"Amor, tosse e fumo, malemente si nascondono."
("Love, a cough, and smoke: all things that cannot be easily hidden." -Italian proverb)
Adan watched her disappear into the courtyard with the bucket dangling from her arm before he went outside and signaled to one of the guards. The man would have to be buried in the cemetery on the left side of the bridge to Skyhold, he realized. Formal documents had to be drafted and proper paperwork filled out—duplicates sent to Redcliffe, as well, naturally. The infirmary aids wandered in eventually and collected the blanket-draped corpse on a narrow stretcher. He folded up the cot, leaned it against the wall, and groaned, rubbing his fingers over his closely shorn hair. He didn't want her to return and find any reminders, he told himself. He was useless when she was distraught. He always felt unsure of what to do; on more than one occasion his hand had hovered hesitatingly over her shoulder, held at bay as if repelled by some unseen force field.
He caught his reflection off a polished metal basin and peered at his weary face: bluish circles beneath his eyes, his thick, meticulously groomed beard framing a scowl.
Merciful Maker, when did I become this old looking?
He pat down his beard contemplatively.
Does it matter, anyway? What use were all those years, all that sacrifice? I am easily one of the finest alchemists in Thedas and here I am, just an over-qualified apothecary.
A failure… and an ugly, ugly man, he taunted himself. I haven't been sleeping well. Haven't really, not since…
He chased the memories from his mind, focusing instead on the prescriptions he had to fill that morning: potions, elixirs, and powders to heal broken bones, infected wounds, and apparently an outbreak of intestinal discomfort among the hold's kitchen staff. He made a mental note to avoid the communal dining hall that day.
Maybe she would like to accompany me to lunch at the tavern?
He let his mind wander. He recalled with heady pleasure the finely shaped leg he'd glimpsed earlier. His lips curled into a grin and he began to hum a little ditty.
He did look forward to their daily banter, how she had no trepidation telling him what she thought, calling him out on his cantankerousness, and even what no one else there ever dared to do: second-guess him.
She could be insolent and exasperating, but it kept him honest, he realized.
Or sane?
He glimpsed his face in the basin once more.
What lunch? Fool, he berated himself. We're up to the eyeballs with work. Where is she? he wondered impatiently, unfolding packets of dried herbs and salts before a scale.
A great nobody. I, the formidable alchemist, a sniveling pile of snot as fire showered from above and people clamored for help, dying all around me.
Useless!
Coward.
He slammed down his mortar and lifted his head crossly only to encounter a pair of transparent blue eyes observing him from beneath the brim of a cumbersomely large hat.
He cried out in surprise.
"You were hurt, you were scared. You did the best you could. There is no shame. They are all grateful you were saved."
He stared at those pale eyes, melancholy weighing upon him. Yet, the words brought forth an unexpected relief, not just because of what the stranger had said, but because of what he'd known. The stranger also seemed familiar, he thought, despite failing at placing him. As far as he could tell, he was young and robust beneath scruffy clothing.
"Where do I know you from?"
"You don't," the stranger stated earnestly.
Adan shook his head, disoriented for a moment.
What was I just doing?
He noticed the salts on the scale.
Right!
After briskly wiping his hands on a towel, he reached for a glass flask.
Where is she?
He peered at the door again, longingly.