and i…love you. its so wonderful to say that to someone again.

The bard bit is actually super interesting because she does to the Warden (I want to say both Wardens but could be m!Warden exclusive but still) she talks about "becoming the woman a target wants to see", so conforming herself to that for her work. She even has some banters about she pretty much blended in by being friendly to do said work as well with Alistair.

And it's kind of nuts you can't address any of this, not even in a follow up conversation, romance or no! The writing assumes that Leliana is being genuine, but of course you can go crazy bonkers in fanon. Like my personal fanon is she doesn't realize she's doing it, because she has no idea how not to do it, or even how to be in a normal relationship. Boundaries, communication, honesty, none of this has been something she's had before. (And also in my fanon she's the Marjolaine, not my Warden. She doesn't mean it and is horrified when she realizes it yayyyyy!! <3)

And tbh, the "chooses the Chantry over the Warden" is pretty much canon? I don't think it's too much of a generous read to go that far bc you have:

In Awakening, the letter she sends directly says she had to break the promise to see the Keep with you to meet with the Grand Cleric (I've always assumed a Justinia stand-in until she was more established), and to note originally the Keep was suppose to be a normal mission to see about the Darkspawn not retreating. The epilogue does state they "reunite a year after the Blight's end" so sometime after Awakening as that's six months after Origins.

The other DLC have no romance content outside Morrigan in Witch Hunt, but I think it's fair to say no Warden would want their non-Warden LI running around the Deep Roads. Golems is sometime after Awakening canonly, and Witch Hunt is 2~ years after Origins, or maybe 1~? Sources seem confused BUT point is it's the last adventure for the Warden that we know of.

9:34, about 3~ years after Origins/The Blight Divine Justinia is elected and Leliana says she was called upon to be her Left Hand.

What The Warden is doing is up to the player bc we don't have any canon information after Witch Hunt, but Leliana is running around all over Thedas as she's been in Kirkwall a number of times, Orlais, etc. I doubt they'd of had much time to be together. :')

BUT this is sounding pretty okay, sad duty is keeping them apart, but it's not like Leliana could follow the Warden into the Deep Roads or doing Warden related work, as mentioned. AND you have Leliana saying she's going to reunite with the Warden "for good this time".

BUT BUT this is not only AFTER Justinia is dead (rather than Leliana actively choosing between them), that Leliana just kinda throws that out the window and goes "I could be the POPE. No...I will be the Pope."

Yes yes she instills the Divine can marry whoever she wants but is this not a genuinely tragic ending? Not only did Leliana make this huge decision without talking to her partner, it puts them both in the Game for pretty much the rest of their lives (something she wanted to escape from). Constantly having to wonder who will betray you next or who will sell you out or wondering if this day will be the day someone tries to kill either of you (and might succeed). Not to mention the incredibly unfair position a non-human/mage Warden is placed in. Like look what happened with Celene and Briala, they were treated as a mockery. And the biggest tragedy of all is Leliana still doesn't put the Warden first, she chose the Chantry, even with Justinia gone.

In a non-Divine ending, enlightened!Leliana still is putting duty first and has a line something like "I know we'll be together again, some day..." while steeled!Leliana is the only one to actually say she might take time to be "selfish" and "focus on her relationship", as if that's selfish for wanting to be with your possibly living on borrowed time partner.