#andarum

arum hawke/anders(/compassion/justice)

okay this might not technically be completely arum/anders considering the spirits that are also there but stay with me. it's when anders realizes he's in love with compassion. arum allowed compassion to possess him while he was traveling to skyhold, and he returns home from weisshaupt with a whole spirit in his body. anders has a Lot of feelings about it—fear that arum could get hurt or warped into something he can't reason with, fear that their relationship would never be the same again and he might fall out of love if arum is changed too much. he's very hesitant around compassion at first, easing up a bit over time as he realizes that arum and compassion really are extremely compatible and have a bafflingly harmonious bond, and that compassion is a large part of the internal healing and growth arum has had over the last ten years. but he still doesn't know compassion personally very well, and he doesn't want to be too physically intimate until he's sure—if he ever is.

it comes to a head when mullein writes to them and details the cure for tranquility. compassion is beyond enthusiastic, determined to use this knowledge to help as many people as they can—and this is what happened with karl, isn't it? he briefly reconnected to the fade with justice's influence. with justice and compassion both working at it, there would be no limit, would there? two of thedas's most adept healers, each with a spirit within them. they could get started right now. where should they go? is there a chantry nearby, a former circle? they must begin right away—

and this resonates with justice, of course, but justice fell in love with compassion quickly and easily, and they'd known each other to some degree in the fade. but it really strikes a chord with anders. the dedication to helping others, the passion for one's cause—the same things that first had him falling for arum, he recognized in compassion. the whimsy, the hopefulness, the heart. and of course, they're two different people, spirit and human, with far different experiences, so they're obviously not exactly the same. but he realizes that he's been falling for those parts of compassion, too, and how much he adores so many of compassion's other quirks just slots into place.

and then they go around curing tranquil willy-nilly and making cassandra mad but first all of them have some insane spirit sex i haven't figured out the logistics yet but just go with it

mullein lavellan/dorian pavus

i've put them through a ridiculous number of aus at this point (mostly with edwin cadash of thorin tytoalbatross's oc fame. hi edwin) and the actual canon of dragon age inquisition is one of the scant few in which they're not friends with benefits before getting together. so their first time is actually meaningful. Not that neither of them Wanted to fuck beforehand, they started flirting like 10 seconds after meeting and that dial went up to 100 and still has yet to go down at all. it's only gone farther. the dial is broken. they're the worst. anyway they didn't fuck because mullein is borderline incapable of making the first move and dorian was dealing with alexius and his father and denying himself the idea of loving and being loved and also there was a war going on and there's not much time to suck and fuck when there are druffalo to herd in the hinterlands.

Anyway. after the whole amulet situation when mullein goes out of his way to care for dorian on purpose by force dorian finally propositions mullein. he tells mullein he'll come by that night. mullein says "why wait" and sucks his dick right there in the library but that's not the point. the important part is that they do finally have sex that night. for like most of it. a lot of times. dorian has his whole self-flagellation moment in the middle of it but mullein tells him that he's already in too deep himself and there's no going back and dorian says "oh i'll be in something deep" and then they have sex again. I don't really know where i was going with this. OH YEAH dorian drops the "amatus" bomb during round like 4 and mullein says "i love you too" and then dorian cums. and then never says it back for like another year and a half which he does by accident and honestly that's another really good moment but i'll get back to that some other time. enough of these freaks i have more freaks to talk about

vervain mercar/emmrich volkarin

Would it be bad if i said the broken hand incident. no i'm not going to do that. i've talked it to death. but it might be my favorite. also up there though is vervain's breakdown moment when emmrich watches him murder his ex-boyfriend in broad daylight and then still insists that he's a good person. it's important to acknowledge that they are NOT together at this point, and also that the ex-boyfriend attacked vervain first, so it technically wasn't murder, vervain just likes to make himself look worse than he actually is because there's something deeply wrong with him.

the gist of the situation is that the ex is working with the venatori, who have tracked a number of shadows including vervain. he was instructed to take vervain in alive. tries to use an ice spell, gets stabbed in the chest before he can cast it. L+ratio+mageknife. vervain takes his boots, his gold, and his written orders to the shop and immediately goes back to the lighthouse to smash some shit. he is not expecting emmrich to follow him. he point blank asks emmrich why he even bothers spending time around him and emmrich is like "well you're passionate and dedicated to your work, so committed to caring for others even at the cost of your own health, and you neglect yourself. i want to take care of you."

and vervain thinks emmrich is insane. "i'm not worth taking care of, use your energy somewhere else" "oh, dear, who made you think that?" "me? i'm a bad person" "you're really not. look at all the good you do." straight up lists things that vervain has done in the past like two weeks and none of it can be denied. and instead of saying "yknow maybe you're right" vervain absolutely refuses to accept the idea that he's anything other than worthless dirt so he just halfheartedly tells emmrich to shut up and disappears for three days getting up to inadvisable activities. he's like mostly normal when he comes back though but it's vervain normal which isn't a high bar. the conversation when he returns is a whole other thing but i'm not getting into that now either. posts to make later though