II.
It didn't take her long to notice he was always watching.
The humans probably didn't pay as much attention as they should, but for her it wasn't so hard to notice such a repetitive behavior. He moved quietly and he rarely sought others to talk, yet Solas lacked a certain subtlety in a very adorable way. He stood tall in his silence, dark eyes sharp and wary whenever she crossed Haven, as if he were a hawk watching over its offspring, as if his gaze alone was enough to keep danger away from her so she wouldn't be in chains once the Breach was sealed.
She didn't mind him standing guard, really. It felt good to know someone was still watching over her after everything that'd happened all those weeks ago. Denarin was dead, and she had fallen into a spider's nest the moment she survived the explosion at the Conclave. It's a bad idea, she had said to the magister. We don't belong. Let the southerners deal with whatever they've done now.
But Denarin didn't listen, always too kind and gentle for his own good, always trying to help if he could do something- too different from what a magister was supposed to be. The world had lost many good people that day, and she had lost a great friend. She tried not to think about him as days passed by, and studying Solas served as one of the best distractions she could find in a place like Haven.
The mage respected Cassandra, yet he always kept away from Cullen and his soldiers. She knew he feared the Inquisition and its forces and she could understand, really. Maybe they weren't so different as one could've expected. He was no city elf nor Dalish, just like her belonged to neither group. An apostate, like Cassandra had claimed when they first met- but something inside her shifted whenever she thought about that, rejecting such a vague description, even if she didn't know exactly why.
Solas was nothing like her, she'd decided one day.
He was silent, calm, yet with a tongue as sharp as his gaze. Like Cullen, he carried the eyes of someone who had seen too much during his life, a never-ending sadness that was only there if one knew where and when to look. She had never been like that, and she knew that. She was angry and loud and furious, almost like Cassandra. A force of nature when she needed to be, fighting her way through rogue templars and rebel mages and demons without a second thought, never holding back even if she knew the men and women were just fighting for themselves, for their freedom.
They were nothing alike, really. They were elves and fellow mages and they were fighting against the end of the world, carrying the banner of gods they didn't even worship, and that was it- but it didn't mean they couldn't be friends .
Maybe more than that, a treacherous voice whispered on her mind once, and she just decided to ignore such a preposterous idea. Solas was wiser, older. He'd traveled the world and the Fade and his expertise was just too vast. He'd never look at her as a woman. He probably even had someone else waiting for him to return after the Breach was sealed, someone that was safe from the chaos spreading through Ferelden.
They could be friends, and that was fine.
