Chapter 5: A Considered Kiss

Consciousness returned to the sound of arguing. Where was she? Her body ached with the fading of extreme pain, much as it had as she'd recovered from the lyrium that had been forced into her skin. But the sounds were not the twisted whispering that had accompanied consciousness that time. She cast her mind about, trying to make some sense of the unfamiliar and slowly the truth seeped into her mind.

Confusion, betrayal, rage coursed quickly through her heart and across her face as she lay there. She remembered. Fists clenching and a growl rising in her throat, she opened her eyes tensing to spring from her cot and all thought stalled. She was not alone. Mother Giselle sat beside her watching her with a considering gaze.

She had expected questions about what had happened in Haven, but instead the revered mother spoke words of comfort and Bainsidhe relaxed. It was clear in the woman's face that her mind was more on her own agenda than on any secrets of her patient. As they left the tent where she'd been tended to face the fragmented leadership of the group, Bainsidhe realized that all of their agendas could be quietly corrupted to serve her own.

She hid a bitter smile as they bowed to her in the rough camp. They wanted to gain power through the name of the Herald of Andraste? She would make them believe that she was the faithful herald, and then she would use them to the last drop of Inquisition blood if necessary to gain her vengeance.

A gaze drew her attention from dark thoughts of vengeance. The mage, Solas, stood considering her as if in deep thought. She'd once thought he was a manifestation of Corypheus, but clearly that was not the case. Yet he felt similarly to her red lyrium enhanced senses. What was he? A threat? A boon? Another want to be godling jockeying for power? The intensity of his watch didn't abate as he approached and asked to speak to her. He spoke of the orb, and there were words under his words that he did not say out loud. An understanding that body language conveyed without clarifying.

How could he have known of the orb? Corypheus had kept it as his most guarded secret and most prized possession. And how should she react to this potential threat? Kill him and leave his body beneath the snow at the edge of camp? Persuade him to share his secrets with her with the goal of destroying her betrayer?

Then he spoke of a place of safety and the decision was made for her for at least that moment. If her army were to grow to the point of outmatching Corypheus', it would need a safe place to be built.

The march was long and cold and surprisingly. As she turned back to watch the multitudes following her, an odd feeling spread hesitant tendrils through her heart. They followed her. Not as a general for someone else of power. Not because they were compelled. But because they had faith in their own dark leader (although in their minds perhaps just dark of skin, not knowing the darkness of her soul).

They were hers.

Enslaved, corrupted, used and trained to faithfullness, she'd never had anything that she could claim ownership of. For a moment she allowed the strange emotions to raise up where she could study them. But only a moment before they were lost in the revelation of their new home. The imposing structure that the subtle mage called Skyhold.

The move into Skyhold was frantic and relieved in equal measures for those around her. She found herself getting caught in the faces of those around her. Drawn in to their humanity in a way that made her supremely uncomfortable. Added to that was the growing withdrawal to the stolen lyrium she'd left behind in the now buried Haven. In defense she found herself spending more and more time hidden away inside the keep.

Her isolation left her unprepared for the attention of the masses, and particularly the advisers as she emerged from her hiding place a few days later. Their faces bore smiles, but there was a definite tension behind those welcoming expressions as she slowly emerged, wincing in the sunlight.

When Cassandra drew her to the battlements where Leliana waited with a massive sword, her heart stopped for a moment. Had they found out her secret? Was this to be her death before the ones she'd lied to? It took a supreme bit of acting to not run, but to walk up to the ladies and listen to their words with a polite smile rather than a snarl.

She was unprepared again for the revelation of what the actual intent was. Inquisitor? Leader of the masses she'd been watching as only Herald. The faces that she'd been avoiding studying all looked up at her. Worshipful, hopeful, certain. Faithful as she had been faithful to her false god.

They offered her the sword with the moment of real decision. Would she avoid the heightened scrutiny, the chance to be revealed for what she had been? Or would she risk all for the power to control this organization as she'd plotted from the snow laden camp?

Her hesitation was just a moment. She knew her course. Power for vengeance was worth any sacrifice. Any risk. The latent rage that lived in her heart since the betrayal began to rise.

Rage lifted the sword and rage thrust it at the sky in challenge. She was the Bainsidhe! She would march through this world at the head of this budding force and she would make it her weapon to bring down the Elder One and turn him to dust.

The next few days passed for her in a world of strangeness and pain. People smiled at her as she passed them, they spoke of her reverently when she listened to their conversations. Cassandra withdrew from the war room and the advisers table in a clear show of support for Bainsidhe's authority. The advisers themselves reacted with a deference they hadn't shown before. She would have relaxed her constant state of watchful tension but for two things. The first being the growing pain that hammered at her skull and her skin as the inscribed lyrium began to compensate for what had been long term ingestion.

The second was the studying intensity of the gaze that Solas leveled on her whenever she was within eyesight.

Finally, a fit of pain and frustration sent her to confront him. Perhaps a foolish thing, she scolded herself, but she grew tired of guessing what level of danger he presented. To her surprise, he headed off the confrontation, almost as if he could see her intent. Instead, he asked her to walk with him and, strangely, without argument she did.

Haven...that was wrong. She knew it, but couldn't quite put her finger on why. He took her to the cell where she'd woken, fresh from Corypheus presence with the cursed mark on her. Why there? He spoke of watching her, studying the mark.

He'd studied her as she slept his words said. His demeanor said more. He knew something of her secrets but not enough. Once again, words beneath the words. Questions he asked without asking. Almost she answered without answering.

But then he took her outside and it was as if she awoke from a compulsion. The warlike armor he'd been wearing disappeared in the green sunlight leaving him in the clothing she knew him to wear normally. The need to answer his unspoken questions faded as well and she could tell he saw when it did. He turned away, giving her a moment to study him.

The subtlety of his need to know was still there, but so was something else. Something in their balance of power had changed. She needed to know more about this dangerous enigma masking himself as a man.

A man...In her experience there was a weakness all men had. Did he?

Only one way to find out. And with the thought came the action. She took his chin and kissed him, his lips surprised and soft beneath hers.

When she drew back to study his reaction, that reaction was immediate. He took her forcefully in his arms and kissed her back in a move that seemed set to show his dominance. She struggled through her bodies traitorous reaction and instead tried to read his intention through his lips. When he drew back, his studying of her bore a resemblance to her own study of his reaction. A moment of deliberation and then he made a decision.

He kissed her again and she realized that the game was well and truly afoot. Who would win this romantic cat and mouse? She was determined that she would, in spite of how good his arms felt around her without the violence she'd become accustomed to in lovemaking. In spite of how his lips moved against hers. In spite of the desperate hunger she read in his body as it pressed against hers. She would win she thought through the rising lust.

Until she woke abruptly in her bed and the realization that he had the power to pull her into the fade and manipulate it around her.

The thought made her heart grow cold with fear.