"You're being very selfish."
Leliana's frequent, condemning words echoed in Cassandra's ears over the next days, all the more damning because they were so correct. Each repetition brought more shame, until she resolved that she would do her duty. Cullen would know that she was going, and they would part on whatever terms they could find. With Andraste's grace, perhaps they would even be good terms. Maybe Cullen would still let her feel loved, even as she let him down.
And she would turn into a nug and fly away.
Still, she wasn't a coward, and she did love this man in her sad, inadequate way. She wouldn't slink off and leave him to pain, even though the separation would lead him to a new love as surely as it had all the rest. It didn't matter. She would tell him the truth.
If only he wouldn't make it so difficult.
She couldn't tell him when he brought a bundle of small wildflowers to her room one muggy afternoon. Where he'd found them he never said, but he settled her on the bed and watched her weave them into her braid with tender eyes. While she worked the last strands, he kissed her neck and drifted his hands across her body in easy caresses, and when she was done he turned her to face him and pronounced her perfect. With tear-bright eyes he made love to her inside warm sunlight until her heart was too full for words.
She couldn't tell him when they were in Kirkwall, examining the progress of the new Chantry. The construction was going nicely, and several citizens were there to exclaim over the decorative columns and airy rooms. An older couple approached her, shyly, and asked her to perform their marriage ceremony as the Right Hand. They'd both lost their spouses in the war for the city, but they'd found new comfort in each other. Leliana usually performed the marriages, and her the death rites, but Cassandra couldn't turn their earnest faces away. She faced them in the half-completed assembly and said the words that would bind them together with as much gallant ceremony as she could summon. Cullen stood behind them as witness, stern and imposing in his armor. Or he would have been, if his gaze hadn't been so softly amused.
She couldn't tell him when they were in his office, sorting through stacks of ancient paperwork. The place was almost looking like a true Knight-Commander's seat instead of the annex of a library, and despite his protests that she shouldn't have to do his job, she saw the relief on his face at every disappearing pile.
She couldn't tell him when they were dining, and his hand brushed her own under the table. She couldn't tell him when she was curled up next to him in the night, skin still tingling from the pleasure he'd wrung from her willing body. She couldn't tell him when they were in the training yard, sparring and laughing while the sweat rolled down their backs. She couldn't tell him when he emerged from another meeting with Kirkwall's elite with a new set of lines around his mouth. She couldn't tell him when he grinned at her with a light in his eyes that was never there for anyone else.
As the days went on, she began to worry she couldn't tell him at all.
Two days before they were set to leave she came back from a final visit to Aveline and Varric, not that they knew that, to find an at-attention Templar waiting for her at the dock. She climbed out of the boat with newly sure feet, half-concerned and half-amused at the formality. "You don't need to salute me, Knight-Captain."
"The Knight-Commander ordered me to bring you to his office immediately upon your return, Lady Seeker." If not for the movement of his mouth, he might as well have been a statue.
Her heart stopped. "Did something happen with the mages? Is he injured?"
"No, Seeker."
Though she waited, he didn't elaborate, and she frowned as she followed him up the stairs and into the cramped spaces of the Gallows once more.
Cullen didn't smile when she entered the room, and Cassandra tried to remember if that had ever happened before. "That will be all, Captain," he said. His voice was the even, detached voice of a soldier, a tone she hadn't heard since that very first day they'd met. She shivered.
As soon as the door closed he stood and walked around the front of his desk and leaned on it as he eyed her. His fingers gripped the edge of the wood lightly, and she saw they were trembling in anger. "I spoke to Leliana while you were away. She asked me if I'd made arrangements for your departure. In two days." The weight of his gaze was like a blade on her throat. "She seemed shocked I didn't know of it."
Of course she seemed shocked, thought Cassandra through her fear. She made a mental note to reprimand the interfering Left Hand, but right now Cullen's carefully blank face commanded all of her attention. "Cullen, I -"
"Why didn't you tell me?"
The broken whisper cut through her cleanly, and she couldn't speak.
He swallowed heavily. "I knew you'd have to go, eventually. You have duties that aren't here, important ones. I'm not an idiot. Our relationship couldn't stay like this forever, no matter how much I was enjoying it. I knew the future would be messy," he said. His knuckles whitened where they held the desk. "But I was sure there would be one. You were so kind. I'd stopped thinking. I'd forgotten that you'd fought a dragon to save a village."
His eyes never left her face, and only long years of hiding her emotions kept her impassive. "Were you just going to leave?" he asked. "Go to Kirkwall one day and never come back? Have I been so overbearing that you thought that was the only way to be rid of me?"
"No," she said, startled.
She might as well not have spoken. "I thought it was your deliberate nature that kept you from declarations of, well, of love. I thought… Cassandra, why didn't you tell me you don't care for me?"
Her mouth dropped open as she understood the shape of his pain. Not rage but sadness. Hatred of himself instead of her. His hands trembling in grief instead of anger. "I do care for you," she said, confused.
"Of course you do, in the usual way. You're a good person," he said. "But not like - " Cullen broke off and shook his head. "I left you no choice but to go along. I pushed and demanded and confessed until you couldn't do anything else. We've only known each other a few weeks, but I've treated you like you were bound to me for life. I don't blame you for running."
Cassandra's heart broke at the defeat in his voice.
"I thought about just letting you go," he said softly. "I thought about it all morning. It would have been easier. But I couldn't. I can't. I know that I'm difficult to manage. I know I'm too serious. I know that I have things in my past that make me impossible to accept romantically. I understand that you have to distance yourself from me that way. But will you consider coming back? When you feel ready? Or even writing?" He finally looked at the floor. "I won't show you anything but friendship. I swear it on Andraste's name."
It was exactly the outcome she'd been wanting, but this was backwards and wrong. She was supposed to be the villain, not him. She was the villain.
The persistent fog in her mind lifted at the thought, and it freed her to act. To speak. The unvarnished truth, that she'd came only with the intention of an affair, that she'd let him love her because she enjoyed the attention, that she'd waded in too deeply and was leaving because she was a coward and a seductress and left men in pain to pay back her own emptiness. That her vanity was the only thing she truly loved. A truth, and one that even she hadn't known until this moment.
She stepped towards him, opening her mouth, and his face grew panicked. "No! Stay back."
The memory of nightmares scored his face, and it comforted her to know that he must have some anger towards her, somewhere, to be so afraid he would hurt her. Not that she was afraid. Cullen was a better man than she deserved.
She kept walking until she was close enough to touch him. Her fingers grazed his cheek, and he flinched. "Cullen, you're more beautiful than you'll ever know."
"You don't have to say that," he said. "I'm not asking for that."
But she ignored him, instead studying his face. A strong jaw framing a mouth meant for smiling that smiled far too little. Eyes that saw the world clearly and himself not at all. Skin pale and unmarked, a sign of a man who took care of himself too well physically and not enough mentally. A brow that was creased, but not as lined as it could be for all that. They combined into a whole that was simply good, without ceasing, and she wondered what it would be to feel so effortless in her morality.
She would likely never know, and she took a deep breath to steady the shame of who she was. He'd seen her naked, but this would be true exposure, and the loss of his regard would be a deep, deserved pain. The office around them, with its still-present piles of paper, seemed to be waiting eagerly for her confession, an echoing memory of the mages who'd come before. Waiting for their own punishments when they'd failed in control.
And then her eyes widened as she saw a new way.
"I know I don't have to say it," she said, "but I must, if you insist on rushing along to the wrong conclusions."
His face twitched into a faint smile, and she traced it with her thumb. "I did not hide my plans from you out of malice, or to escape your feelings," she said. A truth, to begin with, was always safer. "I simply could not determine the way to ask you what I needed to."
"Which was?"
"To come with us."
A shocked silence fell between them as he reached up to take her hand in his own. "Come with you? To do what?" He laughed uncomfortably. "I'm not sure what I have to offer. I've never been anything but this. I lack most of the qualifications to be a Reverend Mother, and between you and Leliana the Divine hardly has need of another bodyguard."
Cassandra thought furiously. "No, of course not. But she has need of you. To command an army."
If anything he looked more confused. "I wasn't aware the Chantry had an army."
"It doesn't. But Justinia is considering the reformation of the Inquisition."
She'd thought Cullen couldn't get any more shocked, but his eyes were so wide that she wondered if they'd ever close again. "The Inquisition?" He rubbed his temple slowly. "Can we move to the couch? I'm not sure I can follow this standing up."
They did, and once there she told him as much as she dared about the Divine's future plans. It was a horrifying breach of security, but she trusted Cullen to remain discreet. More importantly, he would be left knowing she valued him, and believing that the parting had been unthinkable from her side instead of something planned.
Of course, he wouldn't be able to leave his responsibilities. He was integral to the city and carried the lives of his men with him. He would have to decline, reluctantly, and they would part with mutual regret. After a long enough separation, with the eager ladies of Kirkwall and her own lack of visibility to aid his forgetfulness, everything would go back to normal. For both of them. It was a move worthy of Leliana herself.
She tried hard not to remember how colorless her normal had been before him.
He asked only one question. "Is this why you've been so interested in Hawke? To fill this position?"
"Andraste's flames, no," she said, horrified. "Hawke has no military experience whatsoever. But we did hope she might be the Inquisitor. A largely symbolic role, but a figure to rally around. Justinia cannot take the title without raising too much alarm, and Leliana and I are both unsuited to inspiration."
Cullen frowned. "I think you would suit quite well."
She laughed to cover up her sudden flush. "The Seekers are not seen as neutral," she said. "Hawke is."
His frown didn't lift, but he turned away to take in the state of his office. After a minute, he stood and walked to the window, the one that showed the training yard and, in the distance, the city of Kirkwall clinging to the shore like a barnacle. She held her breath, waiting for him to realize he couldn't accept.
"I have many responsibilities here," he said slowly. He didn't look at her.
"I understand," she said. And despite her plan, despite the fact that this was exactly what she wanted, a small part of her was more disappointed than she'd ever been. She rose to leave, her face appropriately melancholy, when he turned around with a sigh.
"I don't think it will be possible for me to pass them on in two days," he said. "Not properly. I'll have to join you in a few weeks. Hopefully no more than two. Will that be acceptable to the Divine?"
Words deserted her, and she only nodded dumbly. Cullen strode to his desk and started rifling through the remaining papers, muttering to himself. "I'll need to speak to the Seneschal," he said under his breath.
A knock came at the door, and a messenger stuck his head in. "The Seneschal is here to see you, Commander."
"Convenient," he said with a quick smile at her before he went back to his organizing. "The Maker works in hidden ways. Give him the usual wait, please."
The door closed, and the sound finally shook her voice loose again. "You're coming with me?"
"Of course," he said absently. "I want to be where you are, as long as I can be useful in some way."
"But what about the Gallows? The city?" She knew she was protesting too much, but she couldn't move past his easy decision to abandon his life after so short an acquaintance. No matter how intense it had been.
Cullen finally stopped moving and looked at her. "They've had me for over ten years, and they've used me well. But I never intended to stay here so long. I just didn't have anywhere else to go. Until now," he said. He bit his lip. "Did you really think I'd care about this job more than you?"
She didn't know what to say, and he took her silence for confirmation. He stepped softly over the stone tiles and caught her in a strong hug. "Never. You're beyond important to me. I only wish you'd asked me earlier. I've been trying to find something for you to do here, something worthy of you, for days. I never thought you'd have something for me."
"Neither did I," she said honestly.
When he laughed and kissed her, she responded to the heat in it while her mind turned and her heart flew in a thousand directions. Terror. Joy. Anticipation. Disbelief. Eagerness. Lust. She hadn't known it was possible to feel so many emotions at the same time. He leaned back with a broad grin. "I hope there are no rules against fraternization in this Inquisition," he said. "Because I intend to be very familiar with one of its founders."
"Justinia will appreciate your attentions," she said vaguely. "She enjoys the flirtations of handsome men." She could think of nothing else to say. This plan would have worked for Leliana, somehow. And yet his arms around her felt like an extension of her own self.
Cullen glared at her, though it was marred by his persistent smile, and she gave in to the side of her that insisted on joy. When the hapless messenger walked in with the Seneschal, they found the city's Knight-Commander entangled with his visiting Seeker in such a way that neither of them would be fit to step foot inside a Chantry for weeks. The Seneschal in particular seemed unamused at their ardor as they unwound themselves.
She tried to apologize, but Cullen only gave her another searing, demanding kiss that set butterflies dancing within her. "Go tell Leliana," he whispered. "I'll come find you later." He nudged her towards the door and turned to the red-haired man who was still wearing a disapproving frown. "Senschal Bran. We need to talk."
Cassandra wandered into Leliana's room without knocking, and a distant part of her took delight in the way the bard rolled off of her royal lover with an annoyed squeal. By the remnants of their clothing, they weren't exactly in the middle of things, but they were well on their way. It served them both right.
Aedan gave her a casual wave and placed his hands behind his head while Leliana pulled on the nearest shirt to hand. It turned out to be the king's, and he smiled appreciatively at the sight even as Leliana glared at them both. "Cassandra! What in the Maker's holy name are you doing?"
"I've asked Cullen to be the Commander."
"He already is the Commander," said Aedan, puzzled.
Cassandra didn't enlighten him, but Leliana's glare fell away immediately. Her eyes gleamed. "You didn't," she said. Cassandra looked down in response, and Leliana clapped her hands. "You did! Did he accept?"
"He did," said Cassandra miserably.
Leliana's grin widened. "Wasn't that going to be your job?"
"It was."
"So I suppose now you'll just lay about, expecting all of us to do your work for you," said Leliana, shaking her head. "At least Cullen won't mind. Is he coming with us directly?"
A stone was settling deeper and deeper in the pit of Cassandra's stomach, crushing many of the butterflies that still danced against her will. "No. He'll be in Haven two weeks after us. Approximately."
"So soon! Well, at least we won't have to find a separate room for him," said Leliana.
Cassandra kicked a nearby chair. "This is unhelpful."
"I'm not trying to be helpful. I'm trying to gloat."
Aedan laughed. "That's my girl," he said. "But would someone like to clue me in on what's happening?"
"I can't," said Leliana cheerfully. "Cassandra may tell handsome, muscular men all of our Divine's secrets, but I'm less susceptible to your charms."
"Is that so?" asked Aedan. He sat up and wrapped his arms around the bard's waist, pulling her close His lips found her neck and kissed a slow trail to her ear. "I'm not sure you're aware of how charming I can be, when properly motivated."
"Aedan," said Leliana in a warning voice, but her eyes were closed, and Cassandra noticed wryly that she wasn't exactly fighting him away. "All you need to know is," she started, before breaking off with a hissing breath as Aedan's teeth pulled at her earlobe.
Cassandra glared. "I am right here, you know."
"I don't mind if you watch," said Aedan easily before going back to his business. "I'm a very good teacher."
Leliana sighed and leaned into him, reverting to his original question. "All you need to know is that Cassandra and Cullen will be together permanently, thanks to me."
"It will never be permanent! How long will his regard survive outside of these walls? I will never hold him, once he's seen all the world offers," said Cassandra, trying to keep her voice steady. She threw a nearby shirt at her friend, which she deftly caught even with her attention almost fully on the man running his hands over her. She hardly seemed to be listening, and Cassandra growled, "If not for your interference, none of this would be happening."
"I know. Aren't I amazing?" said Leliana. She smiled impishly, then giggled as Aedan murmured something in her ear.
Cassandra gave up and whirled back to the door with a grunt. Perhaps there would be people for her to hit in the courtyard.
"Do you want him there?" There was no more joviality in Leliana's voice.
"I don't know," she said, her hand on the knob.
"Justinia would say that the answer to a question of the heart is always known, even if the knowledge is not admitted."
She stared at a knot in the door's wood furiously and ignored her. That was one of the Divine's favorite expressions, and Cassandra had always hated it. She yanked the offending barricade out of the way quickly and stepped into the hall, trying not to answer in her mind even as Leliana called the question out again in her wake.
But of course she could. Justinia was right, and the knowledge was plain and strong in her heart. Cassandra wanted Cullen in Haven, so much that she was trembling with it. But the problem wasn't Haven. It was in the weeks before he arrived, when she would fade in his mind into nothing. It was that time when he would turn to another woman, and Cassandra would have to watch him love her instead.
It rained the day they left, and the rain turned to steam when it hit the heated summer stones. Cullen didn't seem to care about any of it. He stood on the dock as their trunks were loaded - he'd supervised every aspect of their departure - while Cassandra worried and tried to keep it from her face. It was odd how quickly their positions had reversed. She'd arrived full of confidence, as centered as she'd ever been, and he'd been so concerned for his future. What a difference a few weeks made.
Or a nosy bard. Leliana had declined to wait in the downpour and was patiently hiding in the nearby boathouse. Of course, the fact that Aedan had sneaked in as well, as only the best rogues could, surely had nothing to do with her desire for shelter. Aedan was staying behind with Cullen, both as a travel companion and to sell the fiction that he'd come to Kirkwall for anything but seeing the Divine's agent, and the couple had been practically glued together whenever they were alone.
Cassandra hoped whoever was sent to call them made a lot of noise before they opened the door.
She looked at the faces around her and saw she was much less popular than she'd been in her first flirtations with Cullen. The Knight-Captains looked happy enough at their pending promotions, but the lower-ranked Templars were scowling at her openly. So much for improving Templar relations, she thought. As though he'd heard her, Cullen shot her a quick grin that she returned as best she could. She tried not to focus on how his wet shirt clung to his shoulders when he stooped to grab a box.
"How much did Leliana pack?" he grunted as he manhandled the box into the boat. A much larger boat than they'd come in.
"She believes in preparation," said Cassandra. "And shopping. I, too, leave with too much."
She gestured to the three trunks - one more than she'd come with, thanks to the clothing purchased in the city - and he laughed. "I think I can manage that." He turned and pulled her to him, as he'd been doing at sudden moments ever since the night before. "I'm going to miss you," he said roughly. "Who's going to make me smile when you're so far away?"
Cassandra thought of the tea-drinking women across the harbor, just waiting for her to flee. "I'm sure someone will present herself," she said. She smiled at his doubtful look, and he sighed as he touched the scar on her cheek. He gave her such a woeful look that even her pessimism couldn't keep her from comforting him.
"You'll be too busy to miss me," she said. "It is I who will be inconsolable."
They came together again, to the coughing amusement of half of their audience, and it took a firm "Ser!" to pry them away from each other. "The transport is ready," said the disapproving Templar.
"We should go," said Leliana beside her, and Cassandra jumped. She looked over Cullen's shoulder to see Aedan standing under an overhang, his careless, noble manner barely convincing, then took in Leliana's carefully happy face. She winced. Clearly the parting had been even more difficult for her than Cassandra had feared.
"Yes, it's time," said Cullen. He stepped back with effort. "Please travel safely. Both of you."
He was only looking at her.
Cassandra's heart clenched, wondering how much time she had before she faded away in his mind. Hopefully long enough to get him to Haven. She threw her arms around him, suddenly needing the solid, hard presence of him to carry with her, and he returned the hug with crushing strength.
"Two weeks is a long time," she whispered. Please remember me.
"I know," he replied in the same hushed tones. "But I'll be there sooner than you expect. Don't worry, love."
The words stuck in her throat, but she hoped he understood from her final kiss that she loved him, too. Irrevocably and dangerously. No matter what happened.
After they boarded the ship that would carry them across the water to Ferelden, Cassandra shut herself in her cabin and opened her trunk to find her robe. Leliana would be there soon enough, and she would comfort her friend as best she could, but she needed to be dressed for her own comfort if she was to be of any use. As she shook out the fabric, a slip of paper fell to the floor, and she picked it up curiously. Her heart fluttered when she recognized Cullen's slanted, rushing script.
Cassandra,
I'm not sure how soon you'll find this, but I pray it comes at a time when you need comfort. I considered stealing your robe, to keep a part of you with me while we're apart, but I'd never forgive myself if you caught a chill without it. I suppose the memory of how it looks on you will have to sustain me. Thank you for caring for me, for choosing me, and for being a woman far past anything I would have ever dared desire. I'm not in Varric's class, with the fine words, but I hope you can read this if you feel lonely and know that I am thinking of nothing but you.
All my love,
Cullen
When Leliana arrived, even her own pain didn't stop the bard from cooing over the letter until Cassandra wanted to strangle her. But she still tucked the note carefully under her pillow as soon as the examination was complete. Whenever she touched it throughout the night it soothed her worried mind, and Cassandra felt the first stirrings of hope as she drifted off to sleep.