** Ladies and gentlemen and fine folks everywhere, welcome to the Quarantine Entertainment System Trial (QUEST). For the next week, I'll be updating as often as I can to provide a little extra diversion for those of us stuck at home. I can't promise every day, but I'll do my best. Stay safe out there. This too shall pass. **
Part Twenty: Wicked grace
Dorian hears the raised voices before he even enters the hall. Fereldans, from the sound of it, with posh accents – or at least what passes for posh in a country where the king was raised in a stable.
"…simply intolerable, Inquisitor!"
"I understand, my lord. The Inquisition will attend to it straightaway." The elf's voice is cool and measured, barely audible through the door.
"Better late than never, eh?"
Who is this insufferable prat? Dorian opens the door to find a small crowd clustered around the Inquisitor. His lordship's toadies, judging from the ridiculous hats. They might as well be carrying pitchforks and torches, the way they're pressing in on the elf. Dorian frowns and starts toward them, but a familiar voice draws him up short.
"I'd stay out of it if I were you, Sparkler," Varric murmurs from his customary spot by the hearth. "Lord Whatshisname is in enough of a froth already. The Inquisitor has it under control, and besides – if his lordship gets any mouthier, Nightingale will have his balls for earrings."
Dorian pauses. He hadn't even noticed Leliana's diminutive form in the crowd, but Varric is right – from the look on her face, Lord Whatshisname had better mind his tongue. And his balls.
Josephine is there too, and even she looks annoyed. But not the Inquisitor. He's composed as ever, hands folded behind his back while this mustachioed mabari barks at him. "I shouldn't have to traipse all the way out here to make this request, Inquisitor!"
Leliana scowls. "Perhaps if you had put this much energy into handling the problem yourself, you wouldn't have had to."
The man flushes an ugly red and starts to retort, but the Inquisitor cuts across him smoothly. "Thank you for bringing this to my attention, my lord. I will see to it personally."
"Good." The man turns on his heel and flounces off without so much as a thank-you. "This is what you get when you put a knife-ear in charge," he mutters to the woman next to him. If Dorian hears him, the elf certainly has, but the Inquisitor's expression doesn't change. He stays where he is, serene as a statue as he watches Lord Whatshisname quit the building.
"Who in Andraste's name was that?" Dorian growls.
Leliana is still glaring daggers at the door through which he disappeared, as if deciding whether she wants those earrings after all. "Lord Brinn of the Palm Lakes," she says coldly.
"Where?"
"Exactly."
"I see," Dorian says. "Shall I set him on fire, Inquisitor?"
"The hats, at least," Leliana suggests.
"You handled him well, my lord," Josephine says. "He did not deserve such a gracious response."
"His concerns are valid. If the Carta has established a foothold in his lands—"
"Then it is due to his negligence," Leliana says.
"Perhaps, but that doesn't matter now. We have to deal with it. We can't afford any interruptions to our lyrium supply."
Leliana inclines her head. "Of course."
"Find out everything you can." Wryly, he adds, "Starting with where in the world the Palm Lakes are."
His advisors head for the war room, presumably to pore over the map. The elf, meanwhile, looks like he's ready to collapse after a long day, which means Dorian's shift is beginning. "You need a drink, Inquisitor," he says, steering him toward his quarters. "I have just the thing, if you'll give me a moment. Off you go – I'll join you just now." The elf arches an eyebrow, but he does as he's told, heading for his door with only a single bemused glance over his shoulder.
Dorian manages to catch Josephine before she's about to disappear into the war room. "Sorry to bother, but did you manage to—"
"Ah," she says. "You have excellent timing. They just arrived this morning." She picks up a small burlap sack propped against her bookcase. "I won't ask what you need them for," she says, handing it over.
"Dark sorcery, of course."
She ignores that, diplomat that she is.
"Actually, it's a surprise for the Inquisitor."
"How lovely. I'm sure he could use a bit of cheer after that unpleasantness with Lord Brinn." She sighs and shakes her head. "As though he doesn't have enough on his shoulders already. How does he handle it all with such grace?"
"I couldn't tell you. I'm surprised he hasn't burned the keep to the ground, stripped naked and streaked all the way back to the Dales."
Her mouth twists wryly. "Let us hope it doesn't come to that."
"Oh, I don't know. It would make a wonderful tavern reel." Dorian gives an airy wave and takes his leave.
He finds the Inquisitor waiting for him on the sofa, a bottle of wine at the ready.
"We won't be needing that," Dorian says.
The elf narrows his eyes as he watches Dorian fetch a pitcher of water and what's left of the manise from Dalish Day. "What are you up to?"
Dorian reaches into the sack and flourishes a single yellow fruit. He's gone to great trouble to procure it, so it's rather disappointing when the Inquisitor tilts his head and says, "What is that?"
"You're joking. Is it possible you've never seen a lemon?"
"Oh!" The elf sits up a little straighter. "I've heard of them, of course, but I've never seen one."
"Not even in the markets in Val Royeaux?"
"Strange, isn't it? You'd think I would have come across them on one of my many fruit shopping expeditions."
"Not too tired to sass me, I see."
"Never."
"Excellent. Just be sure to conserve some of that energy, Inquisitor. We're just getting started here." Dorian takes out a small knife and cuts into the fruit. "I have exactly three of them, so we'll have to ration ourselves carefully."
"Are they sweet? They look delicious."
Dorian flirts with the idea of handing him a slice so he can find out for himself, but he's not that cruel.
"Patience," he says. He takes the pitcher of water and places a hand over it, wishing the vessel were glass instead of ceramic so his audience of one could get the full effect. "This part I'm particularly proud of. You'll never believe where I found the spell. But we can talk about that later." Closing his eyes, he murmurs a word, and the water starts to foam – a little too much, actually, sloshing over the sides of the pitcher. Dorian hasn't quite got the hang of this spell yet, but no matter. There's plenty of water, and a little showmanship is a fine thing. He pours a dram of manise into a glass, and then he grabs the pitcher…
"Don't you dare!" the elf cries in horror. "That's the last of it!"
"Trust me." Dorian adds the soda water and a generous squeeze of lemon, and then he takes a sip, letting it wash over his tongue. Good, but it still needs something. A little bitterness, perhaps? Taking up the knife again, he scrapes off a bit of lemon zest and adds that. He takes another sip, and… A slow smile spreads across his face. Turning to his lover, he bows low and hands his masterpiece over. "Inquisitor."
The elf scowls into his glass. "What is this potion? It fizzes."
"Stop pouting and try it."
He does, and as soon as it hits his tongue, he blinks in surprise. He gives an adorable little sneeze – the bubbles up his nose, presumably – but he recovers quickly. "Oooh," he says, his gaze falling to the drink. He takes another sip. "Oooh."
"You can thank me now or now."
"What is it?"
"Manise and soda water."
The elf gives him a flat look.
"You're right, of course. We can't very well call it that. We'll have to think of a suitably exotic name. Something Dalish, perhaps?"
"Maker, no. If my people found out I'd added water to manise, I'd be exiled from my clan. And then murdered." He takes another sip while Dorian fixes a second glass for himself. "We need to make more. As soon as possible."
"So it meets your approval, then? A suitable tonic at the end of a hard day?"
The elf sighs and slumps deeper into the sofa. "A very hard day."
"No one would ever know it. Josephine was just remarking on how poised you seem. I believe the word she used was grace."
"She's always very kind."
"Perhaps, but she's not wrong." Dorian drops a lemon wedge in his glass and settles in beside his amatus. "How do you manage it, anyway?"
The elf hitches a shoulder. "Instinct."
"It's your instinct to be a martyr?"
"Is that what you think it is?" He laughs, but there's a dark undertone to it.
Dorian sips his drink, unsure how far down this path he wants to go. They're supposed to be unwinding, after all.
The elf takes the decision out of his hands. "It's not martyrdom. It's survival."
"How is shouldering the world's problems a matter of survival?"
"It isn't, but I'm shouldering them whether I will it or not. The only choice left to me is how. And if there's one thing I've learned as a hunter, it's that the moment you show weakness, the moment you let yourself be hobbled by it… that's when the wolves come for you."
The image is too close to home. Dorian has long thought of his lover as a forest creature, trapped and isolated from his own kind. The idea that he feels surrounded by wolves on top of it all…
"On the other hand," he says softly, "if you ignore a wound, it only grows deeper." Dorian knows it better than most. "If you let the hurt build up the way you did before Adamant… It will poison you, amatus. I admire your grace more than you know, but if you're not careful, it will be your downfall. It's all right to lash out now and then. It's necessary, even."
He frowns into his glass. "Like I did last week? You want more of that, do you?"
"If that's what it takes. You need to let yourself feel."
Blue-green eyes meet Dorian's. "I do. Right here, right now, I'm feeling."
It's not enough, Dorian wants to say, but he doesn't dare. This isn't the moment.
Wear your armour for as long as you need, vhenan. The elf spoke those words to him months ago. Dorian could not have imagined that his lover would need the same assurance from him someday. How fragile we are, he thinks. All of us. Even him. Perhaps especially him.
So Dorian will play along for now. "Well, then," he says. "That's something, at least." He sets his drink down and holds out a hand, and the elf curls up against him.
There's a long pause. The elf stays where he is.
"Are you going to put that down?"
"Not on your life."
"Fair enough," Dorian says, and kisses his silver hair. "Whatever you need."
