heyyy what if casadh and peepaw : a kiss while being reunited after a long time.
sunday monday tuesday wednesday kisses // selectively accepting // @aestuum & this one also has a lot of @keepslore ( and @hoboblaidd ) in it for max damage
Minrathous shakes, the beam above them creaks, and dust falls, nearly like flakes of fresh snow, but there is no keen chill or coverage, just Varric brushing them off his desk. They end up falling to the floor, decorating the parchment cast to the wayside.
"Why are you awake?"
Varric's shoulders straighten momentarily as he registers the voice as Dhavi's, and he leans back to meet her eyes. "Same as you. Can't sleep."
Dhavi seems to accept that as the truth, as she is one of the few people who knows about the haunting inside his head, or the previous haunting — now there are whispers that Solas is out there, not that his health allows him to be out there. Still, Varric wonders if Dhavi has seen him, but that thought is pushed aside.
She steps into the room, making herself comfortable on the edge of a couch crammed into this makeshift office. It doesn't even creak under her weight, and for a moment, he wonders when the last time someone truly worried about her — he had not made this easy on anyone; that thought is let loose. She speaks, and it's like a thread gone and lost between fingertips.
"Are you writing home?" Dhavi leans forward, a smile still on her features, "The girls must miss you both."
Some words want to come about how he's also caused a lot of heartache, that he's still unsure if any of this is real or not, it feels that way, and ink stains parchment, but when he closes his eyes, dreams dare to blot in. Still, sometimes Varric is not sure if he's watching the end play out, but there is always a voice yelling at someone to take the shot, and then it goes dark, just a reminder and a soft voice that he had to go home. "Yeah." He laughs instead. It's really enough for now. "How is the research going?"
"You know I can't tell you that."
"Right, dead."
"No, that's not it," Dhavi states, fist thumping against the sofa. This is a slope to an argument — one they've had since an open fire about who was right and who was wrong, who was worth it and who wasn't and since he reappeared alive but in frail health. "You'd do something irrational — and then die, again."
"Done that already, I think it's up there with jumping into the fade." It's said softly and catches her off guard, goading them both into a laugh, a time nearly ten years ago, things less complicated — somehow. He opens his mouth to make another comment, a comment about how he quits. Still, someone else is at the door from the maze of rooms that currently make up their new headquarters as a so-called war of gods carries on above and shakes them all again.
There are a series of formalities, and Dhavi nearly excuses herself, but the news isn't nearly as privileged as that, or as it should be; it boils over, and the Shadow Dragon runner huffs, "Rook — Rook is here."
Dhavi is quick to stand, but it takes Varric a moment to follow her down the maze of hallways that make up the Divine's manor. They crisscross into a more tactical space, and he waits. Dhavi ducks behind a curtain and into the room he knows is housed at the centre, and the others greet Casadh and the rest of their team. It starts with Mae and Dorian, so he waits — there are too many people around, as others have appeared and even people have streamed around him, as if Varric is a stone in the river. There is a swell of voices, people gathering and cheering, and he can hear how it's not like the cheer of a rowdy game, it's not the crowd of a bar, it's that tired reminder that they have made it now, for now. It fizzles away, like most do and falls flat.
Then it's likely people falling into place or quiet wayside, as some duck back under that tattered curtain and excusing themselves around him, likely returning to their postings as well. Varric's hand taps against the brass head of the cane, his thumb on the faint outline of the inlay. It is not a dream, that is highly unlikely at this point — there is proof at this point, but he's waiting.
Time ticks like a clock, time like a song, something he now hears as a dull lull at all times, the same thing that had been carried along in stories but never felt like his own. It doesn't linger in his mind for long. No, there is a hand that pushes that curtain out of the way. There is a pause, and Varric can hear them talking to someone, correcting a medical calculation on the fly, and Varric cannot help but laugh. It isn't loud, but it draws a pause, a pause in which they stumble over which strain of yarrow to use to help with clotting and what to use next, but that dies as Varric is met with a familiar set of eyes, a set that looks him over twice and an expression that changes too quickly for Varric to even take a stab at.
"Hey, Kid."
"I...is this a dream, Varric?"
"Shit, if it is, where's your losing hand?" That breaks something, and Casahd takes two uneasy steps before the rest falls apart, and Varric finds himself catching them, mindful of his shoulder. Still, they tuck as close as they can and Varric swallows, quelling the thoughts in his mind whirling about dreams and dismay, things that had led all of them here, and the man that still seems to be running somewhere in the above, seemingly to place it all on stern and sure shoulders.
Varric leans up, not that they need to lean far, but the move to press their forehead to his own, one of Varric's hands coming to rest on the back of their neck. "I can't trust my own memory, but trust this, trust that this is not a dream." What a terrible nightmare this is, that grapple of being near alive or nearly dead cracks with something that sounds like a near sob, so maybe for once he has lobbied the correct words at the right person. "Casadh, hey." There should be a story that comes to verify identity. Still, it's instead for a moment his mind sparks that shared dream, one of many, one of the ways that souls are bound and tied in fashions — three very different souls, all thrumming and crashing together wildly, drastic and beautiful music.
There are words also that should come, words of apology, words of worry, but they are drowned out by a mournful sound, a memory that didn't know, a spectre that looked like him, and all the things that are disjointed against his shoulder. Casadh is now in a near slouch against him, and Varric moves his hand from their neck to their shoulder, turning them both enough to press a kiss to a tear-stained cheek. Varric is unsure if they are his or mixed in with Casadh. Instead, it is words that still jumble out. The cane falls free of Varric's grasp; he will regret the motion, but they are pulled against him as tightly as his shoulders allow.
"I can explain myself, but I am so happy you are alive."
Those words will be repeated again to another person—as Dhavi is right, he is foolish, and seeing this through might stop his heart, but he's made it back to others, he's made it back here, so there is one more thing to do.
But for now, he presses his lips again to Casadh's cheek.
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Every day feels like another step toward some yet unseen precipice, while no amount of circling back or collusion with shadows can stay the advance. Though his relationship with Spite is better, his own mental health, entirely separate from that unfortunate circumstance, remains volatile at best. He does not know how to watch the love of his life dive head first into danger and out of his reach. To implore @aestuum not to go where he cannot follow is a Sisyphean ask. They will always go where they believe people can be saved—one of their most admirable and maddening qualities.
However, since the encounter in the Deep Roads with that blighted Warden, they have grown more heedless than usual. It has struck a nerve in Lucanis, and it has led him to pace the length of their shared quarters in the Lighthouse with Spite looking on with equal parts curiosity and latent rage.
WHAT IS. THIS? FEELING? he demands, irritable in this lack of familiarity.
"It is no—" Lucanis can say 'nothing,' and the spirit will sputter and hiss, but that will be the end of it; or, he can commit to an effort which would ultimately make sharing this body more tenable for them both. "Frustration, Spite. Helplessness. Worry. Fear."
TOWARD — CASADH, WHY?
"I do not want to see them harmed."
LUCANIS AND SPITE. PROTECT. CASADH.
"Yes, but..."
How does Lucanis explain that despite all of his epithets and laurels he is only a man? An assassin, a self-appointed arbiter of death, in a way that can only be described as one of the many follies of mortalkind, yes, but a flawed and loathsome human man.
This is in direct opposition to Casadh, who is endlessly kind and selfless, often to their detriment. They walk with gods and call them by name. They command the attention of spirits older than the concept of time. There is no one less qualified to feel frustration to their efforts, and yet he cannot help himself.
"Please do not interfere," he is not above begging Spite. "when I talk to them. No matter the outcome."
Spite prickles, already suspicious of any situation where someone (be it Lucanis or otherwise) may upset Casadh, but he seems to at least be considering compliance.
It doesn't snap the man's attention from what he's doing; the finger jab is met with a low hiss, and it's landed nowhere tender or painful. He tends to do this to many who had sought out his attention when he was looking over something, or better yet, sleeping of all things.
"Wrong shoulder, kid." It isn't. "Do you go around doing that to Dhavi in her arm?" They don't, that's Varric.
Vhen being at least a little jealous of Casadh's relationship with Lucanis in the way a kid is jealous of their single parent starting to date culminating in the infallible child logic that he's a Gross Shem and Casadh is Too Good for him and his Shemlen Cooties. Casadh doesn't have any shemlen cooties because Vhenatish'an cured them with magic obviously.
There had always been something different about Nanna's corner of the Lighthouse, a comfort that hadn't needed to be grown into, but there was a particular and crafted comfort set to the room when Casadh came to see her today. Nanna's workbench had been repurposed into a table, and two chairs had already been pulled out, as if waiting for them.
The smile that Nanna greeted them with belied the gravity of what they'd agreed to discuss. This was something that could have easily have been done in the kitchen, but for the severity of the topic, it was something that should only be for the ears of other Grey Wardens. At least at first, when they knew how to approach it.
"I imagine you have heard the call through the taint as much as I have," she began, setting the pot back on the heating rune she'd conjured and taking a seat across from them. "It is different, is it not? From the usual pull of the taint. I imagine it will only grow increasingly strange with presence of two sources of the Blight, but I believe I can offer a base, at least, of what to expect in the days to come."
She sat the cup in front of them by its rim, steam rising from the freshly poured tea. For all that Nanna seemed to avoid tea herself, the smell was brewed intently, giving the air a sweet and homey smell.
"When you are ready," she said with an encouraging smile. "I would like to hear of your dreams."
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It seems like good things always ever come with the bad.
Ten years. It's been nearly ten damn years that he's been locked in the belly of Weisshaupt. He came here to report on the status of the Southern Grey Wardens after Adamant. He came here to help.
And Jowin - the First Warden - had locked him up down here. Accused him of inciting some kind of coup, spouting off about ancient magisters, blood magic, and Wardens surviving the slaying of an Archdemon. All he'd tried to do was tell the truth. Get the Order to listen, to respond in some meaningful way! It seemed everyone he thought should act a certain way was determined to act another. Seemed very few of his fellow Grey Wardens ever behaved as he thought they should. As Duncan would have thought they should.
Alistair doesn't know what's happening, exactly, but he knows that it's bad. The whole world seems to be shuddering, and he can hear a voice in his mind. Taunting him.
Is it an Archdemon? He remembers the murmurs, the flashes from the Final Battle in Denerim. The haunting feeling that he'd die, the whispers in his brain telling him he was doomed. But this is...
Clearer.
Worse.
But it brings opportunity when the horrible, angry tendrils of Blight that wind through the cells make the guards panic. They start letting everyone out. Shouting to get a weapon and get to the walls. Everyone. No matter what they're locked up for. They need bodies.
And a body, Alistair certainly is. He follows the panicked masses to the armory, and straps on what armor will fit in a hurry. It's been some time since the weight of more than his tunic has graced his body, and he knows that this will bruise. He takes a sword and a shield.
The fight awaiting them outside is worse than anything he's ever seen. The Blight is huge - angry, grasping. The darkspawn are new and strange, throbbing. Bursting with sick Blight. There's a face in the sky, telling them they're all going to die. And it's not even a dragon.
But there is a dragon. No -- an Archdemon.
The rest is a blur. Everyone dies. Well, nearly everyone. Some of them make it to the library, following shouts that the last stand will be there. He stumbles half-dazed through the maze that is the compound, following scraps of trails from the other Wardens who know the place better as they run. He finds the Joining Chalice from Ostagar on a pedestal.
He laughs a bitter laugh. It's on a pedestal, of course it is. And he's meant to be in the gutter, in the cells. He takes it, stuffs it in a bag over his shoulder.
It seems impossible. Making it to the library. But he does it. The Archdemon lands, and is snared by a dragon trap as he climbs and weaves his way through broken stone and shattered walls.
He watches from one of the towers as the dragon falls, as the First Warden falls, and the dragon rises again. There is - something. Not someone. Raising it. Over and over again.
And then it's over -- no. Worse! The ground rumbles, the Blight swells. Alistair searches for escape, and sees only one. A cluster of bodies, diving into a mirror. A mirror, like the one Morrigan once appeared to him through.
He doesn't have time to think. Would it help if he did? Unlikely. He dives into the mirror, too.
Feyn leaned against the outside of the house, half-listening to the low conversation inside. The sudden surge of Blight in the Hossberg Wetlands had left the people of Lavendel on their back foot, and the fall of Weisshaupt hadn't helped either. The run-down village struggling to recover, let alone feed themselves, now suddenly had a small, dispirited army to support as well.
Casadh had insisted on coming to check on some of the people here. He'd seen the guilt in their eyes, had known that this was their way of trying to make up for their perceived failures.
He wasn't sure what else there was to say. Everyone had failed at Weisshaupt. The only upside to the entire endeavor was that an Archdemon was dead, but even the relief that should bring was muted. Ghilan'nain was still alive. Lusacan was no doubt being risen, if the Archdemon wasn't already at large.
And Solas was still trapped in the Fade.
Feyn pushed off the wall as Casadh exited the house. His eyes skimmed over their expression, trying to figure out the best way to handle them as he readied a kind smile. "Any luck with yer sleepin' patient?"
