A/N: Alixire's having a tough time of it, but she is much too strong and unyielding to give up now. If Cullen thinks he can get away from her easily, he has another think coming! Once again, thanks to all who have supported my work in one way or another, and I hope you continue to enjoy!
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Thirty-Seven. Alixire: Abandonment.
From the very beginning, Alixire had known that falling in love with Cullen was a logical mistake.
It had been impossible to rationalize her feelings when she first realized she was growing increasingly fond of him. Everything about it had seemed wrong and impossible. A Templar and mage. No aspect of such a pairing could be seen as wise or beneficial, and though some people undoubtedly receive a thrill from breaking taboos and embracing forbidden temptations, Alixire has never been one to place her neck on the chopping block for the sake of a few moments of pleasure. She knows as well as anyone that the Templar Order formed solely for the destruction of mages, and that falling in love with one is akin to a prisoner adoring their executioner or a slave paying homage to the chain around their neck. She is not masochistic or self-destructive, but all the same, she could not stop herself from making the damning decision of allowing herself to love him, no matter how much this choice would come back to hurt her in the future.
In the end, it was as much his fault as it was hers. She had been the one to initiate a relationship between them, but he had the distinction of being the one to love her first and engage her interest. Alixire, like all other mages, had fostered a special hatred for the Templars over her years in the Tower, and had vowed never to speak to them if she could help it so as not to give them a reason to use her words against her and trap her in a cage of suspicion. However, it was impossible for her not to be aware of Cullen, even though she wanted nothing to do with him or his order. The feeling of staring eyes was an unshakable one, one that prickled her nerves and raised goosebumps on the flesh being raked over by the want and curiosity of Cullen's unblinking gaze. It amazed as her that a Templar could be so captivated by her with such little provocation. Though she was talented and pretty in an average sort of way, there was nothing else about her that was particularly extraordinary compared to the other beauties in the Tower with much more to boast.
After months of being aware that he was watching her more closely than his job required him to, Alixire's curiosity finally got the better of her. She began speaking to him in passing, hoping that through his words and behavior he would reveal the motives behind his special attention to her. But what she discovered about him was not at all what she had been expecting. He was not in love with her for sadistic reasons or because he wished to possess the thing that had been time after time adamantly denied to him. His feelings for her were earnest and pure, like a blushing young boy's for the first young girl to strike his fancy. He admired her for who she was rather than the challenge she presented, and such innocent affection touched Alixire's jaded heart and softened her own feelings towards him until she, too, found herself on the brink of falling in love with someone she couldn't hope to fully have.
It was too late for both of them by time they realized the consequences of what they were getting into. One day they had been their normal selves, him staring at her with thinly disguised appreciation, and her returning his gazes with the tight frowns she reserved for Templars, and then before they knew it, they were sequestered in unused corners, speaking together alone and out of sight. She was impressed by the way his reverence for her set him apart from the other Templars, who were so deeply conditioned against the mages that their hearts would never be moved to love one, even if their bodies demanded otherwise. That Cullen had thoughts and feelings outside of the Chantry's dictates made him intriguing in her eyes, and the respect she felt blossomed more and more until she could no longer control the strength of her feelings for him, and was at last driven to offer him her love, or at least what little of it his conscience would allow him to accept.
"I adore," she once admitted to him during one of their meetings in the hidden corners of the Chantry library, "that you are the only one of your kind here who doesn't think of me as a caged lion, a powerful beast you are forced to lock away so it cannot escape and ravage innocents without mercy. It is refreshing to be thought of as something other than a danger to myself and others every once in a while."
"Then what do I think of you as?" he'd asked. It was true that he forgot the physical danger she posed whenever they were together, but Alixire knew that he was aware of some other danger whenever he was around her, something that made him keep his guard up as he wouldn't for any other woman but a mage.
"You think I am caged bird," she had answered. Back then, she hadn't remembered that she'd once owned one herself, but the meaning of the image had lingered in the back of her mind over the years.
"How so?"
"You think I'm beautiful and exotic, possessing a power beyond your understanding. It is my wings, my gift of flight, which frightens you. You do not worry that if you open to my cage I will bring harm to others, but rather that if you give me the chance to decide for myself, I will fly away and you will lose me forever."
Cullen hadn't said anything for a long time after she said that. He took her hand in his and stared at it for a moment, studying it with an amazed expression as if he wasn't quite convinced it was real. Then, in a quiet voice, he said the words she would never forget for all her life. I know I am in the wrong in loving you, Alixire. You are the symbol of Andraste's destruction and the defilement of the Black City. You represent everything I hate in the world, but still I will never be able to forgive you if you leave me here. I've turned my back on so much of what I believe in to love you, and I'm afraid the moment that you leave I will have nothing left to hold on to. Not the Maker. And not you, ever again.
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Alixire presses her hands against the magical barrier surrounding Cullen, her stomach twisting in horror. She is grateful beyond words to see that he is still alive, but the knowledge that he has been tortured to the point of despair keeps her from feeling as happy as she should be at the sight of him. He is doubled over in his cage, his hands pressed against his temples as if he is trying to tear his brain from his skull, and his screams echo across the room, chilling her to the bone.
"Not this trick," he whimpers, looking up at her with a sickened expression. "You cannot fool me. I know what you are. The Maker will keep me safe from you, no matter what pain you try to inflict on my heart."
"Cullen? Do you recognize me?" She kneels on the ground so she is level with him. "Can you see my face?"
"I know what form you are trying to use against me all too well. I tried to protect her from you, so you would not pervert her memory, but you have gone too far within my thoughts for me to stop you. But no matter what visions you use to torture me, I know she is dead. You cannot make her otherwise." He presses his clasped hands in front of his lips, hiding his expression. "If any part of you is human, kill me now and stop this game. How dare you violate my thoughts and tempt me with the only thing I want that will never come true? How dare you turn my shame and grief against me, and force me to relive my hopeless infatuation with her… how I allowed myself to love a mage, of all things?"
"So this at last is the lover, huh?" Zevran interjects. "Who knew you were such a little heartbreaker, Alixire?"
"Don't call that thing by her name," Cullen yells, slamming his hands against the barrier. "You will not defile her, spirits of evil!"
"But it really is me, Cullen," Alixire insists, her eyes welling up at this torment. "My companions and I survived Ostagar, and have started on a journey to unite Ferelden against the Blight. I came back to you just like I promised!"
"Silence, I will not be fooled by any words you use to tempt me. Begone." He shuts his eyes tightly and then opens them again. "You're still here. That always worked before, but you're still here!"
"Because I am real, Cullen. I am here to deliver you from this injustice you suffer. I have returned, just as I swore I would"
"I… I…" He covers his face again, sobbing into his hands. "It doesn't matter anymore if you kept your promise to me. I've asked the Maker to forgive me, and I can't go back now. Even if you are real."
"What are you saying? You do not sound like yourself."
"That is because I am no longer who I once was. I was an innocent when you knew me, but your comrades have corrupted me to the core. I know understand what my purpose is and have forsaken any doubts I had back when we were together. I am here to better serve the Chantry and to devote myself entirely to the Maker. There is no other meaning to my existence anymore. It is my duty to oppose you… and all you are."
"Desperation has driven you to that conclusion, but I know your true heart, Cullen. Don't allow your loss of hope to force you to become someone you are not."
"Don't pretend to understand everything I've endured these months since you've been gone. You weren't here… you didn't see the things they did to us. They deserve to die. Uldred most of all. He caged us like animals, and broke us in every way imaginable. I… I am the only one left."
"The Maker preserved you, and kept you from the hand of death. Please, Cullen. Do not waste this opportunity by hardening your heart with hatred. Not all mages are Uldred. I am not Uldred. There is not a single being in Thedas or in the Fade that would ever convince me to harm a hair on your head. I love you."
"Don't say that! I can't bear it! You mages will say anything to protect yourselves, but I will not fall for it anymore. And to think I once thought we were too hard on you."
Alixire studies his eyes carefully. "Do you really believe that? After everything we shared and felt, do you really, with every fiber of your being, believe that is true? Or is this the Cullen who was never able to trust in the fact that I loved him enough to willingly come back to my cage speaking with me now?"
He shakes his head. "Alixire. None of that matters anymore. The only thing I have left to ask of you is that you destroy everyone in the chamber ahead. The mages fought back to the best of their abilities against the blood mages, but even they were lost. Uldred has them now. They're in the harrowing chamber, and he is turning them into demons as we speak. You must destroy them all to cleanse the Tower. There is no hope that any of them are still themselves. And…" He looks at her, his body shaking. "If any part of you really loves me like you say, you will choose me this one time. The one time when it matters most."
She closes her eyes and rests her head against his barrier. "You're wrong, Cullen. I already chose you the time it most mattered. I chose to love you in spite of everything I am and everything you are. That was the best way I had to show you that you were more important to me than even myself. Killing innocents and giving up on my brothers and sisters would just make a mockery of that sacrifice. And I don't want to have a reason to resent you. If we both resent each other, everything really will be over. I can't let that happen."
"I won't change my mind again," Cullen insists, though his voice wavers. "I promised the Maker. I promised myself."
"And I made a promise to you, Cullen. Even if you won't forgive me, it doesn't matter. I'll spend the rest of my life making you trust me again, even if that's all I do. I love you. I truly love you more than I have ever loved anything or anyone else. Even if you don't want to hear it, I'll keep on saying it until I make you remember that you love me, too. You don't have to turn against the Maker or turn against me. There's enough love in your heart for both of us. That was how we were made to be."
She pulls Andraste's headdress from her pack and sets it in front of his barrier. "You will always have me to hold on to, Cullen. You may doubt everything else if you like, but never doubt that. Wherever I fly off to, I'll always come back here, to you."
For a moment, Cullen lifts his hand and presses it against the place where her hands are resting on the barrier. Though the magical force keep them separated, she can almost feel the sensation of his skin touching hers once again, as if they have never been parted. It doesn't matter to her whether or not he can also sense her touch or if he's grown too distant for her to reach him and unburden his wounded soul at this moment. The heart is a fickle thing, one that loves what it shouldn't and cannot be convinced to change its feelings by any voice other than its own. Though falling in love with Cullen had been a foolish decision, it had been her heart's decision to make, and even Cullen himself would never be able to convince it to change or bend to his will. Through all that has happened and is still yet to come, Alixire will keep on holding onto her misguided love and pray with all her might that the Maker, in a rare show of mercy, will grant her the one thing in the world she has ever wanted with absolute, unshakable certainty.
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Coming Up: The Wardens arrive in Haven to look for Brother Genitivi, and Alain single-handedly incurs the wrath of the village with an incident involving Antivan boots and dead bodies.