My Love

by Sabrina Zbasnik

  "Alistair?" Lana accepted it, the envelope thudding into her hands from the weight.

  "Nearly one if not two a week. How does he have time to rule a country?"

  Lana snickered, "Well, the alternative would be him putting all that time into ruling so..."

  "You make a fair point. I assume his aides regularly slot him in front of a desk and tell him to write so he doesn't cause half of Ferelden to fall into the Amaranthine ocean."

  She couldn't stop laughing at Cullen's obvious discomfort with Alistair, which he often drove to extremes. After curling her fingers in his hand and squeezing back for a moment, Lana slit her finger down the envelope's catch. But there was no letter inside. Turning the envelope upside down, she watched as golden coins plopped out one by one onto the desk; ten in total.

  "By the void," Cullen sighed, "he sent you Sovereigns? What in flames for?"

  Lana smiled wide as she picked one up and turned it in her fingers. The embossed Ferelden mabari strutted proud off the glint. "It means there's a baby in the palace," she grinned, remembering her bet to him. "And Ali's finally gotten himself that family."

  "Oh..." Cullen inched back, his head slightly bowing to his chest. Dropping the coin with the others, Lana grabbed onto his arm and tugged him down to her level for a full hug. He started for a moment, her reach shaking him from his thoughts, but after getting his bearings he returned it in kind. Turning her head, she caught his lips and kissed him with eyes so tight she could see stars.

  "What..." Cullen gasped, his mouth sliding away, "was that for?"

  "For saving me," Lana said.

  "Ah, that, uh..." he dove back, kissing her again, "I'd gladly do it again."

  Lana ran her fingers down his cheek, her thumb tracing along the scar upon his mouth until it softly pulled his bottom lip open. She felt a tremble inside of her that for once had nothing to do with fear. "I know," Lana sighed. Not ready to let him go, she reached her hands around the back of his neck and pulled him down for a crushing hug. Cullen answered it in kind as she buried her face into his soft chest while his strong fingers locked tight, his biceps flexing against her from how he clung.

  As he broke away, he now caressed her cheek and smiled that soulful Cullen one. "I should leave you to begin that letter."

  "Yes, I suppose so," Lana sighed, her head hanging down. She knew she had to do it, to try and get better, to be strong enough to keep going. "When I'm finished in here, do you want to, uh..." a silly blush climbed up her cheeks and she tried to hide it under a hand.

  "What?"

  "Um, uh..." Maker she felt foolish and giddy, her stomach flipping upside down, "whipped cream?"

  Cullen's head tipped down but she spotted a smile climbing his cheeks, no doubt from the ridiculous way she asked that. "If you wish," he said, picking up her hands, "and now I have to somehow return to work waiting in anticipation. You're a challenge," he smiled wider with the last part and slid off the desk. Halfway across the floor, Cullen turned back and whispered over his shoulder, "Please, write quickly."

  "I'll try," she couldn't bury the smile in her voice as she glanced over at the monumental task ahead of her. Cullen was right, it wasn't just what she had to put down but who it was to, who she had to ask for help. He made it to the doorway, when Lana called out, "I still blame myself for him, for what happened."

  Pausing, he ran his hand up and down the wooden frame before speaking, "We all blame ourselves."

  As Cullen drifted back out to the sitting room, no doubt failing to get anything accomplished in his own to do pile, Lana hoisted out a fresh stack of vellum from the rest and began anew.

  To: Anders

  C/O Hawke

  I am writing to you for help. This isn't easy and is not meant to make amends for our difference of opinion, but you may be the only person I can turn to as much as it pains me to think about...

  To: (struck through but still legible) Warden Commander (hand changed to Hawke's blockier script) ___E__ SecretNameToNotMention

  C/O: The Divine and her crafty pigeons

  (Note from Leliana: Maker's breath, they're ravens. How can she not recognize ravens?)

  I went though about a dozen opening lines from laughing at you needing my help, to taunting you with a refusal. Which Hawke then read and pouted over. So, here it is, my response. From Anders, the one that betrayed you, the order, all mages. Your eternal disappointment. Congrats.

  To the first point, no, Justice doesn't have much of any advice about the fade. We can't believe you survived inside it physically for two years. No one's done that in, well...darkness, sick, black over gold, blight, darkspawn, you know the rest. There is something, a glimmer in Justice's I wouldn't call it a memory but an idea. That the veil itself was less than, or more. I don't know, I'm getting a headache and Hawke's making her puppy eyes at me. I must be glowing again trying to tap into Justice.

  Fine, yes, it was a bad mistake. Are you happy? I know you kept trying to get that from me, to hear me say it aloud as if I didn't already know. Stupid old Anders, the mage who never committed to anything went and locked himself forever with a spirit. A spirit that's slowly driving me (thick ink marks covered over what he wrote). Forget it. It's too late, it's done, and there's no going back.

  Kinda like the wardens, huh? Look at you, the great Commander who stood for us all, brought us under your big griffin wing and you abandoned them same as me. But not really, right? Told your templar about all of that? What's waiting at the end for those of us in the taint club? We never really leave the Wardens no matter how far we run.

  All right, I got it out of my system. Wait, one more "ha ha, welcome to my world, you're trapped here forever." Okay, done. You want help and I might have some ideas. The nightmare casting, yeah it's a bit embarrassing to bring up to other mages. About on par with a late potty training accident and hiding the evidence of a first wet dream. But, and I swear to the Maker if you tell anyone else I'll send you a very crisply worded letter because I'm not going anywhere near Val Royeaux, I've had them too.

  Since joining with Justice, there are times when I don't know, it's not his doing but my own. Nightmares, more than that, this hunger to do something. And all around me were injustices, pain that I wasn't helping to solve. It'd drive me awake. Lucky thing I'd mostly wake to find myself trying to heal a wall. But you, I tasted your power and I'd be freaking out too.

  Hawke's telling me that I'm not helping, only making you feel worse. I suggested she send a cake to try and aid you and that was right up her alley, so expect that. Also glitter, she seems to think glitter will help. So, an answer to your immediate problem. Seems you've got a templar in easy reach which oughta help a bit. He'd know more of how to hamstring a mage better than I, your bigger problem is keeping him from enjoying it.

  Fine, I will be helpful and nice.

  There's a signal Hawke and I use. When I'm losing control and Justice tries to pop out, she'll say a word, a special word we have to tell me that things are okay, that he's not needed, and that I need to calm down. It doesn't always work, but mostly's better than nothing. And no, I will not say where we learned that technique from no matter how much Hawke needles me to tell the story. You've met Isabela, you can probably guess.

  Anyway, that's all I have. Come up with some word or safety phrase your templar can throw out to convince your mind this is reality and not the fade. You'd know of all the potions that curb mana better than I do. Burn off mana when you can, keep open fires to a minimum, and don't eat Hawke's cake - it's made with pickled plums.

  And, Commander, thank you, for what you did for Hawke. I know there is nothing I could have done or will ever do to deserve her. She's the only thing in thedas that keeps me sane and gives me a reason to get up in the morning. If I'd lost her I don't know what I'd do, and your sacrifice kept me from having to find out. So, thank you and I hope you heal, because in the end you were a good Commander. I was a lousy Warden.

  (Signed with a drawing of a fearsome mountain lio
n far more detailed than Hawke's dragon doodlings)

  Beneath the drawing is the label "Ser Pounce-A-Lot II"

  Chapter Seventeen

  Release

  Pinching his forehead, Cullen tried to stretch his legs out from under the foreign desk. It must have been built with the always shrinking Mothers in mind as he kept banging his toe, heel, and knee into it when shifting his legs. To get through the day, he'd have to sit turned to the side, which gave whoever he was meeting with the impression that he was in a hurry and didn't care for what they had to say.

  Situated near the Grand Cathedral, the borrowed office was so he could take all the meetings he should have had in Skyhold. Most were with dignitaries and others that moved between the fortress and Orlais, willing to pass on information or trusted enough to carry it. He claimed it far from the apartment so there was no risk of anyone recognizing Lana, and Leliana was happy to establish it.

  Craning his neck back, Cullen gazed through the ceiling and wondered what the two of them were up to. When he last saw Lana she was hunched over a piece of vellum not writing but drawing an eternal series of lines to make a grid. After Leliana appeared with a bag of coins, rocks, and two bottles of wine he knew it was time to leave them alone, though Honor bravely stayed behind.

  It'd been a long day of getting nowhere with people who had little to no push within the Inquisition. Half he didn't recognize, and the other he knew as cooks or buyers that once reported to Josephine and now answered to an amalgam of people. So many months since he last visited, and Cullen knew nothing of Skyhold's current infrastructure. All of his meetings kept making mention of some big Satinalia feast as if he should know of it and be planning to attend, but...Maker, what day was it again?

  He reached out to pick up a mug of mead when a knock broke against the door. Taking a swig to clear out his caked in throat, Cullen called out, "Enter."

  Detan appeared, her hair tied back even tighter than usual giving her a haunting look that reminded him of some of the well preserved corpses in Nevarra. She bowed deeply, and he waved his hand. They'd been working together long enough, Cullen saw no reason to stand on ceremony. "Ser!" When she snapped up she all but saluted, which set Cullen on edge.

  "What is it?" he asked, praying he didn't hear about the apartment catching on fire or something worse happening.

  "There is a...you have a visitor, um, uh..."

  Cullen's concern moved to the level of an army marching over the mountains. He'd never seen Detan flustered, and she'd regularly deal with the Divine, Grand Clerics, the Grand Enchanter, and Empress' trio. Who could get to her? As he staggered to his feet the answer carefully stepped into the door.

  "Commander."

  "Inquisitor," Cullen struggled to not gasp at the patrician elf filling the doorway. Despite having a wiry frame, he always managed to command a room as if it wasn't large enough to contain him. And all without relying upon bombastic bluster as most other nobility required.

  Smiling with his thin lips, the Inquisitor turned grey eyes upon Detan. She giggled, a blush rising to her pale cheeks which she tried to fan away with her clipboards. "Could you give us leave, please? We have matters to discuss."

  "Ah, yes, Ser, Inquisitor Sir, I..." Detan scrambled away so fast her heel smacked into the door.

  It startled the certain Inquisitor so much he reached out to grip onto her hand to steady her and Detan melted fully into the puddle. Murmuring barely words, she slid out the rest of the way and loudly slammed the door. Outside they both heard a "Maker, damn it!" as she cursed herself before stepping away.

  Spinning back to face Cullen, the Inquisitor tipped his chin, "I see you are in good health."

  "I had no idea you intended to travel to Val Royeaux," Cullen gasped, sliding around the desk.

  The Inquisitor smiled his thin lips, "It seems I am capable of some subterfuge all these years later after all." Instead of his red finery they all suffered with, or the armor fanatics sold copies of in shops across all of thedas he was dressed brazenly in what looked like old Dalish mail. Almost as if he dared anyone to call him a savage in it.

  Slowly, the Inquisitor stuck out his hand and Cullen took it, shaking it with a firm grip. Glancing over at the missing arm still bundled tight to his chest as it healed, Cullen shook his head at being such a poor host. "Please, sit..." he said gesturing to the chair before the Inquisitor, as if he couldn't figure out how it worked.

  Chuckling softly, the man tugged on the chair and eased down into it. With less grace, Cullen fell into his seat and managed to knock his knee against the desk in the process. Cursing the pain under his breath as he rubbed it, he missed the Inquisitor glancing around the office.

  "Not as nice as Skyhold, but less drafty. And...it's strange."

  "What is?" Cullen asked, trying to find some footing.

  "To see you sitting. Blessed creators, every time I'd walk in on your office you always seemed to be standing, or, on occasion, picking at the floor."

  "There were a lot of weeds trying to sprout through the floorboards and...not the point," Cullen shook his head and gulped. Maker, why did he feel like a Knight-Errant all over again facing down the gentle but strict glare of the Knight-Commander? "You must have come all this way for a reason."

  "I have," he nodded his head. Sliding a hand between the buttons on his coat, he unearthed a letter. "Once I received word that you would not be able to return for the foreseeable future I decided to make the trip myself."

  "You didn't have to, if it disturbs your..." he fumbled around a way of pointing out his amputated arm, but the Inquisitor lifted the limb up and chuckled.

  "It's been healing well. All the best surgeons in thedas have had a hand in it, excusing the pun. But in truth, I suspect much of that was due to...how it was removed," he avoided saying Solas' name, a fact that began after he returned from wherever the mirrors took him. "And you..." the Inquisitor turned his head, those steel eyes warming to a soft grey, "you are well? I'd feared that something might have occurred to you given your reluctance to return."

  "Ah, that, I can explain," Cullen began his tongue yearning to tell him the truth but he paused. It wasn't his secret to give. "Actually, I cannot. It's a..."

  The Inquisitor held up his hand, "Let me guess, a private matter. I do not wish to pry into that, I was merely concerned that my best Commander was out of sorts and trapped in Orlais."

  "My sorts are well in order but trapped does feel accurate somedays," Cullen said and a weight lifted off his shoulders. It felt good to admit that aloud.

  "Yes, I would believe it. For a time I wondered if your letters were not some ruse. It seemed impossible to imagine you willingly ensconced in such...refinery. No matter, you have your reasons, and as I said I will not pry. I am here to finish what we began."

  "Ser?" he tipped his head, lost.

  A despondent smile flitted across his lips and he gripped tight to his forearm, "I do not relish saying my goodbyes. In fact, I do all I can to avoid them, but all good things must come to an end. Consider it official, Cullen Rutherford, you are released from your duties with the Inquisition. There was some talk of a pension and we'll have to figure out what to do with your belongings in time, but that's all matters for later."

  "Inquisitor, I don't..." he gasped, it couldn't be that easy. "What about the troops and our timeline for...?" Cullen yanked up the letters he'd been working on for the past week.

  "It's out of your hands now. Your replacement, Addley, she's been taking up the slack originally under the assumption you would return, but slotting her officially in place should be no problem. Not that I want you to think your absence will not be felt. It has for these past months and will continue. But we all have a life to live, and yours it seems is growing beyond us."

  "Inquisitor, I..." he swallowed deep, "I don't know what to say." He thought that it would take more time, there'd be procedures to follow, and...done. Just like that. No more duty, no more having the lives of hundreds of people place
d upon his shoulders. Cullen felt lighter, not as if he was freed of bonds shackled to his limbs, instead it was as if someone scooped out a part of him leaving him hollow inside.

  "And of course, Skyhold will remain should you decide to pop on by," the Inquisitor threw out half heartedly, "we're not going to ban you from the mountain by any means."

  Cullen bowed his head, a gratefulness merging with a stubborn need to want to cling to the familiar. Slipping his eyes tight, he thought of the woman waiting for him up the stairs, the reason he began this, his hope for a future, and some of the fear washed away. "Thank you, Inquisitor. For giving me the chance, the opportunity to prove to myself that I could be redeemed...I suppose."

  The gentle man, the one few saw outside of his hard shell, wafted across the Inquisitor's face. With lashes laying flush against his cheeks, the Inquisitor bowed his head deep. "Commander Cullen, you have served us honorably and while we disagreed on occasion I was proud to think of you as a friend."

  "And I yours, Ser," he reached out and grabbed the Inquisitor's hand. This was it. His future was nothing more than a question now, no one to answer to but himself. Maker, was Cullen prepared to face the unknown? Dipping his chin down, he moved to release the Inquisitor's hand when a bark echoed from outside the door.

  Oh no.

  "Strange," the Inquisitor remarked, "I swear I heard a dog."

  Cullen stood up fast, his knee jamming on the desk, but he was too late. The door creaked open and Lana stepped inside. Her face was buried in something she was reading, but when she pulled it down so went her smile. Where was Detan? Why wasn't she guarding the door to warn her?

  Gritting his teeth, Cullen glanced towards the Inquisitor who seemed to be taking the shock in stride. He closed his steel eyes tight, his head bobbing as if he was listening to a song in the distance. When they opened, he sighed, "Ah, now I understand why you are here in Val Royeaux."