Disclaimer: I own absolutely and completely nothing. Bioware has that particular pleasure.

Summary: A City-Elf/Bann Teagan collection of drabbles and one-shots based on a prompt table from an LJ-community. These will be more or less in chronological order with the faintest traces of added plot here and there. Will vary from drabble length to one-shot.

Author's note: dearest gods, Isolde must be my pain and curse. I'm not too sure this came out as I wanted x.x aish, damn woman.

In this chapter: To apologize without understanding is to lie.

010.

He does not like waiting. He does not like sitting around with little to do – even though organizing an army and keeping a whole village safe and working is hardly nothing in anyone's standards. Little work makes him think in all the wrong things which occupy his life nowadays and he does not like that either. Eamon still sleeps away, lost in a nightmare no one can touch and both waiting and thinking seem to be all Redcliffe is capable of doing. From noble to thief, merchant to priest, lives do not move forward, eyes spend every day on the road as if the Grey Wardens will suddenly waltz in with a miracle cure on their hands. So far, sitting by the road and looking at the entrance of the village isn't bearing fruits.

Teagan has taken to wait by his brother's window instead, eyes fixed upon that very entrance. He likes that window. Always a lovely view, magical simply because it had once been forbidden. He can still feel the stone on his hands as he climbed to the shield, the fresh air on his face as he perched himself above the cliff and stared down and away, all those lands which he didn't know and dreamed about. His father disliked it as much as the boy loved it. Now, grown and wiser, Teagan can recognize fear as well as any other. There is also no one to tell him what to do or to be careful anymore. Depressing thought.

Hours pass slowly nowadays, even when he is working. In that room is even worse. They drag on, making him feel each second and he prefers it. Alone, he can stare at his brother's face in silence, count each breath, reassure himself there is still time before anything else happens. The healer's words – spoken every six hours or so – do much less than this physical assurance.

"You should eat."

Another sign time has passed enters the room with little warning. Isolde is still beautiful, almost untouched by the years, small traces of white beginning to touch her brown hair and faint lines marring her face. The clothes are slightly larger for her body – she has lost weight – slightly more make-up on her cheeks. Concealing dark smudges, most probably. His sister-in-law conceals so much, so well. She conceals too much.

"Here. Do eat, brother." She smiles, sitting in front of him, white hands fluttering in activity and no distress appears in her features as she moves to serve tea without need for a reply. It is easier to ignore he has given her no reply, both to her address or to the food he doesn't wish. Everything seems normal this way – and Eamon breathes, Connor is safe so there are no worries plaguing her. Everything can be normal.

"Teagan? Teagan, are you listening?" Chattering away, the woman does that at times, in one ear, out the other. "You should eat, I have not seen you eating since… well, I know not since when."

He shakes his head, accepting without a smile, consenting without a word before turning to the window and the road which remains vacant. It bothers her, anyone who has the slightest acquaintance with her would notice. And Teagan is a noble. He was raised to be a gentleman, taught by a mother who tried hard once his father disappeared, someone who spent hours to no end drilling him into social pretences when all he wanted was a sword and maybe a real horse to replace a wooden one. Boys can frown and show dislike, grown man are supposed to accept everything with a smile and a nod. Isolde never saw his anger, he has learned long before she does not need his uglier side. Even now, she does not see it, blatant and obvious as it is.

"Are you well?" she asks prodding his attention, forcing herself into his thoughts as if she is not there already. She should not do this. Dear Maker, Isolde should ignore him because when he does not work, he thinks. When he thinks, he worries. When he worries, he remembers past actions and is angry. He is angry with her, that little ugly side grows and agrees, sings into his ear all the recriminations he could say but doesn't. It raises and pushes and Teagan fights back, smothers it before words can. A smile and a nod, nothing else. "Teagan. Teagan, please?"

Please? Please what, he wonders. To tell her what is wrong will lead to shouting. To speak to her about this will make his scabs tear and bleed, rub salt on the newly opened wounds. To speak is to realize there is hurt and unspoken problems between them. To say anything now will be to harm her in return. He cannot be that cruel.

"Teagan. I'm…"

"Stop." The china falls from her hands and shatters on the floor without warning. The window loses his attention with a sole word. "Do not finish that sentence."

Determined, strong and stubborn, this is Isolde. His ideal had been something so similar, beautiful and caring – which she is – honest, gentle, giving – and that she isn't, not completely. This woman in front of him is Eamon's Isolde not his. She is giving but those who matter to her always come first. She is honest but not always, that is whispered by her Orlesian blood and all the games she was raised into. Gentle, most of the times. Her lip curls when annoyed. A sharp gaze is enough to know there is steel beneath her bones, hidden well by a lady-like manner cultivated since birth. She is a good woman but she is not an ideal and she does not see.

"It is fine," the man tells her simply. "I understand." Teagan doesn't and he is lying but he smiles and nods, watches her face relax and breathing ease as she believes his act. Isolde always closes her eyes to his uglier side. He can flaunt it in her face, hide it behind kind words and she will still be blind to it. She doesn't ask more than necessary and she believes.

He could tell her. He could explain that she cannot apologize because she does not see him, her actions, hurt nor shame – hide, lie, back away, pull away, ignore, betray. Isolde cannot see he would still have come if she had trusted him, if she had told him the truth. If she had just been a little less herself, known him a little more, the woman would have remembered he would have protected both brother and nephew with a sword pointed at his heart. There can be no forgiveness without knowledge or regret.

So he cannot tell her and he lies, protects her in his brother's stead, someone who would have no wish to let her perjure herself further.

Time has passed, Teagan concludes, and Isolde isn't beautiful anymore. Pretty but not beautiful.

Note: Prompt 010 (Pretty) from Troyed community table of prompts.