Prompt: Personal responsibility
Inquisitor Trevelyan helped Commander Cullen limp to the cot. Her adviser's jaw clenched as he sat, trying to keep weight off his injured leg.
"I'm so, so sorry," she said as he lifted the leg to lay straight out in front of him. She gripped her elbows with her hands.
"It's not your fault," he grunted.
"It is," Elanor said, her cheeks crimson. "I should have known better than to walk straight into that path. It seems so obvious now that it was an ambush..." She squeezed her eyes shut. "I'll speak with Cassandra. She's the one who should be leading the Inquisition, not me. Cassandra has battle experience; leadership experience. She never would have made a call like I just did. And now you're hurt." She bit her lip and sat next to the cot, opening her pack.
He didn't speak for a moment, watching as she dug around, coming up with a small potion and a wad of bandages.
"While it is true that you lack experience, Miss Trevelyan," he said, wincing as she peeled bloody layers of cloth away from the wound, "Cassandra cannot lead the Inquisition. She is the right hand of the Divine, and the Inquisition must be separate from the Chantry—it must be neutral." He gave her a grim smile. "This little skirmish will hardly be the worst battle we face. You will learn with time, and advising you on military matters is what I am here for."
Elanor popped the cork of the bottle with her teeth and glanced at Cullen for permission before pouring a thin stream of the red liquid onto the gash on his leg.
Cullen gripped the edge of the cot as the wound hissed and bubbled. Sweat broke out across his upper lip.
"Drink the rest of this," Elanor said, handing the potion flask to him. "Madame de Fer said some of the healing from this potion will be internal."
He gulped it down, wondering idly how he had come so far from fearing the merest whisper of magic to blindly trusting the potions of one today, and an Orlesian mage at that. Immediately, the pain seemed to subside and he sighed in relief.
"What if everyone's wrong?" Elanor blurted, eyes wide. "I'm... I'm just a lay sister in the Chantry! I wasn't raised to... to be trained with the understanding that I'd have legions under my command. I'm a nobody! I... I sing songs to myself... I sometimes eat too many cookies! Two days before I left for the conclave I was having a race with some of the children... I cry over injured animals, and I sometimes make fun of the templars behind their backs to make the Chanters laugh!"
"But you also fight with a fierce tenacity that I wish more people possessed," he pointed out, trying not to smile at the panic in her voice. Her concerns were entirely valid, but the image she presented of herself was a charming one.
"You were hurt," she said, twisting her fingers in her lap. "I can't... I can't bear it if someone I... I know, someone I am responsible for got hurt."
"You are a skilled fighter," he continued, "and—"
"I'm only one woman! My skill in battle won't save the world!" she snapped and the mark on her hand flared green. She tucked the hand under her arm, hiding the glow. "I don't know if can do this," she said in a quieter voice.
"Someone has to, Miss Trevelyan," he said, gently. "The Chantry is under siege, the Grey Wardens unresponsive, and the qunari are at our doorstep. The world is in chaos. If we do not stand to fight against it, who will?"
Elanor sat at the side of the cot, her eyes distant but still wide with the enormity of her responsibility.
"I don't think that anyone is ready for these kinds of events," he continued after a moment. "I know I was not. The most you can do, I think, is to do what you can, to do what you think is right even when that's the hardest thing you've ever done. To believe that there is right thing to do when everyone and everything around you is clamor and chaos."
"'Blessed are they who stand before the corrupt and the wicked and do not falter...'" she murmured.
"'Blessed are the peacekeepers, the champions of the just,'" he finished the quote. She looked up at him and for a moment there was... something in her eyes. Then just as quickly it vanished. She smiled, looking a bit tired.
"I'm going to make sure everyone else is okay. Do you need anything else, Commander?"
"No, thank you, Inquisitor. I'll remain here until this potion has finished its work." He watched her leave, a little reassured. When he'd first met her, he'd had his doubts, but seeing her fight, seeing her here, exposing her own weakness reassured him somewhat. She would not be another Meredith. He could do some good here. Cullen blew out a breath and resumed wrapping the bandage around his leg.