I have some questions I'm curious about from fellow Solavellan lovers all about your Lavellan, Solas and Rook. Answer all or one, up to you!
What does your Lavellan understand about Solas that makes forgiveness possible without excusing what he’s done?
Is there something your Lavellan fundamentally misunderstands about Solas, and that Solas fundamentally misunderstands about your Lavellan? What finally allows them to understand each other more clearly and how does that understanding come?
What is the dynamic between your Lavellan and your Rook?
If your Rook comes to know Solas primarily as an adversary, while your Lavellan’s experience is coloured by their love and history together, where do their interpretations of him overlap - and where do they differ?
Thank you so much, Lore! These were DIFFICULT to answer <3
What does your Lavellan understand about Solas that makes forgiveness possible without excusing what he’s done?
a) Evunial understands that it's not on her to excuse Solas' deeds in the first place. At least when we're talking "historical" wrongs like the Titan genocide. She loves him NOW. His history is exactly that: history. And it's his to deal with. She doesn't need to forgive him because there is nothing for HER to forgive. She would never presume to judge him with the narrow scope of her own experience, and IF forgiveness is someday granted, it has to come from those most deeply affected. (Which she doesn't perceive herself to be.)
The things he did to her (breaking her heart, lying by omission, remaining distant) - she deeply understands that he did it to protect her. He's a man. He is flawed. He had good intentions while being in incredible pain, which clouded his judgment - as it would for anyone. She saw him shaking and crying after the first time they had sex, and she comes back to that memory again and again to remind herself that he's just a person who experienced terrible cruelty and is trying the best he can. It's unfair to expect more of him than of anyone else, simply because he is very old.
b) She also understands that many/most of Solas' mistakes happened while he was under duress, maybe even magical compulsion by Mythal (though the bounds aren't 100% clear to either of them), AND ALSO caught in a political system that informed his thinking, behavior, morals, and also forced him into certain actions. (Insert philosophical debate on Free Will lol). Evunial knows Solas needs to make amends for his own sake and peace of mind, but she doesn't push him or demand it of him. She loves him as is, the essence of him, as her spirit always has.
Is there something your Lavellan fundamentally misunderstands about Solas, and that Solas fundamentally misunderstands about your Lavellan? What finally allows them to understand each other more clearly and how does that understanding come?
Solas:
Solas, in the beginning of DAI, sees Evunial as a wide-eyed... almost child. To him, she is incredibly, incredibly young. She seems naive and sheltered (tbf, she is sheltered), especially compared to his own life experience. He appreciates her questions, he enjoys teaching her, but he writes her advances off as puppy love. He is painfully careful with her because she knows she is Wisdom incarnate and he is terrified of corrupting her (and afraid the Anchor is already doing it). But he also cannot resist the draw of her presence because it lets him reflect back at her what he himself once was.
But Evunial isn't naive or childish - she is what he was never allowed to be: wise. A soft kind of wisdom, diplomatic, kind, and humble. It only seems naive and childlike to him because he is a self-hating, self-abandoning cynic who clings on to pragmatic idealism as his only shield against his self-loathing.
What finally changes his perception is their first sexual encounter which leaves him shaking and sobbing with a panic attack. In his experience, someone immature would have pushed for answers and information out of curiosity and entitlement. Someone dangerous like him would use the moment to gain insight into potential weaknesses.
Evunial's willingness to care for him without pushing him to talk makes him see her in a different light when he thinks about it later. He's ashamed that he underestimated her, and of his patronizing behavior. He lets himself accept that this could actually be a true relationship, not just a dalliance or distraction, something he's been so hungry for all his long life - but this realization is also what ultimately drives him to break up with her in Crestwood.
Evunial:
Evunial, especially early on, romanticizes Solas a lot. She has never had a romantic relationship, nobody ever dared flirt with her. She notices how Solas reacts to her questions and admiration and concludes that this is the way to his heart. Solas is very torn on this - a part of him obviously enjoys being admired, but it also icks him. He is afraid of falling into the same trap as the Evanuris, getting addicted to the quasi-worship. It's a delicate back and forth tug of war inside him that Evunial interprets as him not being that interested.
Also, it takes Evunial until Veilguard to REALLY understand what Solas did. Her idealized version of him - the chain-breaker, the rebel, the freedom-fighter, protector of the People, the kind and intelligent and sensitive man who burst into tears after fucking her - she had a lot of time building that image of him in her head. And she was 100% unable to be objective about it because she was so deeply in love.
The revelations during Veilguard... fill in some of the gaps with reality instead of fluffy imagination. She gains a more complete picture of Solas and she is grateful for it - but it's also difficult.
What is the dynamic between your Lavellan and your Rook?
My second canon Rook is Hal'evuna (or Vuna), and she is Solas and Evunial's daughter (conceived the one and only time they had sex, right after the battle at Adamant; both of them forgot about contraception because of Solas' panic attack; lyrium body shenanigans make her age faster;).
Evunial loves and treasures Vuna for not entirely selfless reasons: this child is a constant reminder of Solas' presence in her life. When she is born in secret (with only Cassandra present), Evunial cries so hard she throws up - from both joy and deep, almost incomprehensible pain. She had thought that Solas would show himself, at least for this. She understands why he doesn't. But that doesn't make it hurt any less.
Vuna grows up on the road with Evunial, always on the move, Evunial fiercely guarding their identities while she works as a traveling therapist (mainly in alienages across the South). (Returning to clan Lavellan is not an option without her Vallaslin and with the child of the Dread Wolf on her hip. She wants to spare Deshanna and her parents the decision of having to exile her.)
It works fine so long as Vuna is little - but once she hits 10 years old, she begins asking uncomfortable questions that Evunial isn't willing/able to answer. Vuna finds out who her father is in the Fade, outside Evunial's control.
Vuna runs off at 14 - she's sick of having to live in secret, so she travels to Rivain and joins the Lords of Fortune in the hope that getting around a lot and having access to lots of rumors and chatter, she might find out where her father is hiding. Varric recruits her as Rook two years later, completely unaware that this is Solas' child (Cassandra and Vivienne were adamant on not breathing a single word to Varric; he doesn't even know Evunial was ever pregnant;).
Evunial and "Rook's" meetings are strained and stilted. Both of them know they have to act as if they don't know each other, while also containing SO MUCH unspoken emotion within themselves.
Vuna is mostly angry at her mother and father ("You can help and save all of Thedas but you can't be there for ME?!") - which only intensifies when they both leave for the Fade.
Evunial loves her daughter dearly but also wishes she could have spared her the whole mess that happens during Veilguard. It was her goal to keep Vuna hidden precisely to keep her away from the Inquisition, the Evanuris, Solas' plans, etc.; she only wanted a normal life for her child. Which, she reasons, Vuna may now have, with both her infamous parents gone from the world.
It takes them centuries to somewhat reconcile.
If your Rook comes to know Solas primarily as an adversary, while your Lavellan’s experience is coloured by their love and history together, where do their interpretations of him overlap - and where do they differ?
Solas isn't necessarily an adversary to Vuna but she IS very much angry at him for leaving her and her mother for "bullshit, fabricated, imaginary reasons". Her interactions with him are a game of cat and mouse, she doesn't know that Solas knows that she's his daughter. They both pretend to have no relation and constantly jab at each other with sarcasm and cynicism.
Vuna views Solas as a selfish prick who chose the fulfillment of some ancient oath to Mythal (or "the People" or whoever) over the chance at a very real, actual life - just to salve his bruised ego.
(She's also offended over his attempts at tricking her towards the end of the game - "will never come down by my hand"; he HAS to know she's smarter than that. Insufferable bastard.)
(Vuna isn't really angry over the blood magic mind connection - in a weird way, she's grateful for it. It's the closest relationship she's had with her father in all her life. He speaks to her directly in her mind, and when she wakes up, she hugs herself and cries because all she wants is to be accepted and loved by him. Solas will battle his regret over this abuse of circumstances for centuries.)
Vuna does come to understand Solas more after viewing his memories in the Crossroads and at the Lighthouse. During her private conversations with "Inquisitor Lavellan", she has to begrudgingly admit that there is more to Solas than her teenage angst lets her currently perceive. She really tries, for her mother's sake, to find understanding for Solas within her heart.
Ultimately, they both see him as a fundamentally good but misguided and deeply traumatized person. They both pity him, to a degree (for Vuna this happens most clearly after she sees Solas with Mythal - she's seen slaves and servants, she's seen Evunial treat their trauma). They both feel he is being judged unfairly at the moment and should get a chance to explain himself and to redeem himself in the eyes of those who feel he needs to do that.
But while Evunial is willing to fully go all-in and forget about everything, so long as she gets to be at his side (cue the "trad wife" comments lol), Vuna remains hurt and angry despite her begrudging understanding. She's glad for her mother but she also feels Solas is stealing her away, another selfish decision for his own benefit (she's not mature enough to recognize that this was also and especially Evunial's decision, and she should also be angry at her, not just Solas) - but she ALSO feels guilty, because it was she herself who ran away and left her mother behind two years ago. It's complicated (:
