and her arms around his back until he closed his eyes and rested his forehead on hers. He trembled a little under her palms, his skin cold to the touch. She tightened her hold on him, drawing him close until she could feel his heart hammering hard against her own. A little of her mana flowed from her skin to his, gentle and warming. One breath at a time she felt him regain control of himself. Once his breathing had evened out she tilted her face to his and kissed him, trying to convey everything she didn't have words to say into the simple gesture. He hummed his understanding before turning his face into the side of her neck.

She gave him a few moments of quiet, her fingers trailing gentle lines up and down his back, and tried to gauge him. Some nights he awoke angry or bitter, those occasions were met with a few hard rounds of training. By what she'd heard him say in his sleep, she had a good guess on how he was feeling. Sadness required a different tactic,

"Do you want to know what I was just thinking?" she asked,

"Hmm?"

"I was just thinking that Cass probably hasn't hit anything since leaving Skyhold. Do you think we can sneak a training dummy dressed in Orlesian formal wear into The Grand Cathedral?" To be fair, she had been idly thinking of this a few hours ago. Ellana had missed Cassandra almost since the moment she'd left, and often found her thoughts straying in that direction.

Ellana felt him freeze for just a moment under her hands. Then she felt the first breathy huff on the side of her neck. The huff became a chuckle as the ridiculous image took root, within moments his shoulders were shaking and finally the chuckle turned into a full throated belly-laugh. His laughter was music to her ears, relief flooded through her and her heart and stomach finally unclenched.

Cullen wasn't sure exactly how he'd gone from mind-bending horror to laughter in the space of a few seconds. The image of The Inquisition breaking into the seat of power for The Chantry to deliver a dummy for The Divine was so unexpected and utterly ridiculous that he couldn't have stopped himself from laughing if he'd tried. It chased the lingering shadows of his nightmare away, no doubt as she'd intended. She somehow always knew what he needed.

Once his laughter had subsided he lifted his face from the side of her neck to lay his forehead on hers,

"You are, without doubt, the strangest person I have ever met."

"Oh please, you love it." she smiled, and she was right, he really did, "Are you alright?" she asked, her voice gentle now as she watched his eyes carefully. He knew what she was looking for; his tells. She was searching his eyes for one of the small lies they told themselves, more than they told each other. The quips, nods and shrugs that said 'I'm fine', when they really meant; I'm struggling, I'm drowning, help me. They'd both become adept at reading each others silent cries for help over the last year.

"I am." he replied, surprised to find that, for tonight at least, he actually was, "You should go back to sleep."

"I was already awake." she said, brushing away his concern with a flick of her hand.

A total lie, Cullen knew. Between her duties as The Inquisitor, worrying about him, let alone everyone else in Skyhold, it was a wonder she got any sleep at all. Even without this new group they were facing, three destroyed villages, families being -

No, no I am not going to think about that now.

He had all day to think about that, as he had the day before. And the day before that. He refused to let it disturb his night-time hours as well.

"You are a terrible liar." he said instead, fondness creeping into his voice, as he pushed the stubborn stray lock of silver hair behind one pointed ear,

"Excuse me!" Ellana said, large violet eyes wide as she pulled away in mock outrage, "I'll have you know I'm an exceptional liar!" She lost her fight with her grin and lifted her head from her pillow to place a kiss onto the tip of his nose, "I'm just terrible at lying to you."

Cullen was sure that from anyone else that would have sounded vaguely insulting, from Ellana it was sweet.

Morning approached too quickly; the light that filled the room lost much of it's blue hue with the coming dawn. Instead of sleeping, they'd spent a truly indulgent amount of time just enjoying each other's company. Well, indulgent for them, anyway. Despite the early hour they'd both been expecting someone to come knocking at their door before now, even if neither of them voiced it aloud.

They'd closed the Breach, found those responsible, and restored order (with or without anyone's approval), but still their workload hadn't let up. Maybe they'd been a little hasty to tick the 'restored order' box on the checklist. There always seemed to be one more task that required their attention, one more meeting, one more fight. But not here. They had very few rules when it came to their personal lives, but this was a big one; no Inquisition business in bed. The one place in Skyhold they could stubbornly refuse to discuss The Inquisition, and today they were both equally reluctant to leave,

"We're going to be late." Cullen warned, fully aware he wasn't moving his hand from her hip to allow her to get up. He knew this was likely to be the best part of his day, he was in no hurry to don his armour and go to work.

"I know. Five more minutes."

"You said that half an hour ago. And again the half hour before that."

"I mean it this time." she continued, holding her hand up in a vow, "Five more minutes. How about this one?" she asked, trailing her fingertips over the scar that bisected his upper lip. She had a rather strange affection for that scar, it suited him. Each scar either of them had told a story, most of them harrowing or unpleasant. Making up new stories for them made them more bearable. It was a game, a silly one at that, but harmless fun was therapeutic. Or at least that's what Sera kept saying. The rules were simple, the first to laugh lost.

Cullen already had a story ready for this one,

"Rescuing puppies and orphans from a fire." he said, without hesitation,

"Puppies and orphans?"

"Just one of my many, many heroic deeds." he said, stretching his free arm over his head to rest behind his neck, flexing the muscles of his arm and chest,

"Uh-huh." she raised an eyebrow at his obvious display but her lips were already starting to twitch, "You're very dashing. So, which one gave you the scar? The puppy or the orphan?"

"Alright, you got me," he sighed dramatically, "I got kicked in the face by a bronto."

"Oh? I wasn't aware they allowed bronto's in The Circle." she smiled, oh he had her this time,

"This was in Kirkwall. You think mabaris are intimidating? You should see what some nobles keep as pets." The image of brontos being led around Kirkwall on leashes was too much, and she cracked. Cullen watched her laugh with a satisfied smile.

Maker, I will never get enough of that sound.

"Alright, you win." she patted him on the chest and stretched with a groan before reluctantly dragging herself from their bed.

He watched as she rummaged in a set of drawers and headed for the bathroom. He would never get enough of watching her either. All graceful willowy limbs, subtle curves with a wild mane of silver hair that reached the midpoint of her back, and completely, utterly unaware of how gorgeous she was. When she turned he could see the tattoo that ran across her ribs and had recently been extended up the back of one slim shoulder. It was a design of flowers and vines, each blossom was unique, brightly coloured and represented a different person or story. Her vallaslin was for her people, the flowered tattoos were for her. The newest flowers told the story of The Inquisition and its people.

Once she was in the bathroom Cullen reluctantly got up and found his own clothes, The Inquisition would only wait so long. With each piece of uniform he strapped on, he felt himself shift into Commander mode.

Ellana's fingers worked on their own accord as they braided her thick, unruly curls into a semblance of order around her head. She barely had to watch herself in the mirror any more and, instead, could let the parade of things she had to do today filter through her mind. The spell of their early morning time off was already beginning to wear away as the list grew. She had meetings with both Leliana and Josephine that morning, some jobs for The Chargers to discuss with Krem, then training with the mages in the afternoon. And, of course, there were The Believers. The newest threat to both Ferelden and Orlais. Also, to The Inquisition itself. She knew The Inquisition was already doing everything it could, but it wasn't enough. It was never enough. There had to be something more, but try as she might she couldn't think of anything more they could do. Well, there had been one thing, but Cullen had balked at the mere suggestion. If there was another attack-

No, she ordered herself, thinking like that isn't going to help anything, be positive.

Still staring at her reflection she tried her Inquisitor smile, today it looked strained and more of a grimace. That wouldn't do at all, even complete strangers would be able to see through that lacklustre smile. Her Inquisitor mask — her armour against everyone that wasn't part of her small circle — had never failed her yet. Almost never, she corrected herself, for whatever reason, Cullen had seen through it right at the beginning.

"If you've drowned in the sink, Leliana is going to kill me." Cullen called through the door and the grimace turned into a proper smile. She shook her head, and her melancholy, away,

He probably knows you're in here brooding, and The Inquisitor does not brood.

She tried her Inquisitor smile again, it was better this time.

Come on Ellana, you've got this.

When she emerged she was wearing her usual Skyhold attire; the soft, well-worn hunting leathers and scarf. She was also smiling, but Cullen could see The Inquisitor starting to emerge; control, confidence and sharp wit taking over from the real Ellana she was behind closed doors.

She pulled him down for a quick kiss before they headed for the door, "If The Inquisitor drowned in her own sink on your watch, you'd have more to worry about than Leliana. Dorian would never let you live it down."

"Threats on my life, and dignity, aside, aren't we expecting to hear from Dorian today?"

They were both concerned about their friend. Ellana had all but begged him to take her or one of the others with him, but he'd refused. Cullen had to admit that Dorian taking a Dalish elf to Tevinter probably wouldn't have been the wisest course of action. Ellana, predictably, hadn't agreed. Poor Dorian had almost been forced to sneak out of the castle to avoid her, but there was no reason he couldn't have taken Blackwall or one of the others with him. Dorian had insisted he wanted to travel alone, hopefully that meant he would be able to travel faster. Of course, it could also be interpreted as part of Dorian's continuous commentary on Blackwall's personal hygiene, or lack thereof. Cullen hoped it was the former, the sooner they knew more about this new threat the better.

"Yes, we agreed a missive every three days so it should be today. I'll feel better once he's home, and we know what we're dealing with. I know he hasn't really been gone all that long, but it sure feels like it."

"Hmm, I'm familiar with the feeling." Cullen grinned at her, "At least he didn't have to go all the way to Minrathus itself, that would have been a much longer journey."

"True, but half-way is long enough. I hope it's worth the trouble and this informant of his is as reliable as Dor believes. And speaking of trouble, Rylen is due back from patrol today as well." Ellana said as they entered the hall, "Hopefully with less exciting news than Dor."

Cullen huffed a chuckle. Fingers crossed, Rylen would return some time that afternoon.

"Knowing our luck?"

"A vain hope, it's true." she added with a small laugh,

"I'll send for you when he arrives." He dipped his head to whisper in her ear, "Try to find time to eat today, please."

Ellana only ever seemed to remember to eat when someone put food in front of her. Cullen had taken to bringing food to his office, so she'd at least eat when she stopped by to see him.

"Yes, Commander." she said with a wink as she headed straight across the hall toward Leliana's room.

Straightening his shoulders, Cullen turned towards the main doors. Waking up after only a few hours of sleep had its advantages. Despite being able to spend time with Ellana it was still early, it was a fair trade as far as Cullen was concerned, coffee existed for a reason, after all.

Most of the nobility that spent time in Skyholds Great Hall didn't rise from their rooms for several hours yet, only a few milled around gossiping or inspecting the sets of mosaic tiles that adorned the walls. He was trying to avoid their attention — without causing some offence that would mean him spending half his day being told off by Josephine — when Varric called him over to his table by the fire. As usual, the dwarf was surrounded by papers, inkwells and quills,

"Morning Curly," Varric said, putting a bookmark into a ledger and closing it,

"Varric. You're at it early."

"Or late, depending on your perspective." Varric muttered, his voice somewhat muffled by his hand as he tried to stifle a large yawn. His eyes were looking a little on the red side, not an unusual look for a member of The Inquisition, and the evidence of a sleepless night was scattered among Varrics papers. Coffee cups, some empty and some forgotten and left to go cold, were among the glasses and tankards. The servants knew better than to try to clean up around Varrics table.

"Any word from the Coterie?" Cullen asked, eyeing the tall stack of documents at the dwarfs elbow.

"About the mysterious village attacks you mean?"

"Maker's breath Varric, keep your voice down." Cullen hissed, glancing around at the nobles,

"From this lot?" Varric scoffed and waved at them, "Don't worry, Curly. They couldn't give a nugs left nut about anything other than how much gold they can line their pockets with and how impressive 'Lea's collection of dragon heads is."

Cullen glanced around again, nobody was even looking in their direction, he wasn't sure if he should be relieved or disgusted.

"Good point." he muttered, "You were saying?"

"We're shit out of luck. If anything the Coterie's been quieter than usual. Huh, never thought that would be a bad thing. My contacts in Kirkwall say everything is quiet over the Narrow Sea too. Whoever your guys are, they're local."

"Wonderful." Cullen sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. He'd known that the Coterie was probably going to be a dead end but still... they needed something, anything, to go on.

"Cheer up, Curly, your face is going to stick like that." Varric said, "I've got a few other people that owe me favours, I'll get in touch, see if something shakes loose."

"Thanks Varric."

"No problem. How's Enlea holding up?"

"The usual. "I'm fine" is becoming her catchphrase."

"She's tough." Varric shrugged,

"She is," Cullen agreed, "But it would be nice if she didn't have to be."

"We got through Corypheus, we'll get through this."

Cullen nodded and gave him a wave before heading out the doors and descending into the courtyard. A few of the newer recruits were milling around the training area. He'd get them started on drills then head to his office to start on his reports. Hopefully Rylen would return sooner rather than later.