Chapter 22: Enough

Everything took twice as long: taking off clothing, putting on clothing, pulling out chairs, trying to read a book. Shaving was out of the question right now, and Theo had to sit patiently while Dorian trimmed and then shaved the beard that had started to grow during his convalescence. He tried to tell himself that this could be the new normal, letting his husband wait on him like this. He tried to smile but he only had to take one glance in the mirror at the emptiness below his left elbow and it was all he could do to keep from screaming.

He didn't want visitors, even after he had finally cleaned up, been shaved, and had his hair combed. Dorian offered to be his liaison to his advisors, but he didn't want to saddle his husband with that. When he said as much, Dorian sighed. "I respect your desire to step down from your role as Inquisitor, love. But there are things that need be seen to by you yourself, or me acting in your stead temporarily, in order for that to become official." He rested his hand on Theo's, running his thumb over Theo's knuckles.

Perhaps the hardest part was accepting that Dorian was right. If Dorian was right it meant starting to live again. It meant facing the world again, and the people in it. It meant facing them in all of his failure and pain and weakness. He couldn't even lace up his own fucking breeches.

"Start slow," Melina advised when it came up the next day after she'd healed his injury a bit more. Every day it got better, but the fact that a healer, and a spirit healer at that, had to keep seeing to him didn't help his feelings about it all. "Perhaps the Commander could visit when I come later?" She smiled and tucked a pale blonde curl behind her ears.

Theo took a deep breath. "That would be fine," he said after a moment.

Melina rested her hand on his forearm. "Cullen knows what it is to be broken," she told him, her golden-brown eyes deep and serious, and there was little point arguing with her, especially when she was telling the truth.

"The commander will be glad to see you up and about, truthfully," Dorian told him, helping him struggle into a loose-fitting linen shirt.

"Of course he saw me while I was out cold," Theo said with a groan.

"My dear, most of our merry little band did, as well as several servants and a retinue of healers," Dorian told him, fussing over his hair. Theo tried to swat his hand away, but Dorian caught him lightly by the wrist and kissed his fingertips. "Most, even your closest friends, believed your luck had finally run out."

"And you?"

"I told you I wasn't saying goodbye," Dorian said, planting a kiss on his lips. "I'm many things, Amatus, but a liar isn't one of them."

Cullen surprised Theo later on by bringing a chess set, and Melina carried a basket of food and a carafe of weak, spiced wine. Theo sat on the edge of the bed, ready to submit to her examination, but she shook her head. "It will be more pleasant for us to visit, Lord Trevelyan," she told him with a smile as she laid out some rolls, cheese, and cured meats on a plate on one of the side tables. She had stopped calling him "inquisitor" when she sensed the way his emotions flared at the word, but could not yet bring herself to drop her formality: something Cullen seemed to find endearing.

"She always was so formal, especially back in her Circle days," he said with a grin that made Melina blush.

Talk turned to Melina's views of the Circle, and the future of the Circles now with Cassandra as Divine, and then her questions of Dorian about life in Tevinter. Theo bit back a pang of jealousy when he saw the way Dorian's face lit up as he spoke about his homeland.

"You're not going to ask me questions or give me some sappy story about the sun coming up tomorrow?" Theo finally asked Cullen, while Dorian shocked Melina with tales of the heathen Black Chantry to the north.

"No," Cullen said. "If you want me to I will. But there was a time when I was at my breaking point, and you trusted me to let you know if I needed to talk to you about it when I was ready. I'm here to return that courtesy."

Theo narrowed his eyes. "So no… 'I know how you feel' or 'I've been there before' speeches?"

Cullen shrugged. "I have been in very dark places. You know that. But that's not what you need right now."

"And you know what I need?"

"Aside from starting to eat a bit more, you need me to beat you at a game of chess."

Theo hadn't played in quite a while, but the moves came back to him easily. Cullen was quite good, forcing him to focus and consider strategy. Still, Cullen handily beat him, as promised. "I'm a commander for a reason," Cullen told him as he reset the board. "Never thought I would be, especially after the Ferelden Circle." His gaze drifted over toward Melina, who was horrifying Dorian with the joyful way she described Circle life.

They'd discussed Cullen's demons, literal and metaphorical, before. "How did you start to come back?" Theo asked him. He swallowed the growing lump in his throat.

Cullen sat back and thought, absently rubbing at the light stubble on his jaw and chin. "Slowly," he said at last. "You've been to the Void and back, Theodane," he told him. "No one expects you to recover rapidly."

"Melina says my stu- my arm is healing well, considering," Theo countered.

"Healing and recovering aren't always the same thing," Cullen gently told him.

Skyhold had a tiny library in a dark corner of the basement. Theo had found it quite by accident once, and though it was all dusty and full of cobwebs, he'd used it as a place to hide when he needed solitude. Sometimes Dorian joined him, but most times he was alone. He longed for that little nook now, drafts and dust and even the spiders and all as he stood before the door of his suite. He hadn't left the suite for over a week, and now he had been deemed sufficiently healthy enough to hold a small council with his inner circle, in the private sitting room down the hall.

His heart knocked against his ribs. He was torn; he had to let Josephine know of his decision to step down and disband the Inquisition, but a small part of him clung to it all as part of his identity. He knew the Inquisition had become too large to hold onto, if Qunari spies could work their way in and if Solas had been able to pull such strings. And more than that, he was tired.

He sniffed and furiously rubbed his eyes before opening the door and stepping foot into the hallway. He'd insisted on going alone, without Dorian or anyone else escorting him. He had to do this himself. "Stubborn ass," Dorian told him, kissing him before heading out.

The halls were quiet. His boots squeaked on the polished floors, the sound echoing in the hallway. The eyes of dead Orlesians followed him as he passed by their painted portraits.

The door of the room was open and Theo cursed silently. No need to knock. No opportunity to lose his nerve. Just a little while longer, he told himself. Just get through this.

He crossed the threshold.

The conversations stopped as he entered the room and everyone stared at him. Theo blinked nervously, painfully aware of the way his left shirtsleeve dangled, empty, at his side. "What's the matter?" he finally asked. "You all act like you've never seen a one-armed ex-Inquisitor before."

Then there were hugs, given gingerly to avoid bumping his healing arm; tears; prayers of thanks; and Cassandra lightly swatting the back of his head. "That is for making me cry," she snapped, before flopping down in a chair with her arms crossed over her chest, but she couldn't keep her smile entirely hidden.

"What is this about ex-Inquisitor?" Leliana asked when they'd all finally sat down.

Theo took a deep breath. "I've had a lot of time to think about things." Next to him, Dorian squeezed his hand. "And…"

"The Exalted Council has agreed to give you more time," Josephine broke in. "You need not make a rash decision."

Dorian stifled a groan.

Cullen inhaled sharply.

Theo went cold. "I should be dead," he said in a low voice. "I don't give a fuck what the Exalted Council thinks. No offense," he added, glancing at Cassandra, who was, technically, part of the council. She just shrugged. She'd seen some of the horrors he had. "I'm through saving them. I've given more than I had to give, for what? For them to graciously agree to give me more time, like it's some fucking favor?" His hand shook and his chest constricted.

Josephine's bottom lip trembled. "We've come so far, though," she said, swallowing and standing up straighter. "Now, with your testimony of what happened, they'll see that the Inquisition is necessary."

"If you're going to do that, you'll have to find another Inquisitor."

"Perhaps if we-"

"I said I'm done," he shouted. "I can't even shoot a bow anymore! I've almost died…" He paused to think. The Conclave explosion. Corypheus's attack on Haven. Adamant. Halamshiral the first time, battles and skirmishes... "Let's just say I can't quite count it on my fingers," he spat, "since I only have five left."

Josephine took a long, slow breath, and let it out in a hiss. "You're not the only one who has sacrificed for this organization," she said in a low voice. "I have no idea what you came up against, and I am sorry for what it cost you. But you don't have any idea what I was doing back here. The alliances I was trying to hold together. The balances I was trying to maintain. And even before that, you could hardly be bothered to pay attention to anything anyone was saying! It's like you didn't care, even before that Qunari body was found!"

"Maybe I didn't."

"That's bullshit, and you know it." The Iron Bull had been standing in a corner, quiet and observing. "You cared so much it hurt. Otherwise you wouldn't have been the one to go through the mirror all those times."

Theo looked over at Bull, but Bull's eye wouldn't meet his gaze. Dorian had told him what Bull had had to do to save him, and he still wrestled with anger and guilt and gratitude tangled up in a knot that lodged in his chest when he looked at the Qunari.

Bull was right, which made the knot tighter: he had cared so much, too much. It was easier to pretend that he didn't. It was easier to pretend he was strong than to admit the awful truth: his time beyond the Eluvian had broken him.

He sighed and looked back to Josephine with her clenched hands and white knuckles and red cheeks. "I'm done," he repeated quietly. "I will inform the ever so gracious members of the Exalted Council of my intention to step down from my role as Inquisitor, and to dissolve the Inquisition." He got up and slipped past Josephine and wrested his arm out of Cullen's grip as the Commander tried to stop him.

"You can't just give up!" she shouted after him as he started back down the hall.

Theo stopped. Giving up meant seeing a challenge and turning away from it. It meant backing down from a threat. It meant being unwilling to give what was necessary. He'd overcome every challenge. He'd faced every threat. He'd given all he had to give, and then more. He understood now what Cullen and Bull had meant when they said they were burned out and broken.

He looked over his shoulder and saw his closest friends standing in the doorway, watching him walk away. "I'm not giving up," he said at last. "I've just had enough."