Notes:
One for the Cullen fans. Are you ready for the most contrived situation ever?
Tight Spaces
"The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places."
Cullen is up before the sun, as always. His hands are shaking and he is on his knees in front of the chest at the foot of his bed. His lyrium stash is open before he realizes it, his fingers wrapping around the cool vial and the sense of sweet release just on the verge of engulfing him.
Stop.
He's on his feet, staggering back into the darkness of the room, a strangled cry from his throat. Not this again.
The surges of want are worse after the Breach appeared. Sweat rolls down his bare chest, following the path his muscles have defined, and he reminds himself just to breath.
Blessed are they who stand before…
With a frustrated grunt he runs his hands through his damp hair.
The corrupt and the wicked and do not falter.
His breathing steadies, the rise and fall of his shoulders slowing. He casts around the room for a rag, wipes his face down, runs it across his torso.
Blessed are the peacekeepers.
His amber eyes pass over the window and he judges that the sun will be up in a bit. Cullen decides he needs a distraction, can't stay cooped up inside.
The champions of the just.
Benedictions give him comfort, as he sweeps his hair back from his forehead and shrugs into his linen shirt and then his breastplate. Though his dedication to the words is an integral part of his Templar past, their familiarity long predates his days as a boy in training. He grew up to the slow recitations of the Chant of Light, the reverent invocations on holidays and the eerie susurrations of the hymns on feast days.
He shoulders out of his room and makes his way out into the crisp pre-dawn air, his breath misting in the winter chill. Haven is asleep around him, but he needs the walk to slow the hammer of his heart against his ribcage. At night, the call of the lyrium is strong. In the daytime, his responsibilities beckon and reduce the song to a dull thud in the back of his head. But he is defenceless when he rests. Cullen knows what it is to be without defences. He intends never to feel that way again.
Nodding to the night watch guards, he decides he should speak, say something that makes it look like he wants to be up and about before the sun. Like he isn't simple deranged, a victim of his desires. By fooling them, can he fool himself?
"Anything to report?" His voice is more curt than he intended, but Cullen is simply pleased that it's more than a hoarse whisper.
"No, Commander. Quiet night all around." The man's accent is from Denerim, triggers his name in Cullen's mind.
"Very good, Boyle. As you were." The soldier brightens at his name, pleased the Commander has remembered. Cullen keeps walking, forcing purpose into his stride.
Commander. He likes the roll of the syllables – blissfully short when held against the double-barreled ranks of the Templar order. With a title like that, Cullen wants to believe himself different. Capable, deserving of the rank. But when the twisted faces in his sleep send him awake and to his knees, clawing for lyrium, it's hard to have faith in himself.
Out of sight of the front gate, he finally allows himself to stop. Puts a hand on his sword hilt and looks up to the sky. The Breach simmers there, quietly luminescent and he wonders what those green tendrils would feel like on the skin. He supposes there's only one person in Thedas who would truly know.
And as if cued by the turn his thoughts have taken, he's aware that he sees her. The Herald is perched, as she often is, on the pier that juts into the frozen lake. Though she is just a silhouette in the dissipating gloom, he knows that it must be her. No one else would find so much to contemplate in the rocks and the cold and the ice. He wonders why his steps have taken him here. It's early, even for her, and if it weren't for the reflection of the moonlight of the lake's glassy surface, he doubts he would have seen her.
Cullen turns to trod back the way he came when the wind suddenly picks up, and he hears her voice. She was singing. Elvish, a timbre both low and haunting, and he is curious what the ballad is about. Surely something sad, with a melody so sombre.
He turns back to the Herald, his body reacting before his mind catches up. He has never spoken to her, not really. He has given her instruction in the war room, and made polite inquiries as they passed each other, but unlike his fellow advisors, he didn't need to corner her with questions or concerns. She was competent, Cassandra assured him, and that was enough.
Or so he said to himself. But as one foot lead the other closer to the pier, he isn't sure just how true that was. There was something about the Herald that unsettled him – her easy grace and the light in her palm belied the threat she could present. What if she wasn't truly on their side?
His skin prickled at the thought – her mark was, after all, implicated in all their problems. What was it that connected her to the Fade? Did her power spring from divine benevolence, or a darker evil they did not yet understand?
"You put yourself at risk, Herald."
She is up and around so fast he cannot blink; her knives are bared and she's dropped into a defensive stance.
"Maker's breath, Commander." She sighs out the curse as she straightens, recognizing him.
His hands are out, trying to diffuse the tension from her bones.
"I'm sorry." How stupid of him. She'd lived in the Kirkwall underbelly for years. Kirkwall was the kind of city where you needed quick reflexes – it sharpened instincts like blades, and if you didn't keep up, you died. "I didn't mean to startle you."
She laughs as her arms lift across her body to sheath her daggers. She is in her armour, he notices, and is pleased with the way it fits her so naturally. He and Cassandra debated over the relative merits of plate versus leather, but the leather is supple, clings to her in a way that allows her to leverage the speed he just witnessed. That speed, Cassandra insisted, was her greatest asset.
"What are you doing up so early?"
Her question snaps him out of his thoughts, and his mind is suddenly blank. What was he doing, bothering her like this? He certainly can't tell her what woke him up. But he has to say something – this silence is stretching on too long.
"I could ask the same of you." He tries to smile and wonders if it succeeds. A question with a question – Leliana's favourite tactic. But Maker, he thinks, it's too early for social graces and games.
She shrugs; the gesture is lithe, like rapids over rocks.
"Couldn't sleep."
They stand facing each other, Ellana's back to the lake, and Cullen suddenly is aware of how different she is. From him and also from the other women in camp. Her frame curves but is delicate, so subtly but decidedly un-human, and her arms are tucked around herself as if to ward away the cold.
"More importantly," he continues, feeling the need to fill the silence. "How did you get past the guards? They didn't report you." He kicks himself mentally for the last bit. He doesn't want to outright admit that she was under constant watch.
She laughs again, and it lights up her face, the planes of which were becoming clearer as the beginnings of dawn surround them.
"Commander, if there's one thing I'm good at, it's knowing how not to be seen." The smile she gives him is cheeky, and he resists the urge to smile back.
"It's dangerous. What if you were attacked?" He keeps his tone even and meets her emerald eyes.
"My, my, worried for my safety?" Her hands slip from her arms to her hips, but he refuses to rise to the playfulness in her voice. The guards were there for her security, after all.
"You are an essential asset to the Inquisition, Herald." He crosses his arms, frustrated that she won't take him seriously. "We can't have you abducted in the middle of the night by some fanatical bandits or angry Templars."
The humour is suddenly gone from her face, and she doesn't respond immediately. Cullen wonders what he has done, how he has blundered this time. She turns away from him, glances back out over the lake.
"Well, you know where I am now, Commander." She does not look at him as she settles back into a sitting position and draws a notebook from the fold beneath her vest. He stands awkwardly behind her as she pulls a piece of charcoal out, opens her notebook and continues a sketch that she'd started.
Cullen opens his mouth to speak, and then closes it again. The rising sun hits them at a steep angle, brings out the warm browns in the Herald's dark hair. She does not look at him again.
Unsure what else to do, he turns on his heel and walks back to Haven. He is confused, feels a flush along his neck and wishes he was better at all this business. The Herald so effortlessly weaves in and out of conversation, smiling, teasing and then listening – asking intelligent questions in mission briefings, as she does when they meet again in the afternoon to lay the groundwork for the trip to Val Royeaux.
Cullen decides, as they stand around the war room table and the Herald shifts from foot to foot, considering the map in front of her, that he should speak to her again. Apologize for the morning and explain that he was tired. Or something.
He sighs quietly as Leliana speaks, relaying what information they have on the Orlesian city, and he feels Josephine's questioning gaze on him. He doesn't look at the Ambassador, instead tightens his grip on his sword and keeps his eyes trained down on the map. In the back of his head, he is aware of the dull ache, the part of him that's parched for his elixir. He can slip away, after the meeting, to his room and open the chest. He'll only have a little bit – it will be just enough to soothe the hunger.
Stop. The voice, like iron in his mind, pulls him back from the brink and he forces him to pay attention. But by then the meeting is finishing; he mutters his own assent that they are done, and then makes to follow the Herald as she flits out of the room, light like a feather on the wind.
When he is out the door, he calls after her.
"Herald –" But he is too late; she is pulled away by Solas, and their heads bend together as the taller elf speaks words Cullen cannot hear. Solas worries Cullen at times; though he has been nothing but respectful, the staff on his back and the depth of arcane knowledge the quiet elf possesses puts Cullen on edge.
"You know, she prefers to be called by her name." Leliana is next to him, and Cullen is so used to her sudden appearances that he is not even surprised.
"It would be disrespectful."
"She is more disrespected when she is not treated like a person." The spymaster's voice is heavy when she responds, and Cullen wonders if she is thinking back to her interrogation of the Herald, the dispute Cullen had interrupted. Looking after the Herald as she follows Solas out of sight, Cullen thinks back to the morning. An essential asset, he had called her. Perhaps that was it. He turns to respond to Leliana, only to find the spymaster gone. Maker, the women was a shadow sometimes.
Cullen sighs, runs a hand through his hair, and heads back to the training field, ready for another round of drills. The Herald trips in and out of his peripheral vision all day, returning from the woods with Solas and more elfroot than she has hands for. Over by the stables with Blackwall, listening to the older man talk. And then she is sparring with Cassandra, not so far from where he runs his troops through drills, and he is able to watch her fight for the first time.
Cassandra is all power, her swings hard and deadly, even behind a practice blade, but they never connect with the Herald. The nimble elf is flipping backwards, rolling forwards – her strategy relies on never being hit to begin with, Cullen realizes. A dangerous game – learning how to take a blow and recover is essential as well, and he hates to think of the Herald crumbling beneath a sword arm like Cassandra's.
Lavellan dances into Cassandra's range, and she's a sight to behold when she's on the offensive. A blur of motion and swift surety; one blade connects with Cassandra's shield, and the warrior grunts, suggesting that there is more power in her strike than an observer might expect. If Cullen's troops notice that he no longer calls out criticisms and maneuvers, they do not complain. Instead, the soldiers follow his gaze and join the haphazard crowd around Cassandra and the Herald.
"Widen your stance, Lavellan," Blackwall stands by the sidelines, arms crossed and eyes critical. Cullen is immensely glad for the man's presence; on his weaker days, Cullen often felt like he, Lysette, and Rylen were the only capable trainers in the yard. Blackwall added a fourth to that list, and had proven more than willing to assist. "When Cassandra finally hits you, you'll go sprawling on your ass with a stance like that."
Cullen casts the man a quick warning glance, but Blackwall's eyes are trained on the fight. Taking such a familiar tone with the Herald – he's not sure it's the best precedent to set, here in front of so many townsfolk.
Varric guffaws, down at Blackwall's side.
"Yeah, and you're really pissing off the Seeker, Gemstone. She can't stand the ones that get away."
As if on cue, he sees it unfolding. Ellana is spinning, her practice blade slicing just over Cassandra's head as the taller woman ducks. The warrior's sword is arching dangerously, and connects with the Herald straight in the ribs. And then the Herald is in the air, the crowd parting for her limp form as it connects soundly with the dirt.
Cullen is by her side in an instant, hand out to turn her face up and see if she's still conscious.
"The Warden is right, Lavellan." Cassandra is at his shoulder, unapologetic as she studies the Herald.
"Mrgh." Lavellan blinks, and then seems to become aware of Cullen's fingers at her face because she bolts upright and out of his touch.
"Come," Cassandra offers her an arm, and the elf clasps her wrist. "We will work on your stance."
And they do, for hours, and much as Cullen wanted to stay and help her train, he has his own responsibilities.
"Back to your positions, you gawking fools," He says, ignoring the looks they share at the undeniable irony of his words. "We've got time for two more sets before dinner."
When the Herald and Cassandra finally tramp off the training field, they are both sweat-soaked and slumped, but laughing about something.
An unexpected friendship, Cullen thinks as he puts the troops through their final paces, and he is momentarily amazed at the Seeker. He saw so much of himself in Cassandra at times that he wondered how they could be so different in how they interacted with the Herald. He didn't think he'd ever truly seen Cassandra disarmed, but in Lavellan's company, the notion of a relaxed Cassandra seemed less unattainable.
When he sees the Herald again, it is after dinner. She did not eat with her companions – Blackwall, Varric and Cassandra had sat around the fire, traded stories with the ease of those who've seen more battles than they cared to remember. Cullen had thought about joining them, but opted instead to document the day's accomplishments and compile requisition orders. He sat at a desk in Leliana's tent when he spotted the Herald by the Chantry doors. She was finally alone.
Again, Cullen found himself reacting without thinking. If only for himself, he wanted to make amends.
"Herald."
Lavellan looked up at his approach, and her expression remained neutral.
"Commander." She paused, put a hand on her hip and looked him over. "Can I help you?"
"I…" he faltered. Was unsure again – what did he have to apologize for anyway? "I wanted to thank you."
She arched an eyebrow.
"Oh?"
"For locating the iron mine and the logging stand." Cullen can't believe that he's doing this, diverting himself from any meaningful conversation with trite pleasantries.
The Herald shrugged at that, her eyes losing interest.
"You write the order, I find the goods. An asset like me can manage that, no problem."
Ah. That word again. Perhaps Leliana was onto something.
"I'm sorry about that," his hand is on his neck as he looks down at her. "I didn't mean to be so reductive."
She shrugs again, and Cullen wonders what he'll have to do to win back that spirited side of her. Not that he wants to. It's just that he has seen her use it on everyone, and inconsistency might arouse suspicion from the troops.
"Did you want to see?" He's floundering now, but he can't stop himself.
"See what?" She blinks, and he's struck again at the slightly different features. The eyes that are just a little larger than a human's. She's not the first elf he's seen – there were many at Kinloch Hold and in Kirkwall – but he'd never had cause to acquaint himself with any others.
"The work we've done?" The words become a question through his intonation. "In the mines. I think you'll be quite impressed. We'll have a stable supply chain for weaponry established shortly. The workers are making excellent progress."
She laughs then, waving a hand, and Cullen is oddly relieved.
"Alright, take me to see the mines, Commander."
As she falls in step beside him, taking quick steps to keep pace with his long strides, Cullen reflects that this was most definitely not what he had intended. A quick apology to make peace and ease the air between them. An apology he hardly felt was necessary – he had spoken truthfully after all, that morning by the lake. But as he reviews the chronicles of their conversations in his head, he wonders what she must think of him.
We've lost a lot of people getting you here. His first words to her, when she was still a stranger and a potential threat. Cassandra had credited Lavellan with their survival against the demons, but Cullen had doubted it then. She was slight thing in mud-caked armour and grime; her face was ragged from the mark that ebbed away at her, pulsing in time with the Breach. He'd been frustrated, that day, at all they had suffered. So little progress, the Divine dead, and an elf with some unknown magic as the only survivor of the cataclysm.
But seeing her spar with Cassandra today, he began to understand why the Seeker had so much faith in her abilities.
"You held your own against Cassandra." He means the words to be a compliment, but she doesn't seem to understand that.
"Try not to sound so surprised," she laughs, a hand reaching up to brush dark hair back from her eyes. Her hair is loose now, down around her shoulders and is longer than he realized. It's interwoven with thin braids, and as she tucks it behind her ear, he follows her fingers with his eyes, traces the pointed outline of her ears. So much fuss over so little a difference, he thinks to himself.
"I… I wasn't." He finds it harder than he should to attend to their conversation. "I was impressed – I have seen little of your combat abilities thus far."
As Haven disappears behind them, he wonders exactly what he is doing. They are losing daylight, and the setting sun casts a red-orange haze over the snow. The Herald shivers and he wonders that she does not wear more layers.
"My father taught me everything I know about hunting." Her fingers drop to a pocket in her breeches and emerge with a small wooden token – a crescent moon inlaid with curving script he assumes is elvish. "I could skin a rabbit at four and hunt with a bow at five." She smiles at him, and he thinks that Varric was right - those eyes aregemstones in disguise.
"I know," she says when he doesn't respond right away. "A savage elf child, right?"
How could she have read that on his face?
"Of course not," and he realizes then that her racial difference must be so much more to her than it is to him. That it went further than the elegant tips of her ears or the almond roundness of her eyes. "Again, I am impressed by your aptitude."
"You are kind to say so, Commander." In the way her gaze drifts away from his face and onto the snowy slabs of rock around them, he suspects that she does not believe him. Thinks he is merely being polite. He wants to show her that he sees her for who she is, not merely as a product of her race. But he struggles because he barely knows her, cannot fathom how to convince her of his sincerity. So he falls back on the one thing he does understand.
"I find it hard to believe the Dalish taught you to fight so dirty." He almost blushes at the sound of the words in his voice, but it was true. She'd kicked out Cassandra's heels a half dozen times, locked her foot behind the Seeker's knee, twisted a hand in her hair, elbowed her in the sternum, the ribs, the lower back.
The Herald laughs and his attention is arrested. This is a genuine laugh; her shoulders shake and she puts a hand to her ribs as the laugh subsides into little giggles.
"You sound so scandalized, Commander." She's almost tearing up, for Maker's sake – it's not like he said anything particularly funny. Not really. But he is glad all the same: he prefers this to the elf that smarts at his comments and turns away quiet. He flounders for something clever to say, but she rescues him by speaking again.
"Every dirty trick I know," her lips linger on the word 'dirty', and he feels the faint flush on his cheeks again. "I learned in Kirkwall."
The name sends the memories tumbling back and a sense of anguish with them. The fires of the Chantry and the madness in Meredith's eyes. His own hand, following orders when he should have known better. He should have been better.
"Commander?" She can sense the change in him, blinks up at him with concern on her face and he wants to will it away, replace it with that joy he'd brought out of her just moments before.
"I forget that you lived in Kirkwall, for a time." His words are thoughtful when he speaks again. She is so small next to him. They walk, close together, nearing the entrance to the mine, and he realizes that he could crush her with his hands alone, if he wanted to.
"I did. I think I did the most important growing in my life in that city." Her face is blank now, and Cullen wonders whether or not to press for more. Decides not to, because he wouldn't want to be pressed for more about his own past.
"Our lives likely overlapped in Kirkwall," she says, tilting her head thoughtfully, her eyes forward as they walk on. "It's funny we never met. Varric too, though I infer from your stellar cameo in Tales of the Champion that you two got on quite well."
Oh Maker, she's read it.
"Knowing Master Tethras as you do now, I suspect you understand how little you can rely on his writing to hold any modicum of truth." The reality was that Cullen was ashamed of the fictional version of himself: Varric worked his magical bullshit and made Cullen an anti-hero who made the right choice at the end of the day. A staunch Templar, blind in his loyalty until the very moment when his decision mattered most. Redemption came so easily on pen and paper – a single choice exonerating him of all his sins.
"According to Varric, you joined the right side in the end." Lavellan shrugs. "Shouldn't that be all that matters?"
No, his mind screams at her naïve simplicity. Every choice matters: every mage who suffered at his hands without cause deserves justice that he cannot give them. But how could he explain that to her, with her wide, unjudging eyes? Would he risk losing this version of her, trusting and respectful? What would she think of him, if she knew the truth?
"Ah," she saves him from replying, once again. "I like what they've done with the place."
They enter the mine, and Lavellan looks appreciatively around herself, eyeing the wooden scaffolding as she turns slowly about. The shadows of the cave envelope them, and Cullen wishes that he'd brought some flint. He moves his hands to rest on his sword hilt, and he only belatedly realizes he'd left the blade in his room, removed it after the drills. Instead, he crosses his arms and watches the Herald.
"Yes, you found a rather lucrative holding here." He follows her down the terraced steps, throwing a nervous glance to the setting sun, just visible outside the mouth of the cave. "The men have been working diligently at excavation. Harritt says it's not the purest vein, but it will serve."
"The Inquisition is fortunate to have such diligent workers." She runs her hand along the wall of the cave. Her gloves have no fingers, he notices, and he wonders at the foolishness of such a garment as he watches her tapered fingers on the stone.
"And to have such capable leaders." He meant the remark as a compliment to her, but realized, too late, that he sounds self-laudatory.
Lavellan says nothing, simply ventures a few steps further, into a side tunnel where the scaffolding is all new. He follows closely.
"Herald, you'd best mind your step-"
The words are stolen from him at the cracking of the wooden beams, and then they are plummeting, both of them, straight down. Splinters of wood cascade, and Cullen feels briefly weightless. Air and darkness rushes up around them and then –
"Ouch."
She is on top of him, and he can't see anything. His ankle is twisted fiercely and pain radiates up through his seat and into his torso.
"Herald, are you alright?" His voice is too loud in the press of the darkness. She is slumped against him, and he can't tell if it is her back or her front. She's heavier than she looks, he finds himself thinking as he struggles pull air into his chest, overcome the shock.
Suddenly, she is alert again and scrambling backwards – it was her front, he realizes as her arms find his shoulders and push off, her thighs digging into his as she lifts herself to sit back. He winces against the pain, and wishes she would stop fidgeting.
"What happened?" Her voice is hoarse, a whisper, and he can tell she is trying to put room between them but can't.
"We're at the bottom of a mine shaft." He wants her to calm down – the immediate danger has passed, and there is no need for panic.
"I can see that." She hisses the words, as if this is somehow his fault, and absurdly, he finds himself making jokes.
"Can you? Those elf eyes really must be something, because I can't see anything at all." She shifts, and he lets out a groan of pain. Abruptly, the perturbed tone is gone.
"Are you alright, Commander?" Her voice is concerned, and he wishes he could see her face. Overhead, more than a dozen feet above them, is the entrance to the shaft. But what little daylight remains is dwindling, and Cullen realizes that soon it will be entirely dark.
"It's just my ankle." He can feel the sweat on his face as the gravity of their situation settles over him. He can't stand and, limber though she is, he finds it unlikely she'll be able to scale the sheer rock walls and get back to Haven for help.
"I'm so sorry." Her voice is soft now, uncertain. "I didn't realize, and I landed on you, and -"
"Enough." He is irritated, but he needs to get that incessant worry out of her voice.
"I should brace your ankle with something," her fingers in the dark, tentative pressure on his ankle, and he just wants her to calm down. He leans forward, grabs her wrist in one of his hands, pulls her hand away from his ankle, and the gesture is rougher than he intended.
The change in her is instant. She is frozen, and the only sound in the gloom is his own breathing, strained and suddenly abrasive against his ears. She is kneeling, he suspects, seated between his splayed legs in the cramped enclosure of stone. For all they say that elf-eyes glow, he cannot see hers in the dark.
"Release me, Commander." Her voice is cold. He drops her wrist like it's hot metal, shifts back to give her space. Ignores the sharp stab of pain that works his way up his ankle every time he moves. Silence stretches, but Cullen doesn't know how to fix it. He can feel her nervousness like it's another person in the tight space with them – energy without a place to go.
"We're going to be here all night, aren't we?" Her thoughts had taken the same direction as his, obviously. They'd tell no one where they were headed. No one had any reason to miss them in Haven.
"The workers will be here promptly, tomorrow morning." He tries to sound confident, but his voice sounds desperate, even to his own ears. "They have to reinforce the new scaffolding."
"That's hardly necessary, I think." she says, voice dry, and he is happy that some her spirit is returning.
"Might I point out that it was you who hopped over to take a peek down the mineshaft." He wants to keep this up, the lightness between them. Prefers it to the inexplicable almost-fear he perceived in her moments earlier.
"Me!?" Incredulity, and it is so exaggerated Cullen finds himself smiling, grateful that she cannot see his foolish grin in the dark. "Might I point out that the wood supported me just fine until you lumbered after me in that ridiculous breastplate of yours."
"If you're implying my weight is to blame for this all, I'd like lodge a complaint as well: you are much heavier than you look."
"Commander!" And he can tell it's a struggle for her not to laugh. "I may be a savage woodland elf, but even I know that it is bad form to comment on a lady's weight!"
And then she is giggling and he can't help himself. His laughter joins hers and bubbles up the mineshaft, echoing around them.
"So you can laugh, Commander." He feels her shift, suspects she is redistributing her weight. Her knees must be tired, bent like that, he thinks. The side of her thigh brushes against the inside of his calf. "I was beginning to suspect it wasn't possible."
It's not the first time he's heard similar words. Josephine and Leliana tease him about it constantly, and even as a child, Mia poked fun at his dour ways.
"Josephine would be so distraught if she could see us now." The Herald says after a moment of quiet.
Cullen chuckles at that. Reflects on their situation, and speaks.
"The Commander of the Inquisition and the Herald of Andraste – fell down a hole."
"Probably bad for morale. Definitely bad for my image." Lavellan concedes, and then she is standing; he can hear the scrape of her hands against the rocks as she looks for any purchase.
"Her-" he begins and the stops himself, remembers Leliana's advice. "My lady, I do not think you will find anything to –"
He stops again because she is laughing, a raucous cackle that he wouldn't mind so much if it weren't for the way it filled their tight cranny, reverberating off the walls and filling his ears.
"Did I say something to amuse you?" He keeps his tone dry. As his eyes adjust to the dark, he thinks he can make out her legs – shapely and just a little darker than everything else – in front of him.
"I've never," she breaths in deep, tries to stifle the humour out of herself. "I'm sorry," she shifts and he swears she's wiping a tear from her eye. "I've never been called a lady before."
This woman is incomprehensible, he decides.
"You don't need to be born a noble to act with grace and honour."
She grows still at his words and he wonders if she is looking at him. Trying, impossibly, to see something in the dark, the way he is trying to do the same.
"You really don't think the born-in-the-woods, crazy elf business is important, do you?"
"You're the one who keeps bringing it up."
When she says nothing, Cullen knows she is realizing that he is right. He will not carry the matter further.
"Sit down," He says instead. "And watch my leg. I don't care how fleet-footed you are – even Andraste's chosen cannot scale a sheer rock wall with nothing but willpower."
Gingerly, she does as he instructs and he is surprised to find her such a good listener. So accepting of their circumstances. Her stubbornness is selective, he notes. She sits again, across from him, and tries to stretch out her legs. But her foot jostles his thigh and he can't help the hiss of pain that escapes his lips.
"I'm sorry!" She freezes.
"It's alright. Here, just turn around." He goes to touch her shoulder, but remembers her earlier reaction. Instead, he simply tries to keep as still as possible as she moves. She seats herself in front of him, and he can feel the stiffness in her posture. If he leans forward, he can bury his face in her hair. She smells of a floral note he cannot place, undercut by sandalwood, or something similarly delicate. He realizes then, that she must have washed after her match with Cassandra. Lovely – while she smelled of flowers and soap, he was soaked in a day's sweat, with the scent of stew on his breath.
"I was recruited into the Inquisition in Kirkwall myself." He says, suddenly deciding that he cannot let his thoughts continue down the path they'd chosen. He will fill the curiosities in his mind with words instead, the memories that are safe to share. "As you know, I was still in the service of Knight-Commander Meredith when the mages rebelled."
"The chaos of the rebellion – it's unfathomable." She replies and her voice is soft. He wonders if she is worried, nervous here, in the dark, so close to a man she barely knows. Her body language suggests that she is, but her voice, though quiet, is steady. "I was lucky to leave before then."
Cullen can't imagine meeting her in Kirkwall. She seems incongruous against his memory of the city, too aloof to be grounded in the squalor and mire of a place like that. But he suspects what side she would've chosen, had she been there when mages rose up and anarchy erupted.
"I witnessed firsthand the devastation." His words were solemn and, fleetingly, he is back there, watching the death of recruits he'd trained and mages he'd chatted with. "Cassandra, determined as always, sought a solution to the discord. She made the decision to join the Inquisition easy."
Lavellan laughs, and the noise is so close now.
"She can be persuasive."
They sit in silence, for a while, and Cullen reflects that there is something to be said for contemplation, out of doors and in the dark. It is unexpectedly peaceful. But then he notices her shaking; Lavellan is shivering against the chill, and why wouldn't she? The middle of winter, in a cave, at the bottom of a hole in nothing but well-fitting leather armour.
"Here," Cullen winces as he shrugs out of his cloak, lifts the fur off his shoulders, and slides the garment off and around his back.
"I will be fine, Commander." She's trying to be insistent, but the attempt is marred by the chattering of her teeth.
"Don't be ridiculous," he pulls the garment out in front of himself and pauses. "May I?"
He waits, and finally she moves. Is it a nod? Realizing he cannot see her, she speaks.
"Of course. Thank you." He slips the cloak around her shoulders, almost laughing at its size on her. The fur collar falls flesh against her neck and cascades over her shoulders, and he wraps the folds of red fabric over her arms, his own crossing over her chest. For a moment, he lets his hands stay where they are, his arms folded across her chest, as he tries to rub warmth into her triceps.
"Are you… alright?" He is relieved when he feels her nod slowly. He thinks he understands her hesitation. He is human, a veritable stranger, and, try though he might, he cannot truthfully insist that their situation isn't oddly intimate. But, he reasons, they both need to stay warm and to keep up their strength. That was definitely the reason he made his next suggestion:
"Sit back a little, my lady. Just until you are warm again."
"Cullen, I…" She's never used his first name before, and the sound of it in her lilting voice stirs an urge in him to make her feel at ease.
"All will be well." His voice is steadier than he feels. "We just need to stay warm through the night so that we can resume our duties in the morning, when the workers arrive and find us."
She pauses to consider his words, and instead of saying anything, she moves. Scoots towards him a little so that her back rests against his breastplate, her head at his shoulder. Cullen follows the movement with his arms, keeps them hugging her, over the cloak. He wishes he could bring his knees up around them, but he dares not to move the left leg. It feels unexpectedly right, to sit like this – gone are the traces of anxiety that pooled in his stomach, replaced instead by a warm contentment.
Despite his own ease, he can still feel the tension in her shoulders and her back. Cullen opts to say nothing, gives her time to adjust. He is grateful for the warmth another body provides and hopes that she has also noticed the change. It's strange, Cullen realizes, to have open eyes and see nothing but blackness.
"Was it hard?" Her voice is distant. Where had her thoughts taken her? "To leave the Templar order? That's all you had ever done, right?"
Surprised by the question. Cullen finds himself answering honestly.
"Kirkwall fell. Innocent people died in the streets. Meredith would have had us stand by and watch, fighting only those battles which suited her purpose and using lyrium like a leash to control us. Surely you can see why I want nothing to do with that life?"
It is easier to say the words like this, into the night, unable to see her face or be seen himself.
"But surely you saw something noble in the order once?" Lavellan rolls her head back onto his shoulder, tilts her face so she is speaking in his direction. He tries to ignore the sensation of her breath against his chin, his neck, his cheek, and instead focuses on answering her question.
He tells her about his childhood: how being a Templar was all he had aspired to. How dedication had altered the course of his life, taken him from would-be farm boy and threw him into the path of first the Blight and then the mage uprising.
"I have only read tales of the Fifth Blight." He can feel her arms shifting, under his, beneath the cloak. "It's hard to imagine that you were there, living through it."
For a moment, all Cullen can picture is Altessa's face, the sweet upturn of her nose, her dimples when she smiled, and the fire that burned, consumed her in the chaos at Kinloch Hold.
"The Blight saw dark times for everyone involved." His voice is harsher than he intended, but he desperately needs to be thinking of anything else. "Might we move on?"
"Of course," She does not miss a step, and he thinks that maybe she too understands what it means to have a past you will not share. Demons you do not want to face again. Instead, she volunteers something of herself.
"Though the Dalish were not an order I trained for, leaving them meant walking away from the only life I knew."
"Was it hard for you?" Cullen sees unexpected parallels in their choices. "The first time, or the second, when they sent you to the Conclave?"
"The first time was harder, but I was with my father still then." She sighs softly, the noise so close to Cullen's ear. "I understood my father's reasons, but all I had known were the woods and the stars overhead. To be taken from that and plunged into a Lowtown hovel with nothing but a bedroll and our wits to keep us going. That was no small change."
"And you survived through… smuggling?" Discipline and order were the very marrow of Cullen's being. The notion that this elf, folded easily in his arms, had lived by a completely different code – Cullen knows many who live by crime, but cannot imagine how she slipped from that life and into his. Into the Inquisition's, he corrects himself.
She's chuckling again. "You can say it, Commander. I was a criminal. The opposite side of the law from you." She shifts under his arms and he readjusts his grip, unselfconscious as he pulls her close and seeps up her warmth. "Perhaps it's a good thing we never met in Kirkwall."
Privately, he agrees. The man he was in Kirkwall was dominated by clear rights and wrongs. Though he questioned Meredith, his discipline and deference had continued to win out over his better judgement. Lavellan and her sideways smile and steps like silent shadows – the person he was then would have had no understanding of her shades of grey. May not have judged her lightly. It frightens him a little, to think that fate could so easily be altered, that he might have met her then and turned her into the city guard.
"The second time –" Her words are cut off suddenly as green light fills the narrow space, throws them into eerie luminescence. She moves, pulls her hand out from under the cloak, and Cullen watches, fascinated. The mark illuminates her left palm, shining through the leather of her glove and bathing them both in its flickering aura.
"Don't worry," she says. Her eyes – he can see them now – are trained on the mark, and her face shows no trace of alarm. Tension leaves his body as he realizes that this is no sign of an impending attack, of a nearby rift. "It does this, every now and then. Solas thinks it may mean that a rift is opening, somewhere else in Thedas."
"And what do you think?" He knew she did not believe herself the chosen of Andraste. Did not worship human gods, saw no reason that she would be saved above all others. But when the mark glowed and he felt its tug on his soul – the call of the Fade? Or something else? – it was impossible to deny that some sort of great power was at work.
She turns to meet his eyes, and her face is so close to his Cullen almost flinches back. It was easier to deny their proximity in the dark.
"I think that there is so much we don't know about what happened at the Conclave."
He turns his face away from her imploring eyes. He doesn't know what she's searching his expression for, and he doesn't want to see her disappointment when he does not provide the answers that she needs. Instead, he cautiously drops his right hand from where it grips her arm, bringing it closer to the glowing mark on her palm.
"May I?" His curiosity from earlier – what would it feel like?
She says nothing, lifts her palm to his hand instead, and Cullen gasps sharply. The mark is – it reverberates with a quiet energy that strums itself through his fingers and along his arm. His fingers wrap around the back of her hand as he traces his thumb along the green cleft, wondering at the strangeness of their whole situation.
"Does it hurt?" His voice sounds distant to his own ears.
"Now? No." She closes smooth fingers around his thumb and slowly pulls her hand out of his. Cullen's breath catches in his throat at the softness of her skin – her exposed fingers in those stupid gloves are warm, gentle, and Cullen is so glad that he did not wear his gauntlets. "When I connect with a rift… yes."
"I'm sorry that you have to bear the pain alone, my lady."
She smiles ruefully, and something in Cullen's chest aches to see her sad. Then, with a shake of her hand, the light disappears and they are plunged back into darkness.
"That's better." And unexpectedly, she nuzzles back against him, and it's Cullen's turn to freeze, paralyzed as she settles in and turns the side of her head against his shoulder. "Too cold to have my hands out, waving about."
"Indeed." He can commit to only the one word, does not trust his voice to offer up any more. He hopes she cannot hear his rapid-fire heart as it protests against his ribcage, that she does not notice the way his breath comes quick and shallow. Blissfully returned to the darkness of the night, he is forced to admit to himself what he had, for weeks, been studiously trying to disregard. The Herald was attractive – she is supple curves and compact muscle, a deadly spring prepared to uncoil to meet the Inquisition's every need. Her hair reminds him of the colour of Honnleath soil and her smile, when she uses it, is so infectious that even glum Adan cannot resist her charm.
Cullen had noticed all these things and more in the early days of their acquaintance, catalogued the superficial details as unimportant. But somehow, he found his thoughts returning there, assessing the sway of her hips as she walked out to the pier by the lake, or the effortless way that she stretched, whole-bodied, arms in the air and then down to the ground as if she could tie herself in knots. An elvish sort of beauty, certainly, different from the buxom chests and ready lips of the Ferelden women he'd known.
"Do Templars take vows, Commander?" He is grateful for the distraction her question provides. "I swear to the Maker to watch all mages – that sort of thing?"
"Hm," Cullen shifts, twinges at the ache that races up his leg at the action. Wishes he'd taken off his breastplate, because leaning back against the wall in a sheet of hard armour is not the most forgiving. But then, he is also glad for the breastplate because it's the one thing that's maintaining distance between him and the Herald. Without it - Focus on the question, Cullen.
"There is a vigil first, and if you make it through, you swear yourself to a life of service."
"That's no small promise."
And there's the rub. He continues. "You're given a philter then. Your first draught of lyrium. The power that comes with it."
"Does lyrium make you able to control mages? I read that it amplifies the Templar's strength, makes them resistant to magic."
"Nothing can safeguard you entirely against magic." Cullen knows that fact all too well. "But lyrium gives Templars an edge, a resistance and a greater ability to counteract it." For all the good that's done him.
"After your philter, you swear yourself to the Maker, yes. We were expected to give up claims to wealth, fame. The order becomes a Templar's family."
"A life of service and sacrifice." He can't place Lavellan's tone, next to his ear. Is she teasing him? Is it genuine interest? "Are Templars expected to give up physical temptations as well?"
Cullen feels the fire on his cheeks before he can even formulate a single thought.
"Why would you –" That question, here, now of all places? But she is still as stone in his arms, obviously unbothered by his discomfort. Control yourself. You're not a teenager. He breathes deep, tries to answer the question truthfully. He clears his throat.
"That's not expected." His voice is not cracking. He is impressed with himself. "Templars can marry, though there are rules around it and they have to seek permission from the order. Some may choose to give up more to prove their devotion, but it's… it's not required."
He shifts, suddenly painfully aware of how close she is, pressed against his chest, curling into his arms.
"Did you?" Unapologetic frankness. Why is she doing this to him?
"I –" That was definitely a squeak. "Uhm. No. I did not. I have taken no such vows."
She laughs. "Good. Celibacy is bad for the soul. Or so the Dalish teach." She moves again. Her forehead is against his neck, warm skin and silken hair, and Cullen reminds himself to just breathe.
"Thank you for being here, Commander."
He can't help it – he barks a laugh at the patent sincerity in her voice.
"I didn't have much of a choice. Curious Herald breaking beams and all that."
"No, I mean, here." She has twisted now; her torso leans into his, arms balled in front of her to keep the warmth in. So small beneath his cloak. "You didn't have to be so accommodating."
"You are the Herald." He says simply, drawing his arms tighter and pulling his good knee up around them. "Your safety is our highest priority."
"I'm sorry I was cold towards you this morning." She sniffs, and he wonders how old she is. Sometimes, she seems so young. Naively well-meaning, as if she hasn't seen the worst of the world, as he has. "I am the only one who can close the rifts, and you were right to worry for my safety."
He does not know what to say in the face of her unpretentious emotions. He is not used to it – even in Haven, conversations are laced with double-meaning and secret agendas. He settles for silence.
"I'm going to sleep now, Commander, if that's alright with you."
How does she tug at his feelings so readily? Vacillate him from extreme embarrassment to effortless comfort in the span of sentences. Pose questions that discompose him, and then abandon him to his own thoughts?
"Of course." His voice is gentle, though his mind is racing.
Within moments, she is asleep. Maker's breath, is it so easy for her? He knows he cannot let himself sleep: he does not want to alarm her, and he cannot promise that state he would wake in a normal state. It has been such a long day. She rests so still in the circle of his embrace. If it weren't for her warmth, her skin against his neck and slow in and out of her breath against his collarbones, she wouldn't seem alive. The cold is palpable now, in the dead of the night, and without his cloak, Cullen feels it against his neck, around his ears, against his back where he presses into the stone.
But tonight, the cold does not bother him. He adjusts his neck, moves to rest a cheek tentatively against the top of her head, and promises himself he will stay awake.
He falls asleep. And later, he finally emerges from the wispy tendrils of an unremembered dream, Cullen is aware of two things.
First, he can see – as sleep-caked eyes blearily blink open, he can make out dim outlines in the cave. Light filters down from the hole above their heads and Cullen is amazed that, despite his best intentions, he has slept through the night. Remained asleep too – no nightly visions had clawed at his mind.
Second, she's still there. His neck aches and his chin rests on her head and Maker has he drooled in her hair? He twists his face to look down at the Herald, and sees closed eyes and long dark lashes. His arms encircle her, but he moves one now to lift a cold hand and push hair out of her face.
"Mm."
He freezes at the noise she makes, fingers incriminatingly resting against her high cheekbone.
Slowly, her eyes blink open. A few things happen all at once then.
Surprise leaps over her expression and she is scrambling back, out of his arms. She hits his leg on the way, and Cullen is reminded painfully of his sprained ankle. He cries out, but at the same time, they hear the sounds of chatter overhead.
The Herald meets his eyes, comprehension returning to her face.
Then, they both begin to shout, and it isn't long before workers are peering down the mineshaft at them. The workers are trying to hide their amusement, Cullen knows, as a soldier insists that he will go back to Haven for some rope and Seeker Cassandra.
"You don't need to get the Seeker!" Lavellan sounds desperate as she shouts up after the man. "Really!"
But the man is gone. Others stand around the hole, chatting and laughing. Lavellan sighs and meets his eyes again – hers are dark pools in the half light.
"Well Commander. It's been fun." Then she's standing and stretches as best she can in the cramped confines and Cullen follows her movements with his gaze. When the fur collar of his cloak slips off one of her shoulders, she laughs.
"Right, I had forgotten." She rolls her shoulders, sinuously like a snake, and eases herself out of the cloak.
"Well, it just fits you so well."
"Is that sarcasm, Commander?" she wears a face of faux surprise. "And here I didn't think you capable. The things you learn about a person, stuck in a hole with them."
He chuckles and accepts the cloak as she hands it back. Gingerly, he tries to slip an arm into the vest, and is moderately surprised when she bends over and helps his limbs into the armholes. As the fur settles in over his shoulders again, he is engulfed by the scent of her. Distantly, he wonders if he will ever be able to look at the damned thing again and not remember her in it.
"Thank you again, Commander." The words are warm as she gazes down at him. Before he has a chance to reply, she offers him a hand.
"Here, let's get you up." He clasps her wrist and braces himself for the pain. She slips easily into the crook of his arm, gives him something to lean on just as his bad foot gives out. He is impressed by the strength of her – though she bends, she does not break under his weight.
The sound of Cassandra's voice above has them both groaning, meeting each other's eyes before dissolving into laughter.
"I don't understand." The Nevarran accent and clipped words are unmistakable. "I expect this from the Herald, but Commander Cullen. Really?"
They look up to see the Seeker's silhouetted head peering down.
"Good morning, Cassandra." The Herald waves up with her free hand, charm in her voice and a smile on her lips. Looking down at the elf, Cullen finds himself unable to take his eyes from her face.
They will not live this down, he realizes as Cassandra makes a frustrated noise and calls for rope. The men are stifling smiles, and give up a cheer as each of them is levered out of the hole. The Herald responds with her usual grace – bows regally to the assembled crowd and cracks a joke. Cullen tries to look serious, but he finds that even standing straight is exerting. He is grateful Varric isn't there with his quill and parchment.
No, they will not live this down, he thinks as he watches the Herald recount their mishaps with dramatic, wide gestures and animated words. But Cullen, feeling oddly rested despite the crick in his neck, is less embarrassed than he anticipated.
They would not live this down, the Herald and him, but he is just fine with that. He wouldn't have it any other way.
Mia,
I'm not dead.
Sincerely,
Cullen
….
I'm joking. And before you get even more mad, it was you who told me to be less serious. So there you go – what do you think?
The Inquisition is based in Haven now. We had planned to stay here only for the duration of the Conclave, but, well, I'm sure you've heard about that. We do not know what caused the explosion.
It is the 'Inquisition' now, by the way. Seeker Penteghast pulled her ancient book off the shelf and has made us an official organization. Ignore what you hear about our heretical ways. We do good work here – we are helping refugees from the mage-Templar war, and we are working on a plan to seal the Breach. The Chantry cannot provide the leadership that we can. So instead, they point fingers at us and call us all blasphemers.
Their resentment is likely due to the Herald. She is an elf, originally from a Dalish clan in the Free Marches, and she is the only survivor of the Conclave. Sister Leliana suspected she was involved in the explosion, but she has proven her loyalty. She has a mark on her hand that can close the rifts. I think she is our only hope against this darkness.
I do not know what true change we will accomplish. Our leadership is often divided on important issues, though our use of the Herald as our frontline emissary does result in decisions being made. She is a capable warrior and is growing into a natural leader. I have high hopes for what she may achieve.
I have enclosed a copy of Master Tethras' latest draft. You have no idea what embarrassing lengths I had to go to receive it. And no, I will not tell you what those embarrassments were.
Consider it my apology for these months of silence. All the best to you and the family.
Cullen