It begins with a glancing touch to your cheek, a touch you lean into with a smile. A spicy, familiar musk fills your nostrils, and your lips part to take in even more. In the next moment, they are captured in a passionate kiss enhanced by the tickle of a curled mustache brushing your upper lip. Letting loose a soft moan, you raise your fingers and sink them into the short, dark hair above.

After your lips part from his, a soft chuckle fills the darkness as a weight shifts to straddle your hips. Hands cradle your face for a moment before moving down, dismissing the sheets and clothing between you as they descend. "I take it you have no objections."

"None," you breathe, skin tingling with anticipation. Your heart pounds in your chest, raw desire consuming you as you smooth your hands over a muscular back. Again the clothing disappears with but a touch, the many impossible buckles and ties vanishing to allow access to the silken heated skin beneath. When a hand finds your shaft and strokes lightly, you gasp and arch your back with a groan of appreciation. "More," you plead, knowing it will not be enough, that you will never have enough of him.

"As you wish," the voice murmurs, even as the weight atop you shifts downward. Before you can think to speak your longing, a warm, wonderful wetness slides over your sensitive tip, and you again cry out to the inky black around you. "Perfect," the other man breathes, followed by a longer, more thorough exploration of your needy length by an oh-so-clever tongue.

"More," you pant with an urgency which won't be denied. Your hands rise to grasp the pillow under your head as waves of pleasure course through your body, the injury of your broken wrist mysteriously gone. For several long moments, only the slick wet sounds from below and the intermittent moans and gasps from above surround you as you climb closer and closer to your peak, until you are driven to cry out in ecstasy: "Maker!"

Abruptly hands close around yours, squeezing with a cruel strength which instantly cuts through the haze of pleasure wrapped around you. The warmth and weight below vanishes as a hauntingly familiar chuckle echoes in the darkness, this time with an edge of mockery at complete odds with the beauty of the intimacy from just moments ago.

Your eyes open wide in shock, and fear quickly overwhelms your lust as you meet the glowing red gaze of the man towering above you. Before you can properly assimilate Amell's presence, the mage says, "Not yet, alas. But have no fear, my little pet. I will claim my rightful place soon enough."

With a great shout, you shove against Amell's grip, fear galvanizing you into action. In the next moment, desperate to escape his grasp, you make the leap from the Fade, and away from his cruel gaze.

Cullen's eyes flew open as the dream turned nightmare fell away, harsh breaths echoing in the tent. For a moment he stared upwards, a shudder running through his body as he remembered those red glowing eyes hovering above him. It took a few moments for him to realize that, for the first time since Adamant, this nightmare was completely unrelated to the torture he had experienced whilst in the Fade. For the first time since the wards had been placed around his dreams, Amell had found him.

And the knowledge filled him with a fear which was all too familiar.

Now that he was truly awake and aware, however, other things also demanded his attention. His wrist ached once more, throbbing and pulsing with a now-familiar pain. In direct counterpoint to that, another part of him demanded attention, though with an unfulfilled need rather than pain. A glance down his body showed that the first part of his dream had left a lasting result.

Maker. Even Amell wasn't enough to push away the memory of where his time in the Fade had begun. For a moment, the memory flooded through him-from the kiss above to the far deeper kiss below-and he felt a fresh wave of heat surge into his groin. With a low groan, he reflexively reached down to rub the ache away, remembering too late the events of the night before.

The sharp pain reminded him of the shards still embedded in his palm, and he gave a soft cry as he snatched his hand away and stared at it. Dried blood caked his palm and coated his fingers, and the muted sunlight seeping in from outside glittered on jagged slivers of glass. And, just like that, he remembered.

Remembered the feel of the lyrium sliding down his throat.

Remembered the scent of the liquid blue bliss filling his nostrils.

Remembered the sound of the song which lulled him into his dreams.

Remembered the horror of the realization, and the way it faded into the dim background of his mind.

It was that horror which suddenly shouldered its way forward in his mind, landing there with the force of a smite and curling around his thoughts like the jaws of a varghest.

And, as if the memory and his own revulsion had awoken it, he felt it once more: the shiver of need that swept through his body and gripped his soul, whispering into his ear that he needed more, and he needed it now.

As the headache formed, he gritted his teeth and turned onto his side, reaching down for the basket. He had enough of the shattered bottle left to see that its contents had been blue, even if he hadn't thought to check until it was too late. Half of him wanted to find some more lyrium to drink, but the other half only wanted proof.

Instead of finding the basket full with bottled blue liquid, however, he found only the familiar sight of healing potions, their crimson hue unmistakable even in the dim light.

He frowned. The lyrium had come from this basket, he was certain of it. What-

It was only then that another memory ghosted across his mind, of... something. Something to do with clinking glass, and a moving shadow, and… He strove to pinpoint the fleeting memory, but the growing pain in his head made it hard to concentrate. Surely that had just been a lyrium dream?

He sagged back into the cot, staring at his hand while a spark of doubt wormed its way deep into his mind.

"Maker forgive me," he breathed, though the words felt as empty and hollow as his hope. He didn't even notice when the entrance flap to his tent moved aside to allow entry to the morning complement of healers.

After that, there was no time to think as the healers took one look at his hand and launched into action. While they bustled around him, Cullen simply stared at the ceiling of his tent, lost and adrift in the realm of his own mind.

Only two things truly mattered: his need for lyrium, and his need for Dorian. And he knew, deep in his core, that he could not have both.