She saw less and less of Anders over the next several days, as the Inquisitor and her advisers came down to question him about Corypheus and other things. She'd gotten the occasional glimpse of him as he passed to go to the washroom or kitchen before retreating back to his quarters. Particularly to the table which was now filled with books and stacks of maps. When he wasn't doing research or writing reports at the behest of the advisers, he was being visited by Varric. Selise had spent much of that time in her room, listening to the rumble and murmur of the voices through the walls and wondering what they were talking about. Whatever it was, it was having a worrying effect on Anders. The last few times that she'd seen him, his eyes had been bloodshot and his clothing looked disconcertingly loose. She had thought the meetings and visits from Varric would have been good for him, but it seemed to be precisely the opposite.
Occasionally, when he was in his room alone, she would consider knocking on his door and asking him for some tea. But she always talked herself out of it for one reason or another. He had seemed so interested in being her friend the first few days that she figured if he wasn't coming to her first it must have been because he simply had more important things to do, or he just wanted to be alone. It's not like he had been lacking for company after all.
She'd had little to report when she found herself seated across from Fiona and Leliana at the end of each of the two weeks. She had already seen Leliana enter his room numerous times recently, and once she informed them that he hadn't attempted to do anything or go anywhere, she was quickly dismissed.
One night, after realizing that he'd neither had visitors or left his room at all the entire day, Selise found herself standing at his door with a plate of food she'd scrounged up from the kitchen. Varric and the Inquisitor had just left to go down south to the Fallow Mire and wouldn't be back for weeks, but surely the advisers who still streamed in and out of his quarters had noticed how he'd begun wasting away, she thought. And yet it didn't seem like any of them cared. Or perhaps they, like so many within the Inquisition, were simply too busy focusing on matters of War to check in on a disgraced apostate's health.
She knocked lightly at first, listening hard for any sign of movement on the other side, but heard nothing. Her second knock was much more forceful, but still no one came. His door was locked, and when Selise opened her mind to the space within, she felt herself overcome with a bone-chilling despondency. Not knowing what else to do, she climbed the stairs in the tavern to the place in the attic where Cole usually stayed.
"Cole can you come pick a lock for me?" she asked as she approached him.
"I can. For your spirit man?
"Yes, I think he needs help."
"He would like that. Locked doors don't stop people who care."
"Oh good. Well then, this way," she said. Cole was quiet as they exited the tavern and crossed the courtyard.
"You are a part of his pain, your colors sing of lost loves. It bites, drawing blood, but sometimes he likes it," he said out of the blue.
"Me?" she asked incredulously.
"You pick off old scabs. Under some are healed skin, under others open wounds."
"And he likes it? But we've barely even spoken in many days."
"But she comes soon and now he is afraid."
"She?" Selise asked. Sometimes Cole's cryptic speak was tiring, even though she'd found it was usually worth it to try to figure out the meaning.
"He is the one who is really lost. She is found. She used to pick his locks too."
Selise thought about this as she walked Cole through the Great Hall, turning through the doorway to descend the stairs. A lost love is coming?
"Where does the spirit hide?" Cole asked.
"I don't know," she answered.
"I wouldn't like staying quiet for so long."
"Are we talking about Anders now, or the spirit?"
"Yes."
They reached his door and Cole went to work, moving deft fingers around tiny pins until she heard the click of the sliding bolt.
"Thank you," she said to Cole, but he did not move to leave.
"Would it help him to have you in there?" she asked.
"I can't help him when the spirit is in the way. I might help you."
"I don't need help right now, Cole," she said.
"You do too. More walls must burn again, and soon."
"Okay," she sighed, "Well you did help. With the door. So thank you."
He waited a second, looking at her blankly from under his stringy blond hair, and then finally he turned to leave. She knocked on the door again, listening to the silence on the other side.
"Anders?" she called.
Still getting no response, she finally pulled the latch open and peeked inside. It was dark, with only a dim glow of the evening light casting out from behind the drawn drapes. She grabbed a lantern out of the hall, and walked quietly into his room.
The dome of light revealed his bare back nestled among the blankets and pillows of his bed. He was face down, hair splayed out in a mess of golden tangles. She set the lantern on an open spot of his overburdened table, and then crossed the room to seat herself on the floor beside the bed, bringing her face level with his. His back and arms were littered with the criss crossing of scars and marks of a lifetime of fighting.
"Anders?" she called quietly. He seemed to be lost somewhere inside some very dark corner of himself. This couldn't have been from all the days of meetings and, well, whatever else he was doing. Could it? Or was it something else? From the small sliver of his face that peeked out of his hair, she saw the crimson brown of a partly opened eye looking dully out at her.
"What happened?" she asked him. This person before her seemed nothing at all like the Anders she had spent a day with not very long ago.
He watched her for several heartbeats, and then his purple lid drooped back closed. She let his emotions come fully into her, and felt a thick, acidic despair creep under her skin and settle itself right in her center. Comforting him while in the fit of a debilitating depression was probably technically outside the scope of her duties, she realized, but if she wasn't there, trying to say or do something, she had little doubt he would just let himself continue to waste away. Even if she hadn't felt her heartstrings being strummed by his obvious pain, how could she just sit by and let him starve himself?
She reached a hand out and laid it gently on his arm, and his eye opened again. Then she reconsidered, feeling that wasn't enough, and moved it up to his head and began to softly stroke and caress his hair, feeling the aching sensation that was rippling through her core begin to ease slightly. But her chest had begun to feel heavy and her breathing labored, weighed down with a forlorn anguish that was not her own, and finally she took a deep breath and pushed it all back out of her, erecting her psychic barrier again. She sighed. It was all familiar to her; she herself had been in the same place he was now in many times.
"Anders," she sighed, "You haven't left the room all day. If this is how you would try to kill yourself, it is not a very good plan. You had to know I'd feel no choice but to come in here for you."
His eye flicked open again and watched her warily.
"I didn't. I didn't know that." he whispered, staring blankly at her. "Besides, no one asked you here. And you don't have to stay."
"But I do," she said, meeting his gaze and not looking away.
"I want to help." she whispered as she moved her face in close, "I understand…. this. I have done this before too."
He swallowed audibly and lay there for a minute, completely still but eyes burning up at her. She continued to gently stroke the silky strands of his hair. It was much lighter than she expected it to be, and had the slight stick of collected oils from days without bathing, but it was cool and soft, and felt good sliding through her fingers.
She waited, not knowing what else to say. What else was there to say? She immediately regretted not making a softer case for her coming, but she felt like she was floundering, feeling completely unpracticed in the art of giving comfort. No one had ever comforted her when she was sinking down into the depths of her own darkness. She had no model to refer to for how to behave when on the other side.
Maybe just being there would help, she hoped. Just make her presence felt, so he knew he wasn't alone. She rested her head on his mattress and decided to stay quiet and let her fingers do all the soothing.
She woke when she felt the surface under her begin to shift and shake, and she lifted her head off the side of his mattress to see him sitting up. It was full dark outside and the lantern was burning low and dim, about to run out of oil. She rubbed at the crick in her neck and kicked her legs straight, trying to restore circulation to her feet. Looking up to meet Anders' eyes, she saw that he still appeared weary and drained, despite his full day of sleep. He was definitely much thinner, and like his back there were a surprising number of scars on his shoulders and chest, aside from the large smooth one at the base of his neck. Somehow she had a hard time really picturing him in battle. He just seemed so…. kind? Her eyes fell upon numerous scarred rings encircling both of his wrists, ghosts of some cruel bindings from a past capture. It brought crashing back the truth of who really was in the room with her. The reviled, complicated figure from the books and stories, and the apostate responsible for one of the biggest acts of insurrection in the history of the Andrastian Chantry. Over the two weeks that he had been there, she had managed to separate that fact away from the attractive figure who warmed the room beside hers, whose voice she heard through the wall.
She opened herself back up for a moment and felt that while he was still filled with the heavy aching, it had lessened somewhat. She was slightly unnerved by her unfiltered access to his emotions. She could remember no other person in her life whose feelings she could allow to spill into her at will. Despite the small amount of time they had spent together, there seemed to be some real metaphysical connection between them. She didn't know how else to explain it. Plus, she had found herself thinking of him surprisingly often over the days, and had spent an embarrassing amount of time milling about in the library or kitchen hoping to steal a glance of him whenever possible.
She picked up the plate of food from his bedside table and sat it in front of him. It was only bread, cheese and some fruit, but she knew that unless he kept a store of food somewhere in his quarters, he could not have eaten at all that day. Then she stood and looked around the room, trying to get an idea of how else to be useful.
"I'll make us some tea," she said as she rushed toward the fireplace, and hung the heavy iron kettle, looking about for matches to start a fire.
"Wine. Is there wine? Or perhaps whiskey? Somewhere," he asked, his voice coming out in a rasp.
"Um. I would have to go get us some," she told him. "I can do that. If you'll eat first." She turned and walked back to the bed, sitting herself on the edge.
"Please. Eat." She said.
"What do you care if I eat?" he asked softly. The words stung a little. But she realized she probably had not given him much reason to believe she cared before that night.
"No, I'm sorry, I shouldn't say that," he said and then looked down. "You're being very kind. Thank you."
"Would you… like to talk?" she asked.
He sighed heavily.
"You wanted to be friends," she said. "Let's become friends. Now that you're not in yet another meeting and have the time. If you still want to, that is."
His distant eyes met hers, and he gave an almost imperceptible nod. She nudged the plate and he picked up a piece of apple and took a small bite.
"Okay," he said quietly. "Tell me about yourself."
She felt a trill of anxiety rush through her, prickling her arms. She hated telling people about her past. Often it made them look at her even more strangely than they did when they found out about the clairvoyance. She had learned all sorts of methods for deflecting questions and redirecting the spotlight when under scrutiny, so usually she could avoid talking about it. But he'd had a hard life of his own. Maybe he wouldn't look at her strange if she told him some things. She searched her brain and had no idea where to begin.
"What would you like to know?" she asked.
"Well… for starters," he began, "What is your favorite color?"
She gave a soft laugh, "Okay. Um… green."
"Hm. Green is good. Mine is red," he said.
"Red and green. I believe those are complementary. Across from each other on the color spectrum. Just like spirit and entropy,"
"Hm, That is interesting" he nodded. "Except reversed again. Red, the color of blood, should probably belong to the entropic, while green to the healer. Sort of how you should be light and I should be dark, but we're not."
"Why would you assume I should be light?"
"Well," Anders began quietly, raising an eyebrow, "what have you done that's so terrible? Could it really be worse than what I've done?"
"I have done enough." she said. "It is interesting though that the healer enjoys the color of blood."
"Perhaps. But… it reminds me of someone," he said, his eyes going distant again.
Right, she thought. Maybe that lost love Cole had mentioned. She felt a tiny spark of inexplicable jealousy, which she angrily smothered out. She wondered if she should tell him that this love of his would be coming to Skyhold soon. At least according to Cole.
"I have been… where you were today. Unable to get out of bed. Depressed."
"Depressed barely covers it."
"I know. I just… want you to know that I do understand. And… you can come to me, if you need to. To talk. Or need help."
"You mean that?" he asked warily. "You… haven't really shown much interest in speaking to me."
"You have been very busy. You must have a lot to offer the Inquisition for them to be down here so often."
He sighed, "Less than they would like, I'm afraid. I'm beginning to think they just want to make me suffer a bit, however they can, even if that means not giving me a moment to myself."
"It seems to be working," she said.
"Yes, unfortunately it is," he answered, "not that I needed their help with that."
She was running her eyes along the scar at his neck again, or as much of it she could see from under the messy waves of his sunkissed hair. How it had not killed him before he, or someone, had been able to heal it was a wonder. Whatever sword had done that must have been very large, and wielded with quite a heavy hand.
"I got it from a man who was trying to stop me from hurting someone I loved," he said as he followed her eyes. "These, too" he said pointing to two long, parallel scars that marred his taut stomach, just below his ribs.
"These were her actually. They're really the only thing I have left to remember her by," he gave a sad laugh as he looked down and ran his fingertips along the shiny markings. His skin still held the last vestiges of its golden tan, and as she inspected the flecks and trails of past injuries, she also took in all the other details of his body. He was slender and toned, strong looking but not overly muscled. An even dusting of coppery hairs traveled from the center of his chest down into the front of his breeches. Despite his recent weight loss, he was still well proportioned, if a bit wiry.
"Why were you trying to hurt her?" she asked.
"It was Justice, or, I guess Vengeance. They're sort of different. We'd been fighting Templars, and Vengeance doesn't seem to distinguish between enemies and friends," he said.
"He can't even recognize someone you love?"
He shook his head and looked at her pointedly, gravely.
"You were right before, about my not drinking. Normally I don't," he offered. "I have done it many times with no problems, but if something… unexpected were to come up, it would be much harder for me to stay in control."
He stopped a moment, finishing the last of the bread on the plate.
"But you… seemed to stop Justice that first night," he said cautiously. "That was just using a disorientation spell?"
Selise nodded. She hadn't been afraid of Justice then, other than at his attracting unwanted attention. Though Cole had been afraid, which she found curious. She had actually experienced a bit of a thrill when she saw the change of his eyes. She felt the depth of his power then, in the hum that rattled her bones and the energy that filled the air. And she saw the sacrifice he had made, to allow another being to share everything about himself. She'd felt a little bit in awe. Possibly even slightly aroused.
Anders stood and walked to the center of the room.
"Come do it on me again. I want to feel what it's like without Justice in the way," he asked her. "I only knew a few in the Circle who used entropy spells, and they never seemed very good with them."
She stood tentatively and went to stand before him. She felt a little overwhelmed at the request to put her hands on his golden skin, which was radiating a decidedly pleasant and very male scent. Her complete lack of experience with men was making itself known to her, inciting her heart to race and her fingers to tremble.
"Just be gentle," he asked with a pleasant curl of his lips and crinkle of his weary eyes. She felt a flutter down in the pit of her stomach, but was glad to see him smile, however slight and tired it might have been. Part of her was starting to regret coming to his door, allowing him to have such an effect on her, an effect which could only be detrimental to her Keeper post. But another part of her was certain that she had to come. There was no way she could have allowed him to continue to waste away in here.
"Okay," she whispered and she placed the palm of her hand on the warm skin of his chest, feeling a sharp thrill race down her spine and collect in her knees. She inhaled a breath of mana and gave a light push of the disorienting spell.
He staggered back and his eyes went from the warm pools of rusty earth, to wide, blank and searching as they looked around and grasped for something familiar to land upon. But they did not seem to find anything. His jaw went slack like he might want to say something, but instead he turned to take a step toward the table that held the lantern, then stopped again. He took another two steps and looked around the room suspiciously for several seconds. Then, sensing her there behind him, he turned again to face her.
"Hello," he said, his purple rimmed eyes holding a question that he couldn't quite find the words to articulate.
She stood and waited. It should be dawning on him soon where he was. She had cast the spell as weakly as she could, in order to ensure that it only lasted a few seconds.
"Hello?" he asked again insistently, as if wondering if she heard him. He swallowed, blinking hard at the space around him, waiting for her response. But she only waited too, watching for the glimmers of realization to creep into his eyes.
And then they did; the confusion drained way and the memory of his request spread across his face as he looked around at the room and then back at her. His lips curled into a a little half smile.
"Oh, right," he said softly, knowingly, "Hello."
"Hello," she responded warmly.
"Well that was interesting," he remarked as he looked around the room again. "And that's what you did to make Justice go away?"
She nodded.
"How much worse can that get? Obviously you went very easy on me."
"Much worse," she said simply.
"And what else can you do?"
"Let's see, I can weaken, paralyze, strip you of your resistances and accuracy, fill your mind with horrible visions that will haunt you for the rest of your life, and make you go to sleep."
"Oh, lovely," he said pleasantly. "I could use a bit of that last one."
"Really? You seemed to have no problem sleeping on your own today," she answered, feeling a light euphoria spreading through her at his reaction to her magic. It was a very far cry from the usual dismissal or derision that she was used to, even within the Circle. It certainly wasn't the same thing as throwing a bolt of lightning, erecting a wall of ice or firing up a shield of protective energy.
"You have me there," he said. "And entropy is all you can do?"
"I have been able to produce a little bit of fire on a few occasions. But I don't control it well."
"Well, you've no need for fire if I'm around," he said with a tone that sounded almost flirtatious, "I can take care of that for you. But if you… are really able to subdue Justice when I get out of control… then that… changes everything." He paused, and his eyes deepened, reawakening that fluttering deep inside her.
"It remains to be seen of course whether it would work on Vengeance. He is a different beast entirely. I hope you never meet him."
"I hope I do," she said before she could stop herself.
"You might think that, but you don't. Vengeance has taken more from me than I could have ever imagined. He may be completely impervious to your spells, as he seems to be with everything else."
"I am not afraid of monsters. I have known many of my own. I was raised by one."
Anders said nothing, only held her gaze unflinchingly for several heartbeats. The moment stretched too long and Selise pulled her eyes away, casting them back down to the floor. Somewhere inside, she winced. This was not what she was supposed to be doing, she reminded herself. Her resolve to remain dutiful and a good soldier for the Inquisition seemed have to withdrawn from under her without her even noticing.
But had she even done anything wrong? She wasn't even sure she had. It had become harder and harder to avoid his eyes, to avoid sharing parts of her with him. The comfort, the ease with which certain words were tumbling from her lips was so…. Foreign. No, it couldn't have been right. And yet, she had no desire to leave.
"So," he said finally, "how about that whiskey?"
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
She eased herself through the open door of his room holding a half full bottle. He'd gulped a bunch of water to try to rid himself of the pounding in his head, then put on a shirt and and tidied up his bed. If he was going to have a beautiful girl in here drinking with him, he should at least make the place more presentable, he figured.
"This is all I could find. I think it might be Varric's. I figured since you and he are friends he might not be as angry about it disappearing?" she said as she tiptoed back into the center of his room.
Despite the dramatic improvement in his mood since she had picked her way in, he still felt heavy all over and probably could have just continued to sleep straight through another night and day if allowed. But he was up now, feeling able to at least act normal for the moment and also slightly energized by the possibility of a way to knock Justice out of control. Not to mention the tiny fact of his growing attraction to her. Plus, Selise had looked genuinely concerned when she looked at him, and she was being so uncharacteristically sweet. It was enough that he decided he would get out of bed, he would talk, he would eat, he would keep breathing, for now. He would do all those things for her, if for no other reason. And, he really liked that she hadn't allowed a locked door to get in her way of checking on him. It was yet another thing that reminded him of Hawke.
And he did feel better, here immersed within the calm, understanding pool of her presence. Somehow he could tell that she really did see him and know his pain. She wasn't fawning over him, wasn't making insincere platitudes about silver linings or being thankful for what you have. She was simply there with him, distracting him with conversation and letting him hurt but at least not doing so alone.
He lit the fireplace and found two glasses, then sat on the floor in front of the flickering flames and patted the spot next to him. She padded over, barefoot again, and folded herself into place on the floor beside him. She barely made a sound when she moved, seeming so slight and wispy somehow despite her perfectly average size. The flames of the fire made her grey eyes look gold, and she had started casting her eyes down to the floor anytime she caught him looking at her, which he was doing more and more. He found her timidity — or maybe it was simple inexperience — charming, yet knew that when pushed she would probably be as fierce as anything he had ever seen. Why else would Leliana and Fiona let her be his Keeper, and with so little supervision? They must truly have thought her powerful to assign her to handle him by herself. The thought almost made him shiver.
"If this is Varric's, then it should be decent," he said as he inspected the bottle and laced the glass with an icy chill in order to cool its contents. He was a bit nervous imbibing in the hard stuff, something he avoided most of the time, but he needed to get out of himself. He was tired of all the reproachful words and stares of the advisers streaming in and out of his room, particularly Commander Cullen, who could barely hold in his disdain. Anders retained a grudging respect for the Templar despite that fact, since the man had fought on the same side as him in Kirkwall, and now seemed to accept that mages were to be given the very rights and freedoms that he had once worked to deny them. He was a study in evolving views, exactly what Anders hoped for among all Templars. But Cullen's tone and choice of words frequently had the ability to effortlessly, inadvertently shame him, eviscerating him down to his core without even trying. He understood that Cullen was a faithful man, still devoted to the Chantry if not the Order, and had personally been devastated at the events in Kirkwall, but even allowing him that, Cullen's words still somehow bit him to the bone. And Leliana, as a former cloistered sister and right hand of the divine, was cold and ruthless in her pursuit of information. She at least was able to maintain an attempt at diplomacy, but she still managed to fill him with an icy chill during her visits. He wasn't exactly expecting a warm welcome from any of the Inquisition, but day after day of being reminded of how hated he was, how lucky he was not to be suffering the more gruesome punishment that he unquestionably deserved was taking its toll.
Not to mention the fact that how busy they were keeping him had made it impossible to learn anymore about the Seeker. As with so much of his life, he was left waiting, hoping for his chance to strike, not knowing when it would come.
But there was a bright spot in the whole situation. If Selise truly was able hand him control of his body again after Justice took over, and that whole thing on the battlements wasn't just a fluke, then that opened up a whole new world of possibilities. Especially if he could manage to keep her by his side.
He filled her glass first and she slammed back a gulp without a wince. He raised an eyebrow at her while he filled his own.
"Let me guess, you could probably drink me under the table," he asked. She looked over at him with her eyes sparkling.
"Probably," she answered matter of factly.
"So where were we? Oh yes… we were going to be talking about you, weren't we? Okay, so your favorite color is green. And… let's see, where did you grow up?" he asked. Instead of answering she took the bottle from his hand, filled her glass again and drank deeply.
"My family had land just outside of West Hill. North of Lake Calenhad." she finally answered.
"And when were you sent to the Circle?" he asked.
"Not until I was 18," she answered and he choked a little bit on his sip of whiskey. She watched him with concern until he'd fully cleared his airway of the liquid.
"Be still my heart! A fellow apostate!" he declared.
"Well yes, but not by choice," she said. "And I only spent three years in the Circle, and then I was… recruited into other pursuits."
"How did they finally find you?"
"I went to them myself," she said, sighing heavily. "I had no where else to go."
He cleared his throat, trying to blink back the surprise, and the desire to ask her what on earth she had been thinking.
"But Selise, at 18 you could have gone anywhere," he said instead.
"I wanted to learn how to control my magic. My mother was dead, I didn't know any other family. My father had only taught me so much, and I spent much of my time at home locked in my room."
"He is the monster who raised you then?" Anders asked gently.
She nodded. "He was a Templar," she said and Anders took in a sharp breath. "Well, a former Templar anyway. With a particularly virile hatred of mages, including me."
"Yet he kept you from the Circle? To what end?"
"My abilities were too useful to him for him to give me up. He and my brother would take me places and have me… assist in the questioning of other mages. He particularly liked the horror spell. It got him all sorts of answers. Not to mention the locations of valuable goods. He made me…. torture them. The rest of the time my mana was stripped and I was kept locked away," she sighed, eyes going dark. "Forgive me, but can we save the rest of this story for another time?" she asked, appearing pale, "Or at least perhaps until after I have had a few more glasses."
"Of course," he whispered, realizing his heart was racing and his blood was on fire. "May I ask you one more question, and then you won't have to speak of it ever again."
She flashed a nervous look at him, but gave him a small nod.
"What happened to him? And your brother?"
"They are dead. An accident by everyone else's account."
"Good. That is what I was hoping to hear."
"They died screaming," she volunteered, her eyes beginning to look glassy, whether from the whiskey or the memories Anders could not tell.
"That's even better," he said softly.
He tried to dampen out the fury that was coursing through him, taking deep breaths until he felt himself calm down.
He refilled their glasses and took a deep drink, staring into the fire. Finally, his body was beginning to feel light again, and loose. He rolled the tension out of his shoulders and exhaled a deep sigh of relief as the whiskey did its work in rolling the knots out of his soul, even if only temporarily. And then he looked back to Selise. Her eyes were locked into a vacant stare, her mind existing somewhere far away. He had the urge to run the back of his fingers down her milky cheek and into the flesh of her neck to see if it was as soft as it looked. How he longed for the touch of a warm body again, preferably someone who might actually care about him. To be a beacon of love among the sea of eyes that looked at him with hatred. He wondered what her kisses felt like. Her lips met in a delectable bow-shaped curve, he observed, and her upper lip pouted out slightly more than her lower one.
Her eyes flicked over to him and he had no doubt he'd just been caught sizing up her mouth. He cleared his throat again and looked away, letting his hair fall into his face enough to obscure the blush creeping up his cheeks.
"So, change of subject then?" she asked gently.
He looked over to her and gave a small smile.
"When would you like to start working in the garden?"
"Whenever you're ready to spend a night out under the stars with me," he answered.
"You can come get me any time," she said.
His slight smiled widened and he turned his eyes back to the crackling fire.