Running On Empty: One Is The Loneliest Number
The sun was slightly higher in the sky when I left Blackwall and made my way back toward the front gate. I could hear Commander Cullen bark orders at the troops and off near the gate, I spotted Bull in front of his tent, Aclassi standing near him. Both men watched as the commander drilled his troops through the routines I had nightmares about and, figuring that I couldn't do any worse than what I had attempted with Blackwall, I walked up to the Iron Bull and his lieutenant. When my throat cleared, both sets of eyes (or eye, oops) turned to look at me. I waved and Aclassi was the only one to smile at me.
"Mornin', Your Worship. Bit early, isn't it?" Aclassi greeted me comfortably. I melted, relieved that one of them would talk to me without a dagger at my throat. I could still hear Bull's voice in my head, ringing about in between my ears of we need to talk and despite our brief moment in the lair of the wolves, the travel back had kept us separate. He had stayed with his company and had caught up with them while we made our way back to Haven. Solas and Blackwall had been my conversational companions for most of it.
"Not really." I answered, smiling against the sunlight. Aclassi chuckle as I continued. "When this Inquisition first started up, I was terrible at the maul. I was just a beserker and Cullen was not impressed. From that point on, I had my ass woken up before dawn and didn't go to bed until I passed out that evening. Training with Commander Cullen is not all sunshine and roses." Aclassi grinned and crossed his arms over his chest, laughing.
"Aye, I can see that. So that was true, then? You were just a mercenary for hire?" Aclassi spared a glance at Bull and I felt that his silence was a bit unnatural for our situation, but I wouldn't push it. Bull would talk to me when he felt like it. Being what he was, the Iron Bull was most likely taking the time to learn what he could about me. Not that it wouldn't matter, the words that I parroted were ones that I had practiced for days throughout my first few weeks with Leliana to keep it as water-tight as I could.
"Yeah. They picked me up when I was stupid young, sixteen or so, but... I was more like a pack mule at that time." It gave me ten years to explain, from the time I could have been kicked out of another orphanage or just abandoning that life to find a new one. Something crossed Aclassi's eyes and he cleared his throat, shifting uncomfortably. I blinked, catching the sight of it, and my feathers ruffled as implications flashed through my mind. "A-ah, no. Not like that. One of the archers liked me well enough, so she bit any hand that touched me. Or tried."
"Ah." Aclassi said, relieved and ashamed. "Sorry, Your Worship, I didn't mean..."
I smiled weakly at him. "It's alright, Lieutenant. Pain is all a matter of perspective. It's only as painful as I allow it to be." The poor lieutenant nodded and glanced at Bull. Mercifully, the Qunari commander waved off his second-hand man and with a grateful pop of a bow, Aclassi beat a hasty retreat. Bull's eye shot toward me and I shrugged. There was nothing to say to that, nothing that I wanted to add, in any case. With Bull, the less I said was better, because he would leave him to fill the gaps.
Fuck, this was hard.
"They've got good form." Bull started after a few heartbeats between us. With a glance, I found him watching Cullen drag his new recruits through a few practice throws and shield bashes. "Cullen's putting his Templar training to good use." My eyes darted over to the Commander. His armor was what he normally wore, the furred pauldrons, the blistered, dull chest piece and his leather under-armor. He wore nothing that was reminiscent of the Templar armor that I had seen before. Curiously, my attention returned to Bull.
"Did Cullen tell you he was a Templar?" I asked quietly. "He's not wearing the armor."
Bull shook his head. "He didn't have to. Might not be a Templar shield, but it's a Templar holding it." Surprised by the observation, my gaze snapped back over to the Commander as Bull continued, his voice low and methodical as he explained what I couldn't have seen before. "He angles the shield just a bit down. Helps direct fire or acid away, so it doesn't spray right into your face." The realization struck me quickly. From just a simple, instinctive action the Bull had gained so much information. That Cullen not only knew how to fight, but could fight well with a shield, and had the experience to redirect potentially deadly hazards from the face. All wrapped up to one thing; Templar.
Holy fuck, my mind went numb, if he picked that up just from that... what does he know about me?
"Qunari learn the same thing when we train to fight Tevinter mages." His voice drew me back into the living world. He huffed, a distant sigh from a memory. "Your Templar's doing good work." My gaze remained on Cullen and the troops, the new information coloring their movements and actions the slightest amount. Clearly it took experience and practice to notice something like that, things I would not have since I grew up in a world were swords and shields and mauls were a thing of a distant past.
"He is." I finally answered and brought my gaze back to Bull. "You sound like you could help with that."
"Nah," the big horns shook slightly, "I'm no good at command unless I know who my guys are sleeping with and what they like to drink. The Inquisition's already too big for that. The Chargers are big enough for me." An amused snort escaped me and some tension eased out of my shoulders. I hadn't necessarily thought of bonding with people in that sense, but I highly doubted that anyone would be willing to talk about sexual conquests while the Herald of Andraste was within earshot. There was another beat and he shifted on his feet, contemplating his next words.
"The biggest problem for the Inquisition right now isn't on the front line." He motioned to the troops with his chin. His eye swiveled back around and studied me. "It's at the top. You've got no leader, no Inquisitor." The muscles of my throat seized and I glanced away from his gaze. Leliana and Cullen had proven apt at commanding our troops and our numbers with effective and efficient planning. Josephine could be a leader, if she had the hard-heart for it. My left hand clenched in my coat pocket as previous conversations with Solas and Mother Giselle returned; no one would follow them like they would follow me.
"Then maybe we need one." My shoulders rolled under my coat and my attention returned to his face. "I would be willing." Tentatively willing, but still more willing than anyone else. This was a mess of a situation with no real win in sight aside from closing the Breach with enough accumulative power. The idea of facing the Breach again had my knees weak and my soul in a state of panic knowing that I could hear the screams and echoing pains of the spirits. Despite that, it had to be me.
"You?" Bull grunted, his expression muted. "Why you?" I puffed up under my coat. Granted, the start of our working relationship wasn't the best. I had fallen on my ass from a lightning bolt to the back, and then had a panic attack after closing the first actual rift we encountered and then nearly passed out from disintegrating a demon with my hand, but surely he could see why it had to be me? I reined back my initial instinct to snap at him for my own defense. Bull's sense of information gathering was meant to poke and prod, because a reaction was just as good as words.
I sighed, "Look. We started on a bad foot. This thing," my hand was raised from my pocket, the Mark a faint glow in the morning light, "it's just a tool. I didn't even want to use it at first, I was so willing just to slice my hand off and be finished with it." His eyebrows rose up to the hard bone of his brow and we shared a brief pause. My shoulders shrugged, "I'm not the best thing that could have happened to the Inquisition, I'm sure they could have found someone braver or smarter, or funnier..." Nothing, no laugh, not even a twitch along his face. God, this was just a disaster much like what it had been with Blackwall. I was insane to think I could connect with these people.
"But they've got me." I said firmly, staring at him. Like with Leliana, my knees threatened to give, but I forced them taut and straightened my back. "And with doubt flying around everywhere about the Maker this, and the Maker that, and what if we're paying for sins and some other shit... I can make these decisions for them." My hand flexed and my fingers curled into my palm as I stared at the Mark. His eye shifted to it as well as he waited. "If it lets them sleep better at night knowing that the weight of the world isn't on their shoulders, then... I can do that for them. I can live with it."
Bull, as it had been with Leliana and Blackwall, stared. It wasn't as intense as Blackwall's had been, or as biting as Leliana's, but it was still unnerving. My emotions were wild under the forced mask of disinterest I desperately tried to play. A shift of his feet again and Bull tilted his head in an attempt to catch my attention. Shoulders once again stiff, my gaze floated up to his face, my ears hot from embarrassment as I awaited my lecture on my lack of skills and knowledge on leadership.
"Huh." He breathed, and then chuckled. "For a second there, you sounded like a Qunari."
What? The figurative rug was ripped out from under me.
He chuckled harder at my dumbfounded expression. "My people don't pick leaders from the strongest, or the smartest, or even the most talented. We pick the ones willing to make the hard decisions..." His gaze, for the briefest moment, softened with sympathy. "And live with the consequences." I ducked my head into my coat and had my gaze shoot down to the ground. A new flush of embarrassment and the tiniest amount of pride popped in my chest. Being compared to a hulking Qunari was a small step to friendship, I suppose.
"Ah, who knows." Bull dragged our conversation back from the emotional one it was falling into. "Maybe you seal the Breach, the Chantry gets off its ass, and all those soldiers go home and get fat." My eyes followed his gaze to the training recruits that Cullen had. The sun was above our heads, still an early morning, but fully visible. The recruits were already panting and sweating, but all forcing themselves through the routine. Determined.
"You think?" Quietly, my voice carried up to him.
He gave me an empty look. "It could happen. It won't, but it could." Dejection flooded me. I already struggled to maintain hope for the people around me, but perhaps he was right. This was Murphy's Law incarnate. Anything that could go wrong, would go wrong, and I was at the center of it. There was a burn to my eyes as I closed them and breathed deep.
"Boss?" Bull prompted after seconds had gone by and my eyes didn't open, my body frozen. A strong exhale shot through my nose and I looked up at him, wondering how he managed to go about his life with that kind of attitude. It was no better than mine, the longer I thought about it, as my own pessimistic mindset had me dragging my heels with this Inquisition.
"You ever..." I don't know what I was doing, posing this question to Bull. It could get me sent to the bin of insanity if he pushed the issue. He tilted his head at me as I trailed off, his pointed ears perked to listen. My throat cleared again, "You ever wonder why you get up in the morning to do a job like this? This... kind of thing, where you want it to work, but it won't?"
"I did, once." Bull answered immediately. Surprised, my gaze bounced back to him, wide eyed. His nose flared and he pulled a barrel over and patted the top of it. Confused but not about to turn away an opportunity when it was presented to me, I walked over and hopped on top. He remained standing and turned only slightly to face me halfway, keeping his good eye out on the crowd.
"So you know a little about the Ben-Hassrath, right?" He asked with a curious glance.
I shrugged, one leg tucked up under a knee. "Barely, to be completely honest with you."
"To start, Ben-Hassrath is a general term. You've got the secret police who investigate problems inside our territory. You got the re-educators who take people with problems and fix their minds... or make them disappear." I avoided his look at the explanation and kept my gaze to my swinging foot as it tapped against the barrel. Yikes. He rumbled, a chuckle or a grunt that I couldn't tell apart, "And then you've got the spies."
"... I'm kinda scared to ask, but. How do the re-educators work?" Bravely, my eyes drew up to his face. His horns swung a little over his shoulders, a pinch of his mouth came to his expression while he pondered my question. The massive muscles of his shoulders rolled and he shifted again to his better foot.
"I only know the basics. Wasn't my area. That said..." Another flare of his nose, an exhale steamed from it. "Keep a man awake long enough, ask the right questions, give the right potions, and you can get him to say anything." A shiver flashed up my spin at the thought of being herded up and tortured, a deep quake of fear bubbled up from my stomach.
Bull sighed and continued. "You don't need blood magic or demons to change someone's mind. We're a lot more fragile than we'd like to believe." I could believe it, one-hundred percent. This whole life that I was living here was a test to how fragile my own psyche was; killing men, death at every corner, dangerous magic, demons, possessions, rifts... I cried and shook at everything, like a newborn kitten left to the wolves.
"You can alter someone's beliefs that easily?" I should have known better than to pry deeper, but if I was going to live here past surviving the Breach, I had to start learning somewhere.
"One of my friends was a re-educator. He said that every memory was like a page of a book." Bull nodded and cast me a quick look. "When you examine a memory, you're turning to that page... and when you're there, the page is laid bare." Memories were fallible and easy enough to manipulate. Leliana, Josephine, and Cullen to an extend had done something similar when it came to "fixing" my history enough so that I could pass as a citizen of Thedas.
Bull huffed again, watching my down-turned face. "Write a few notes in the margins of the page, erase a word here and there, and your whole outlook changes." My hands gripped the barrel and my bones felt exposed to the world, my skin, my protection peeled back. It was impossible for him to know, but the thought that he could unsettled me.
Jaime Welton. Ferelden. Orphan. A mercenary. With just the right amount of notes, of erased words, I had become someone else. My organs shuddered through my body, alarmed by the fact that despite knowing who I was, it was not what these people saw. I glanced up and looked around, spying Cassandra and Blackwall training together, Cullen and his troops, and the civilians that walked past us.
Fucking hell. A hand ran down my face. The implications...
"Yeah," he murmured, having caught my reaction, "Always felt a little weird reading after that conversation." I snorted and chuckled with a glance at him. For a moment, we shared a look and he flashed me a small grin; on some level, we understood.
"And, so, you're a spy." I ventured.
He gave a half shrug. "Close. I am now, but I didn't start out that way. They sent me to Seheron because they needed someone who could fight and hunt down problems." Another rumble came up his chest and my attention flashed to his torso in surprise, then back up to his face. The words were rough from memory, "That whole island was a sack of cats. Incursions from Tevinter, Tal-Vashoth, and native rebels fighting both sides... And in the middle, me, trying to wrangle the rebels and restore order."
"That sounds insane." My weight leaned back on the barrel, my hands braced behind me on the lip of it for balance. "How the hell did you put up with all that shit?"
There was an angry snort. "I hunted down a lot of rebels. Lost a lot of friends to the Vints, or the Fog Warriors, or the Tal-Vashoth. One day I woke up and couldn't think of a damned reason to keep doing my job." A dark look came my way, my question finally being answered as he sighed, "Turned myself in to the re-educators." My blood went cold and my gaze was frozen on his face. To actively, willingly, seek out that kind of treatment...
"That's..." I struggled for a word, because everything I thought to say sounded petty and contrite. "That's fucking brave, knowing what they do."
"Mmhmm." Bull hummed, his darkened gaze shifted away from me. "I wanted to be fixed like they had fixed others. The Ben-Hassrath ordered me to go to Orlais, ostensibly as a Tal-Vashoth, and work undercover. That's how I ended up here." My gaze shifted to glance at Bull sideways, a whole new perspective of the Qunari that had been thrown into the mess with me, from one hell-hole into a hell-mouth.
"Well," I exhaled, weakened by what I had learned, but grateful to have some understanding of the man, "I'm glad you're here, Bull." And I was, because it had taught me a bit of the world I didn't know, and though it made my skull burst to try and keep up with all of it, he at least attempted to assist me in ways he had known how.
Bull chuckled, "Me, too." The barrel was warm under my ass and I refused to move. Now was a good a time as ever to have The Talk, as he had asked. With my hands, I shifted my weight to face him a bit better, to allow him to fully face the open lake and keep the gate in his peripheral vision of his good eye. His movement was automatic once he didn't have to accommodate for me anymore.
"Did the rift or my Mark worry you?" I risked a guess. A silence fell over us and quietly I kept my eyes down and swung my one free leg slightly. If he wanted to have this talk, he would answer. If it wasn't to be, I would only wait a few moments before packing my ass up and moving on to the next order of business.
"What does it feel like?" He asked carefully, his words meticulously chosen. His gaze fell on my head and I knew I couldn't hide like I did with other people. It wasn't about domination or fear, it was about honesty. I needed this man on my side, because I didn't need his people coming in thunderous and merciless. I couldn't be a hundred percent honest with him, but I could give him as close to it as I could get.
"Strange." I started softly, my hands wrapped around a bent knee. "Like... being smothered. Breathless. Cold. Everything echoes and comes in waves. One person screams and it just... keeps going and going." My leg swung again and dirt fell from the heel of my high-water boot. "That's what I hear, the screaming. I hear it first, and this Mark sparks like a piece of coal." My hand came up and my fingers stretched, the emerald slit in my palm was a gentle pulse.
"I can see them, too. Before they come through the rift." The memory of the last rift was painfully clear. The screams rattled through my head and the agonized terror of the spirits was fresh. My palm warmed and beat with a bit more strength and it made me wince. "And when I close the rift... It feels like someone takes a meat hook and tries to pull my tendons out through my palm."
The Iron Bull shuddered hard enough for me to notice. Silence hung between us again and strangely, I felt relieved. My shoulders were lighter and my lungs breathed easily, my chest felt warm. There was such an overwhelming sense of relief, freezing and freeing and warm all at once. Perhaps Solas was right, I couldn't keep bottling this inside, but I was so terrified of telling anyone else because I didn't want to burden them with worries they couldn't fix.
Bull had no such obligations. He didn't care for me like Cassandra, Solas, or Varric did. He didn't worry for me like Cullen, Leliana, and Josephine did. Blackwall was a worried Warden, but I got the sense from him too that he would attempt to "save" me from these emotions I was feeling, and I couldn't have that. I nearly laughed at the thought that The Iron Bull would be an unwitting safe harbor for the mess that was me.
"Bull," my voice was small, but heartfelt, "I'm really glad you're here."
He blinked, his shoulder slumped and he chuckled quietly. "Yeah... me, too."
- 0 -
I skirted my duties for most of the morning. I was supposed to return to the Chantry to talk to Josephine about getting set up to head out to Lady Vivienne De Fer's party out in Orlais, as the date was coming up by the end of the month. Cullen eyed me from the sidelines of the training field and I shamefully kept myself in Bull's shadow, claiming traumatic flashbacks that prevented me from returning to duty. Aclassi had returned with reports from the Chargers and their set up, something I listened to with interest if only to be assured that the company was comfortable.
When Bull finally caught on that I was hiding from Cullen and was making a go of teasing me about it, I packed my ass up and hauled it through the gate. Once on the other side, I checked in with Varric and huddled around his fire for a while, making sure that he had what he needed and just enjoying his company as he entertained injured or tired recruits. As the sun rose to the middle of the sky, I trotted my way toward the tavern in search of the other addition to my group of companions.
"Sera?" I found her settled on a table (not in a chair) and chewing through a piece of jerky and three or four mugs of something that sat around her. The elf grinned at me wide and kicked a chair out for me.
"Lady Herald!" She sparked brightly, shoving the rest of the jerky in her mouth. "So this is it, innit?" Confused, my head tilted, and I prompted her with a tick of my chin. Sera giggled and drained another mug out of I don't know how many. "Oh, no, it's fine, yeah? It's just, I thought it'd be bigger." My eyebrows shot close to my hairline and my brain switched gears as I tried to keep up.
She giggled again, then frowned. "Pfft, that would have been hilarious if you were a man, right? Wasted." She placed her cup down with a bang and I jumped a bit at the noise. "Anyway, stopping wars should earn more sovereigns than this. Need things back to normal for coins to be flowing again. Another reason the Templars and mages need to be sat down."
Heavily, my brows snitched together with my frown. "It's not just a war between those two."
"Well, sure, the sky has a hole in it. But I can't put an arrow in that." She replied testily, then pouted with her bottom lip. "Well, I have. Doesn't come down. That's... weird." No shit that was weird, but when did she get close enough to attempt that? Had she gotten past the guards? Who in their right mind would get that close to the hell-mouth without appropriate - no. I wasn't going to go down that road. Not yet.
"And that's the point, right?" She huffed, sliding down to a chair across from me. "It's weird and right there, but they still want to punch each other. They're too busy to look up where the real questions are." Marginally, I was beginning to understand. She wasn't necessarily frightened, but normality was her foundation, and the hole in the sky had become her top priority because it upset the balance she had.
The mages and Templars fighting each other was a ridiculous notion to her, as it had been to me when Chancellor Roderick wanted to have me arrested just at the moment the Breach was over our heads and spitting demons. She sounded like nonsense, but she was straightforward and brutally honest. Pleasantly surprised, I perked up when I realized I could actually follow along.
"Right, they should know it's a simple job. End all war, stitched the sky." She stared at me, herself confused for once. I grinned at her, flushed with humor. "The easy one first, of course."
She snickered wildly, eyes sparkling. "You're daft, yeah? Most people get special, they lose their snerk. Can't see how stupid it all is. I think I'll like you, Lady Herald. Maybe you are a little touched, yeah?"
A laugh bubbled up, "Touched in the head, maybe." That earned me another laugh and she pushed a drink toward me. I waved it off, as mead never agreed with me so early in the day. It was nothing like the beer back home. "Thanks, but I need to head up to the Chantry and get puffed up for a salon thing out in Orlais. Wish me luck."
"Don't blow anything up without me!" She hollered as I left, cracking into raucous laughter as the people in the tavern stared at her with wide eyes and worried glances. I hurried out of the tavern before Leliana or Cullen were called out on the public disturbance I had just caused. Outside, the icy wind swallowed me whole from the heat of the tavern and pushed me around as I made my way up toward Solas. The elf sat on the crates outside of his cabin and glanced up at me with a twitch of his ears.
He stood when I was close, "Shall we, then?"
"Yeah." I sighed. "Time to figure out what the hell is happening to the Mark." The door to his cabin opened before his hand touched it and I smirked at the use of magic. I bundled inside and threw myself into his bed, rolling into his blankets. A heavy snort came from behind me, but Solas dragged a chair close to his bed and sat, his legs crossed and his arms resting comfortably about his torso. I sat up and moved to the edge of the bed, holding out my hand.
"It doesn't seem anything has changed." Solas inspected my hand with a critical eye, his long fingers going across my palm. "You mentioned that it felt different than it did when you sealed the smaller rifts before the Breach?" I nodded and pulled on my thinking cap. The last thing I wanted was this thing to destroy me before I had a chance to destroy it.
"It did. When I sealed the smaller ones, they just felt like an ocean's tide. A push and pull, and then a give." I flexed my hand in his, the Mark quiet and beating just behind the pace of my heart. "The Breach felt like this last rift did. Vast and chaotic. There was so much anger and emotion that bled from it. I... I almost passed out. I wasn't prepared."
Solas shook his head and released my hand to sit back. "No, I don't imagine anyone could be. I speculate that perhaps because the Breach had been sealed, the other rifts are something similar to an overflow."
"Oh, shit." I winced and rubbed my palms together. "Copies, then? Since the Breach was closed, it's now trying to find another way to reopen?"
"Precisely." Solas nodded. He sighed deeply and held his elbows with crossed arms. "The pressure of the unstable Veil is now producing these pockets of Fade that are bursting, which is why I think you feel the same sensation as you did with the Breach."
My hands ran through my hair and hooked around my neck. "That's... not good. What if... what if it overwhelms me? What if the Mark is more than just a key? What if they can use it as... another rift?" Solas' eyes went wide and then narrowed on my face and flashed to my hand. It clenched near my pulse and the echo of its own beating pace against my heartbeat was a weird comfort.
"I do not believe you can be possessed, as you are not a mage and have no magical abilities, but..." He hesitated and looked over my face, a hint of worry marred his usually stern features. "This Mark is something completely new. I had not thought of that possibility, that it could be another rift that they could sprout from as they do the others."
"Solas," I started, but he held up a hand to stop me, his eyes closed in pain.
"Yes, I know." He groused, clearing his throat. "The idea is... alarming, but I assure you, Jaime. I will do everything I can to make sure that does not happen."
"You can't promise something like that, Solas." I murmured, a sadness swirled in my lungs for Solas. This is why I didn't want to share any of this with my companions, I didn't want them to worry about things they couldn't change. "We live in a world of impossibilities now. What we once thought dreams is now reality."
His eyes flashed and his mouth set in a hard line. "Then we'll do what we can to stay out of the nightmares."
I could only hope.
