#pre-trespasser

     The moon had a milky glow in the inky black sky, amidst an array of diamond dust stars. The cool wind tugged at the free locks of her black hair, tickling her neck. Ghilina only smiled as she took comfort from the gentle, melodic timbre of the voice behind her. She snuggled her back deeper into his warm, broad chest as his outstretched arm pointed out ancient constellations written in those stars.

     Ghilina set her jaw as she shook the memory from her mind, viciously blinking back the sting of tears that they often brought. Instead she forced her mind away, placing an elbow on the desk as the width of her forehead rested between her thumb and forefinger. 

     The shudder from the ever cooling breeze made her involuntarily shudder, but she did not tear her focus from the documents she pored over by candlelight. Documents that had gone neglected in the days leading up to Corypheus, and she was determined to keep her mind busy.

     A quick set of knocks echoing from her chamber door startled her as she looked up, the door swinging open before she could answer. 

     Walking inside was the dashing dark-haired, bronze-skinned Dorian whose curled mustache bowed with his frown.

"Honestly," he complained, crossing the room in a long-legged stride to the open balcony, "I haven't the foggiest how you could concentrate on anything with this cold."

     He pulled the balcony doors shut with a clatter as Ghilina watched with an amused grin, leaning back in her seat, arms folded.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of your company, mister Pavus?" Ghilina asked.

"You know I am to return to Tevinter, yes?" Dorian began, "It has been many months since we defeated Corypheus, and I cannot postpone my journey much longer."

"When are you leaving?" 

"Tomorrow," he answered sadly, "I've given my goodbyes to the others. It will be strange to be without them. For my last night in Skyhold, I wanted to spend it with you."

Ghilina gaped with astonishment, "with me? What did you have in mind?"

Dorian reached for her hand and pulled her from her chair, "A few ideas, just know I won't take no for an answer. Come with me."

Ghilina couldn't help but smile as he led her from her chamber and down the stone steps.

     The blanket draped around her shoulders was thick and warm in the cold night, it failed to reach her toes which would feel the chill before too long. 

     Ghilina heard the murmurs behind her and turned to look. Dorian was accepting two large steaming mugs from one of the kitchen girls whose head peaked up from the hole leading into the Mage tower. Ghilina admired the girl's courage, even now few were willing to brave the inside of the tower, much less climb the ladder to the roof. 

     The girl gave Dorian a final toothy smile before the loud clack of boots against wooden ladder rungs signaled her descent. 

     The mug Dorian offered was filled with a dark and hot liquid. Ghilina accepted the mug gingerly and wrapped her hands around its metallic surface, letting the warmth flow through her fingers and banish the wintry chill. 

"I trust you wouldn't think I had it poisoned," Dorian teased lightly, "I'm told it's good for a wounded heart."

Ghilina could not hide the surprise from her face, to which Dorian greeted with a delighted laugh.

"You didn't really think you were hiding it, did you?"

Ghilina looked down, "I had hoped I was."

She took a drink from her mug to hide her embarrassment, and what greeted her was a dark, hot liquid that was rich and creamy as it coated her tongue thickly. It smoothly flowed down her throat.

"Chocolate?" She asked, staring into her mug.

"Hot Cocoa," Dorian corrected, "or so I am told. It was among the many gifts sent to the Inquisition for their help against the Red Templars. Quite popular in the more cold and rural parts of Orlais, I hear."

     She watched him from beneath the lip of her cup as he sat across the table, a knowing smile on his face. He lifted his gaze for only a moment to meet hers. But a moment was all it took for her heart to flutter like the butterflies in her stomach.

     Her vision blurred as her eyes glimmered with tears. She looked skyward before they could fall, quickly blinking them away. 

     Dorian took her cup from her hands then and placed it on the wall's ledge with his own, "There will be none of that."

     Before Ghilina could protest, Dorian had gently pulled her to his chest and held her affectionately. She could not hide the surprise from her voice, "Dorian, what-"

"If it is uncomfortable, I will stop." He interrupted, "I have seen how strong you have tried to be, you are the Inquisitor and no one should see you vulnerable. We both know I am not no one. I am not Cole so I have no way to offer help as he could, but I would still offer help as a friend. You can cry here, get angry, fume, with just us and no one else."

     Those words were all it took for the walls Ghilina had built to hold her up and make her strong, to crumble and collapse at his feet. Moment by moment, they fell like the tears from her chin. 

     He continued softly, "What is tearing you apart shouldn't remain apart of you, you taught me that. Let it out, dear girl."

     She sobbed into his chest unceasingly, hands clutching at the fabrics of his mage robes. 

     Ghilina loved her hair, her hair very much like her mother's and all too uncommon among the Dalish, but it wasn't the best thing about her. It fell in raven-black waves against her ominously fair skin, so striking that it was one of the only things anyone in her clan commented on. But Solas, he barely seemed to notice it at all. Many times, she had caught him as he watched her like she held stars in her hands and left flowers in her wake. It was enough to bring heat to her face and wonder, fleetingly, what his lips might feel like against her own.

     The happy memories she had once treasured like kind and welcome friends in the darkest of times came to her now, each one bearing a dagger for her already vulnerable heart.

     Dorian only held her in silence, rocking her slowly and stroking her hair as the tears soaked his chest. 

     She stared back at him for what felt like hours as they exchanged shy, affectionate words in the snow, until finally she dropped her gaze, "Sweet talker," her voice was quieter now, less confident.

     Ghilina dared herself to look up; a gentle flush of pink against her skin that was not because of the biting cold. She held her breath as she leaned up on the tips of her toes, turning his face to her's by the chin, before tentatively pressing her lips to his. 

     Her head had gone hazy; her body stagnant for all but the sensation of their lips intertwined, so sweet and silken, it was unlike any kiss before. 

     Before she could regret, to see the discomfort of her boldness on his face, she retreated. Only to feel his hands grip her and pull her back in for a more experienced kiss that robbed her of her breath and her heart.

     She trembled and whimpered between waves of misery. Minutes of sobbing broken apart by short pauses for breath. But always she returned, hurling herself back into the open arms of her grief until her whole world faded to black.

     Ghilina found herself in her own bed when she was startled awake by the familiar belly laugh of The Iron Bull.

"Oh come on, Kadan. By the look on your face when I found you, I'd have thought you never had seen a woman fainting before."

Ghilina's back was to them, she found as she opened her eyes. Instinctively, she remained still as she listened.

"Could you keep your voice down, Amatus?" Dorian chided, "Half the castle must have heard you, and in case it went unnoticed, the Inquisitor is sleeping."

"Besides," he continued, "the only women I had seen fainting were never my closest friends. This was new, and more concerning."

The Iron Bull grunted, "Judging by the dark circles under her eyes, she must not be sleeping well."

Silence descended on the room then, for so long that Ghilina began to think they might have silently slipped out. The silence was shattered unexpectedly when Dorian spoke. 

"She must have been burying herself in work to keep her mind occupied." Dorian quavered with sadness, "You should have seen her when she finally let go, she was… beside herself with grief."

"I can guess. Just seeing that fake smile on her face for our benefit... She was holding everything back."

"You care much more than you pretend to, Amatus." Dorian teased.

Ghilina could hear the smile in Bull's voice, "Hey, I care a great deal."

"Of that, I am certain." Dorian gritted his teeth then, and continued, "What I cannot understand is how Solas could do this to her. No explanation, no closure, nothing. If I ever see him again, I'll… I don't know, but I'll do something to make him regret breaking her heart."

"You are a good one, Kadan. I don't know if she would like hearing you say that. But you're a good man all the same, and a good friend." The pride on Bull's voice was tangible. 

"I try to be. Ghilina has become one of my best friends in such a short amount of time. She doesn't deserve this. What he did to her."

     Dorian giggled suggestively before he reluctantly agreed. Ghilina heard their receding footsteps shortly after, followed by the soft clatter of her chamber door.

"No, she doesn't." Ghilina heard the creak of a chair, "We should go, Kadan. Let her rest. Besides, you're setting off tomorrow and I would hate to see you go without something to remember me by."

She sat up in bed and stretched, her eyes were sore and swollen, no doubt glaringly red, and feeling puffy at the touch. Her cheeks felt stiff and worn from the dried tears, and her head ached. Yet despite all of that, she felt surprisingly refreshed. Perhaps some time on the balcony would help relieve some of the swelling and soreness she felt.

Now, he was gone and she could feel his absence like an abyss in her heart, a dark spot in her mind. He had become such an integral part of her life in such a short time that she couldn’t think of a future without him.

The worst part though was that he had left without a word. After what had happened between them in Crestwood, after he had taken her vallaslin, he had promised to talk to her. To explain why he didn’t want her. As it turned out he never intended to say crap about any of it.

May the Dread Wolf take him, she thought and clenched her fists.

“You gotta stop that, y’know.”

That was Sera’s voice. Alis turned around in surprise and found her friend standing at the top of the stairs, her arms crossed in front of her chest. She hadn’t heard her come in.

“Stop what, exactly?” Alis asked.

“Being all sad”, Sera said with a beaten look upon her face. “Makes me sad, too. But we shouldn’t feel sad, right, after defeating Coryphisus and everything?”

“Yeah,” she replied slowly. “Maybe ...”

Sera came closer and stopped in the doorway as if she was unsure if she could join Alis out on the balcony. Encouraging her friend with a wave of her hand, Alis said: “Come here. Let’s hang out for a bit.”

The younger elf stepped out onto the balcony, taking in the panorama of the Frostback mountains. The sun was nothing more than a golden glimmer in the distance, as the dark of the night slowly covered the world like a blanket with thousands of stars to illuminate the sky. “Woah,” the younger said. “It’s quite the view.”

"Yes, it is."

Sera turned to look at the Inquisitor. Suddenly, her eyes seemed darker than usual. Alis knew that look. There was something gloomy on Sera’s mind and she would need to get it out of her system before she could return to her playful self.

“Care to share your thoughts with me?”, Alis asked encouragingly.

Sera’s lips twitched. For a moment, Alis thought her friend would shake her head and pretend that everything was alright. Instead, Sera gestured towards her face. “He did that, didn’t he?”

It took her a moment to realize what her friend meant. Slowly, Alis brought her hand – the one without the anchor – up to her face. Her fingers traced the parts of her skin where June’s blood writing used to be. Not that her skin felt different. It was warm and soft and smooth as usual, except maybe for the scar under her left eye. Sometimes, she simply forgot it was no longer there.

“Yes, he did,” she said at last. “He told me what the markings meant and I allowed him to remove it with a spell.”

“Didn’t know it’s possible” Sera mused. “Removing the Dalish ink stuff, I mean.”

“The vallaslin” she corrected, more out of habit than real interest in being right. “Yeah, me too.”

“Why did you do it?”

Alis blinked. She’d expected her friend to ask her how Solas had removed the vallaslin or why he made the offer in the first place. But she was wrong about Sera – again – and she was glad about it. It felt good to have someone care about her most of all things.

“Getting the vallaslin is considered as a rite of passage among the Dalish,” she explained and noticed the undertone of sadness in her own voice. “When it was time for me to get mine, I didn’t think as long about it as some of the others. I told our keeper to give me the markings of June because I recognized myself in him. He's a practical god, a god of the people. Not unlike Andraste, I suppose. Anyway, Deshanna gave me my vallaslin and I wore it like a piece of clothing. After a time, I forgot how my face looked like without it. My vallaslin marked me as Dalish and I was proud to be one of them.

But when I arrived in Haven and joined the Inquisition, I felt the need to become … well, more. People had begun to form this mental image of me that had nothing to do with who I really was. It gave me nightmares, even thinking about it. How could I be more to these people than I was?”

Her heart ached, as she thought about Solas. He, too, had seen so much more in her than an ordinary woman, and through him, she had discovered that she was more than a Dalish elf. More than she could ever have imagined. A champion of her people, all of them.

“You have a rare and marvelous spirit. In another world …”

Alis took in a long breath, then sighed deeply. “When Solas offered to take the vallaslin away, I didn’t do it to abandon my people. That would have been a foolish notion. No, in removing the blood writing, I hoped that I might become the woman I needed to be in order to defeat Corypheus.”

“So, you didn’t stop being Dalish after all?”, Sera asked.

“No.” Alis tried to smile but failed miserably. “I could never do that. They made me who I am and I’ll be forever thankful for that.”

Sera’s gaze flicked from Alis’s face to her own hands. “Wish I would feel the same way about Lady Emmald”, she said in a low voice. “Not so much to be proud of there, though.”

Alis took Sera’s hand and squeezed it gently. “Those days are gone”, she said. “We have changed, both of us. We are no longer who we used to be. You are not the street urchin any longer, just like I’m no longer the first to my clan’s keeper. We’re more than we were, stronger.”

“You’re right,” Sera said, returning to her usual glee. “Let ’em think we’re still weak and elfy or whatever. We are better, you and I. Because of us, no one else.”

“Because of us.”

“Know what’s weird?” Sera looked puzzled. “I came over here to cheer you up, but instead you’re treating me all friendly and stuff. Don’t know how that happened, really.”

Alis laughed. “That’s what friends are for, Sera. We cheer each other up.”

“I guess you’re right.” Sera scratched her head, leaving her hair in a bigger mess than before. After all this time with the Inquisition, she still wasn’t used to having someone to share her feelings with. Maybe she would never be perfectly comfortable talking about herself.

“I thought the inky stuff looked nice on you”, Sera said after a short silence. “Pretty rad, to be honest.”

Alis smiled sardonically. “It’s not made of ink, you know that, don’t you?”

“Sure.” Sera snickered. “I just don’t care.”

“I should have expected that,” Alis replied. “Anyway, thank you.”

Another silence fell between, but it was less heavy than before. They simply enjoyed each other’s company. And what unlike company it was. A Dalish woman bonding with a city elf over the cruelty of life. The two of them made have begun their lives under completely different circumstances, but in the end, they had made a deeper connection than any Dalish or city elf might think possible.

“His Elfiness never deserved you, y’know”, Sera said finally.

Alis stirred. The seriousness in Sera’s voice startled her. “What...?”

“Don’t know what you saw in him, to be honest. He made my head hurt with all his Fade talk. But it seemed like he appreciated you. Could see it in his eyes when he looked at you. But if he wanted you so badly, he should’ve treated you better. I hope he feels ridiculous for leaving you behind.”

A smile tugged at her lips. “Thanks for saying that, Sera.”

“You said it yourself,” she replied. “Friends say nice things to make each other feel good.”

“Now, you’re ruining it”, Alis said.

Sera chuckled. “Alright, I shut it then. All I’m sayin’ is, you’re fine as you are. And if we happen to meet His Elfiness again, you can count on me to put some arrows in his smug face. If you like.”

“That's very nice of you, Sera, but I hope that won’t be necessary.”

“As you wish,” her friend said and made an imitation of herself drawing an arrow from her quiver. “But if you change your mind, let me know, Inquisitor. I'll take him down before he knows what hit him."

Unwillingly, a broad smile spread across Alis’s face. When she had first met Sera, her dismissal of the Dalish culture had hit her like a kick to the stomach. It had taken time to understand Sera’s point of view. Now she wondered why she had been so close-minded. There were countless elves like Sera, trying to get by. For most Dalish they were nothing more than animals, too weak to stand against their shemlen overlords and for the longest time, Alis had shared their opinion. But thanks to Sera, she had come to see the error of her ways. The city elves were deserving of her help and support. And maybe, with time and a lot of careful diplomacy, she might bring the remaining Dalish to see them as their kin again.

Imagine the things we could accomplish, she thought and looked at Sera. Together.

In that moment, she realized that she might have grown to fill the role of Inquisitor, but there were still parts of her that were left unchanged. She was a resourceful woman, after all. She was a force to be reckoned with. It was best she used her powers to change the world for the better. Because no matter how terrible the past was or how many people she’d lost, the future was something she could still take control over.

A wave of warm energy washed over her. She was hurting, but she was alive. All she needed to do was take the next step, and the next and the next, until she had formed a new life for herself. Until then, she would see to it that the Inquisition continued to help people across Thedas as best it could.

Her new-found confidence seemed to be showing because Sera suddenly raised her eyebrows.

“You’re alright?” she asked in a baffled tone.

“I’m fine,” she said and meant it. “Or at least, I will be.”

Sera’s face lit up. “That’s good. Fine is always good.”

“It is.”

“So, where you gonna go, now that Coryphinas is gone?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I’ll go back to the Free Marches,” Alis said. “Deshanna, my clan's keeper, holds a seat on the council of Wycome now. It would be a good place to start over.” She turned to Sera. “When I go, would you want to come along?”

How had he come to this? How had he earned it? A position of respect, the accomplishments of his men and the Inquisition as much his as they belonged to the woman who had lead them this far; such mastery as he could hope for over the weakness of flesh that had been forced upon him when he had chosen the path his life would take as a youth; friends, true friends, who had found their way past his heinous mistakes and bluster to draw him close despite his protests. And her ... her faith, her love, her softness shown only to him in these private hours they could snatch together. Kassandra Trevelyan could have chosen anyone, yet she had chosen him. Not only chosen him, but given him an anchor, not only in her love but in the shared devotion they felt to the tiny girl they had made together, whisked away for these few hours by Leliana and Josephine. And in that choice, his life had somehow found its way to this place, this moment, when everything seemed at peace.

He looked down at his hands, bathed in the blood-red light of the sunset, and, for just a moment, it seemed as though his hands were slick with the real blood of those whose pain he had contributed to in the confusion of his own trauma. All those mages at Kirkwall, made Tranquil even after their Harrowings; other punishments that gave pain where none should have been given - not by his hand, but by his implicit agreement when he did nothing to prevent it. Even when he had spoken up, far later than he should have done, all he had achieved was to be cut out of Meredith's councils, no longer trusted enough by her to know the worst of what she had in mind. He had been lucky, he knew, to have been with those of the order in Kirkwall sympathetic to Ser Thrask's attempt not long before; glad that together they had, at least, managed to calm some of the mages they encountered and encouraged them to hide until the worst was over. But there had been no such choice when it came to storming the Gallows itself. Innocent blood was on his hands; the blood of innocent men and women who had only been defending themselves against an unfair, unlawful death sentence laid down upon them by a madwoman. If Hawke had not been there ... he did not want to imagine how long he would have stood by in silence without such a catalyst to spur him into embracing the right path at last.

He ached for the Templar Order, deep in his heart. They had begun with such noble purpose. They had been intended to protect and serve, and that was why he had wanted to join them in the first place. The boy he had been had been so certain that the best way to protect and serve Ferelden and Thedas was to join the Templars. He'd wanted to help people - people, not just those born without magic. Nor had he been alone in that noble ambition. Many of the boys and girls he had trained with had come to the Order with the same hopes, though not all of them had been willing apprentices to the sword and the Chant. In truth, there had been a good deal more learning of the Chant than he had been expecting, he recalled with a rueful smile. He had expected armor and swordplay, and while there had been a great deal of that, there had been a great deal more reciting of the Chant while candle burned down, while distractions were offered in the background. It wasn't until many years later that he had realized the necessity of such practices. A templar engaged in negating the power of a mage was subject to many such distractions; the need to keep their mind focused at all costs was the true shield against magic and spells. Perhaps he wouldn't have objected so much if he had known the purpose at the time.

He had been so proud the day he was knighted. The day I first took lyrium. His hand shook at the memory - that first burn of distilled lyrium through his veins, burning him, marking him, taking hold of his destiny quietly as the Chantry had deemed it. Of all the things he had done, he resented the most that the Chantry had allowed him - and so many others - the leash themselves so firmly without the least notion of what it would mean to break that leash. Oh, he had done it now, certainly; at least, the leash was not so tight about his neck any longer. The craving would always be there; the pain of being without the lyrium would always haunt him. Yet he refused to mindlessly follow any longer. Two years without lyrium, and still it called to him. It always would. But he had pleasanter distractions now that took the entire focus of his mind without demands on anything he did not willingly give. The woman dozing in the bed behind him, for example.

Kassandra was ... how could he define her? She was the light in his darkness, the unexpected reward he had never seen coming. He had thought to love her in silence, never speaking a word nor betraying a glance, and yet she had spoken first. She had given him the means to walk onward into the light, never faltering in her certainty that he could undo the chains that bound him to the Chantry. Though they knew now that Andraste had not been the one to deliver her from the Fade, still he believed that Andraste's hand covered his lover's path. The core of Andraste's teachings was love, and love was what had helped him finally find his way once more. Though he might never tell her to her face, Kassandra would always be the Herald of Andraste to his heart.

And he had almost lost her, too many times. Lost her to the heedless stupidity of fearful men and women at Adamant; lost her to the coarse cruelty of a magister and his minions, to the snow and the wind, at Haven. Even now, years after the fact, his heart clenched at the memory of watching the avalanche plummet down to cover the village, knowing Kassandra was there. Squinting through the darkness of the night to find the shining beacon of Fade-light on her hand, only to see it wink out of existence and know, deep in his soul, that she was gone. Gone before he could touch her face, taste her lips; gone before he could even admit to himself how deep his feeling for her ran. He had remembered the preaching of the elderly priest in Honnleath in those moments, her ramblings on the dark night of the soul that found the dawn's light in the love of the Maker and Andraste. That night had been his dark night of the soul. The wind had blown bitterly cold, the wolves howled, and Cullen had mourned for a love he had never acknowledged, even to himself, while she lived. In truth, he had given up hope in those hours, his patient vigil at the mouth of the valley nothing more than a means to give himself privacy as he struggled with the anger, the pain, the tearing maw of loss that screamed in his chest. And there, on the snow, the flash of green Fade-light.

He'd been moving before he even registered what he saw, shouting back to the other watchers, There. It's her! He barely recalled Cassandra crowding in at his back as he'd hauled Kassandra up onto her feet, grimacing at her moan of pain, at the blood that decorated her dented armor. Between them, they had carried her down to the camp, listening to the awe and wonder that spread before them, yet all his mind had been consumed with Kassandra. Would she live? How had she survived? Would she live? The ache in his chest had not dissipated as he waited, deepening with anxious uncertainty until finally the mages emerged with the news that she lived. And all at once, the enormity of what had happened had hit him. It had taken all his strength not to fall to his knees and weep for the miracle that had brought her back to them, all his focus to turn his attention to what they should do next. A crooked smile tugged at his scar once again as he remembered the thought that had driven him in those hours before she woke - I must make her glad to have escaped the death she embraced for our sake. And the quieter, less noble wish - I want her to be proud of me. Of us. He hadn't truly wanted the pride of anyone since his childhood until that moment, nor had he mourned anyone with such raw immediacy of passion. He had hoped never to have to feel that gnawing pain again.

But, of course, there had been Adamant. The last resort of good men and women lead into foolishness by fear, and all he had been able to do was open the door for the Inquisitor and her companions to forge ahead and prevent the abomination taking place at the heart of the fortress. He'd had to watch the woman he loved walk directly into danger yet again, powerless to do anything but coordinate the attack that would keep the worst of the danger from her. Yet the scream of the dragon circling the high stone walls had filled him with terror. The last time he had seen it had been at Haven, flying away from the icy wall of death unleashed by Kassandra in hope. The last time he had seen it, he had mourned the loss of her ... and at Adamant, he had mourned again when word reached him of her disappearance through a Fade rift. Yet that pain had been so much worse, constrained as he was by his duty at the head of the army around him. There had been no leisure to grieve for the woman he loved; no time to linger on the knowledge that there would be no more stolen kisses, no more quiet moments. No chance to regret never telling her the truth of his heart. And, for the second time, she returned from seeming death, weary and wan, haunted by the Nightmare of the Fade, and this time, he had not cared who saw the depth of his feeling for her. Orders given, he had shown her his grief, his fear, his love ... and still the words had not come.

Not until a few weeks later, back in the safety of Skyhold, when uncertainty had become confidence with the surety of her consent, and he had finally given her everything he had to give - his body, his mind, his heart, his soul. And again, she had spoken first, the words a tender memory from that gentle morning, and he had responded with absolute truth. I love you. The words were a new leash, yet one he wore with pride. He loved Kassandra, for all her fiery faults and stubborn misdemeanors; she loved him, for her sins. He would never stop thanking whichever deity had brought them to one another for this chance. He would never take her for granted.

"Cullen?"

His head rose as the last of the light bled from the sky, the sun dipping beneath the horizon as the deep blue of night rushed to wipe the fire and blood from the clouds. He glanced over his shoulder, a tender smile softening his features at the sight of Kassandra, disheveled from sleeping through the worst of the afternoon's heat, her toned curves complimented by the lacy confection she had chosen for their sojourn in bed.

"What's wrong?" she asked, ducking beneath the arm he raised to invite her against his side.

Cullen kissed her brow, holding her close as he breathed her in, his eyes straying to the empty crib that held their daughter every other night but this one.

"Nothing, my love," he promised her softly. "With you by my side, nothing will ever be wrong."