A/N: It's been pointed out to me that Michel de Chevin has a completely different backstory to the one I've given him. Sorry! That's what happens when you start writing characters based on a few in game interactions without reading the wiki!
Also, this chapter may settle a few questions — not to everyone's taste. Love & criticism equally welcome. I will now answer all questions about the plot so far.
Killeen was on the verge of sending a polite note to de Chevin several times during the afternoon, but each time decided against it.
She would have to be honest with him — at least, partly honest. But … she owed him to be honest to his face, rather than simply avoiding him, and so when the dinner hour came, she presented herself at his quarters.
The wine was better than ever, the food excellent, but for once the conversation was strained and awkward.
Finally de Chevin set down his glass. "Something is troubling you," he said.
"Yes," Killeen admitted. She turned her own glass between her fingers, eyes fixed on the deep red liquid. "I — I feel I ought to tell you — Michel, I —" She paused, took a gulp of wine for courage. "I'm sorry. I can't continue to — my affections are …"
"Committed elsewhere, I know," Michel said, surprising her.
"Oh," she said. "So you understand, this is — this has been very pleasant but …"
"This has been very pleasant," Michel said, "and it can continue to be very pleasant."
She stared at him. "Oh. I thought you — I misunderstood."
"You thought I wanted more than your occasional company," Michel said, "and you were quite right." He leaned forward and took her hand. "Lieutenant — Killeen. I have regained my title, but the lands that went with it have already been given to others, others the Empress cannot afford to offend. I must start again, and it may well be the work of more than one generation. I will need strong, clever sons and daughters. And I will need a wife who is an ally, who I can rely on to speak as I would speak, to order troops when I am not there, with a head for strategy and skill in battle."
Killeen found her mouth hanging open, and shut it with a snap. "Ah —"
"These things are more important than transient passion," Michel said. "So long as the children you bear are mine, I will have no objection to any other liaisons you pursue — if they are discreet."
"Michel —" Killeen said. "That's — " Not something I can contemplate.
"Think about it," he urged her. "A new great campaign, a new cause. The two of us, building something for our family that will last through the ages."
For one surreal second, Killeen did consider it : Michel and herself, talking over politics and battles over the dinner table as their children listened and learned; herself, rallying troops as the wife of a great chevalier; celebrating their success in some Great Hall that belonged to her, and not to the Inquisitor.
Then she gently withdrew her hand from his. There was more than one reason it was an impossibility. "I'm flattered," she said.
"You're flattered," Michel said, "but …"
"Yes. I'm sorry."
"Ah, well," he said, and smiled. "Such are the fortunes of life and love. I hope we can still be friends."
"I'd like that," Killeen said, and meant it.
As she made her way back along the walkway later, slightly light-headed from the wine, she found herself smiling. Strong, clever sons and daughters … a marriage proposal as pragmatic as setting a stallion to a particular mare!
Voices drifted up from the garden below her.
"I am telling you, Commander," Cassandra was saying, "it is quite clear. I am very good at reading people."
Cullen snorted. "You're terrible at reading people."
"Varric is very good at reading people," Cassandra countered, "and he concurs."
Must be about Bianca, Killeen thought as she passed out of earshot, and her information about this lost thaig and the red lyrium.
She went through the Great Hall, pausing for a word with Rylen about a couple of promising recruits who would suit that company, and headed to Cullen's office.
It was empty. Killeen wondered if he'd gone to bed, and at the thought suddenly realised – she couldn't possibly sleep there with him. Not after that morning, not after …
His lips against her neck, breath stirring her hair, body pressed against hers …
Heart racing at the memory, she crossed to Cullen's desk, poured herself a goblet from the nearest wine bottle with hands that shook, and took a long gulp of the dreadful stuff. She couldn't simply absent herself, leave him to wait out the dark watches of the night when his demons walked alone.
But what if it happened again?
Oh, Maker, let it happen again …
No, she told herself firmly. Because what if it happens again and he wakes up? Killeen drank more of the wine, pacing. Wakes up and realises I am so desperate for his touch I'll accept even the humiliation of caresses he means for another.
It's not as if I look even a little like her, she thought, and the idea of attempting to disguise herself as the Inquisitor to fool Cullen leapt into her head, complete with blond wig slipping askew and ill-fitting enchanter's robes over her armour. She giggled aloud at her own absurdity.
"I hope that's not another joke about nugs," Cullen said. Killeen spun around so fast the room continued to turn for a second. Cullen was just closing the door behind him and he raised an eyebrow. "It isn't, is it? Because I've barely recovered from the last one."
Killeen covered her consternation by draining her goblet and refilling it. "No."
He crossed to his desk, shuffled through the papers strewn across it. "Then what's so funny?" he asked.
"Nothing. Just – something funny that happened, earlier." And then, since he was regarding her expectantly, and because the longer she talked the longer it would be before either of them climbed the ladder to the loft and she had to work out a way to explain why she'd be sleeping in her bedroll from now on, she said the first thing that came into her head. "I got proposed to."
Cullen went still, his face unreadable. One finger tapped the surface of the desk. "Oh?"
Killeen gulped wine. "I think so. It was a li'l – a little hard to tell. Exactly. But telling a woman you want her to breed you strong sons sounds like it ought to be a proposal."
"This was de Chevin?" Cullen asked.
She nodded, stopped nodding as the motion made the floor rock. "There was more. Leading armies and so on. It wasn't just the broodmare stuff."
"Someone should teach that chevalier some Ferelden manners," Cullen said very evenly.
Killeen waved a hand. "He was qui' nice 'bout it. Falte – Flatten – Flattering." She took another gulp from her goblet and pulled a face. "Your wine," she told him, "is terrible."
Cullen crossed to the desk, picked up the bottle and sniffed at it. "This isn't wine," he said. "It's some Qunari spirit the Bull keeps telling me I should try. I use it to clean ink stains off my fingers." He looked at her. "How much of this did you drink?"
She waved the goblet at him. "Thish mush. And a bit. More."
Cullen plucked the goblet from her fingers, set it on the desk and took her elbow in a firm grip. "Come on."
"Where?" Killeen asked as he marched her through the door. The cold night air hit her and her vision blurred, the wall walk tipping sideways. "Ooh. Dizzy."
"Here," Cullen said, steering her to the battlement. "Lean over, and put your fingers down your throat."
"Ugh." Killeen protested plaintively.
He pushed her firmly to the edge and bent her over it, a firm grip on her shoulder. "I saw the Inquisitor the morning after she drank a mug of that stuff. Believe me, this is for your own good. Do it. Or I'll do it."
"Ashully," Killeen mumbled, as the wall rocked beneath her, "don' thin' I'll need –"
Cullen braced her as she coughed and retched and added interesting new stains to the keep's external fortifications.
"Done?" he asked when she'd been still for a while.
"Yes," Killeen said, and he hauled her back. "Ugh." She was far from sober, but the stones of the walkway no longer tried to slide out from beneath her feet. "Why do you keep that stuff around? Without a label saying 'paint-stripper' or 'poison'."
"Didn't the taste warn you?" Cullen asked.
"After the first mouthful, there wasn't much of a taste." Killeen said. She made a face, and, as if reading her mind, Cullen offered her his water flask. "Thanks." She rinsed her mouth and spat over the edge of the wall, then drank more deeply and give him back the bottle.
"At least I got you outside," Cullen said. "I haven't always made it that far."
It was the first time Killeen could remember he'd referred to the bouts of sudden nausea he'd endured when the effects of ceasing to take lyrium were at their worst. "You couldn't help —" she started, then: "I didn't mind."
"That didn't make it any more pleasant." He took her elbow again. "You should walk," he said. "It'll help. And it's a nice night for it."
Killeen eyed the clouds scudding over the moon, hunched her shoulders against the knife-edge in the breeze. "A nice night for what?"
He glanced at her, glanced away. "For, ah, an evening … "
"A nice night for an evening?" Killeen said. "Cullen, are you absolutely sure that I'm the one who's drunk?"
He rubbed the back of his neck with the hand that wasn't gripping her arm, and, in the moonlight, she was almost sure he was blushing. "Evening walk. A nice night for an evening walk. If you like, uh. Windy, um. Nights."
"It's all right for you," Killeen said, eyeing his cloak.
To her utter and complete astonishment, Cullen let go of her elbow and put his arm around her shoulders, drawing her into the shelter of his cloak. "Not being a chevalier, I'm not chivalrous enough to freeze on your behalf," he said. "We'll just have to share."
His body was fever-warm against hers after the chill of the breeze.
Killeen had lost count of the number of times she had imagined such a moment. If she turned, just a little, they would practically be in each other's arms.
She kept her head down, concentrating on the stones they were standing on, so he would not see the heat in her cheeks, although there was nothing she could do about her heart, pounding so hard he could surely hear it even over the thin whine of the wind.
"I'm glad you're not going to marry Michel de Chevin," Cullen said.
"He's not leaving the Inquisition," Killeen said. It seemed important that he know that whatever happened, she would be there. "And even if he was going to, and I did – did decide to breed strong de Chevin sons and daughters — I wouldn't leave you until all this is over."
Somehow, they had stopped walking. Cullen's arm was warm around her shoulders, his body a windbreak against the breeze. Killeen leaned back against the wall, feeling in need of a little support. He was just enough taller than her that she had to look up slightly to meet his gaze, unreadable in the shadows cast by the clouds sliding past the mood.
"I know," he said softly. "That's not why I'm glad. You deserve someone who see you as more than … a good business decision."
Killeen looked away, managed to look back. "Chance'd be a fine thing," she muttered.
Cullen seemed not to hear her. "Someone who thinks you'd give meaning to all his days and nights. Someone who'd think about you every moment he was away from you and look at you every moment you were together. Someone who would compare every woman he met to you, and find them lacking."
"I don't think that's Michel de Chevin," Killeen said dryly.
"No," Cullen said. "Neither do I."
She took a breath. "Cullen — that's not why I told him no. I — I don't feel for him the way I … the way I feel for … someone else."
"Someone else?"
She made herself smile, wondered if it looked as false as it felt. "I know, you're going to take your revenge for all the teasing I dished out at Haven. But it's true. I have … feelings. For someone."
"Does he know?" Cullen asked.
"No," Killeen said. "It's … one of those utterly laughable, one-sided crushes. So go ahead. Make your jokes. I deserve them, I know."
"Are you sure?" Cullen asked. He was very close to her now, hands on her shoulders. Her back was pressed against the cold stone of the wall, his breath stirred her hair.
Her voice came out huskier than she'd planned. "That I deserve it? Yes."
"That it's one-sided," Cullen said softly, forehead resting against hers.
Without any direction from her brain, her hands lifted to rest against the smooth metal of his cuirass. "I —"
"I've thought about what I might say in this situation," Cullen whispered. "You're my second in command. We're at war. And you … I didn't think it was possible." His lips brushed her temple, her cheek, and her knees weakened. "It seems too much to ask — but I want to — "
Her voice deserting her, Killeen turned her face towards him, her answer in her parted lips.
He leaned toward her.
"Commander!" a voice called.
Cullen released her abruptly, and turned on the interloper "What?" he snapped.
"The Inquisitor," the man stammered. "At once, she said. The War Room. At once."
Cullen half turned back toward Killeen. "I —"
"Go," she said. They were soldiers; they lived their lives between emergencies and mustering calls. "Go. It'll be important."
"So is this," he said, low and fierce.
Then, being a soldier, he turned and ran toward the stairs.