#seragna

“Dunno, really. Just started mixing. Well. A Friend got into this noble tit’s workshop and found a bunch of flasks and stuff. So I got to start with that. But after, it was all trying to see what worked and what didn’t.”

Sera raises her left arm and pulls down her sleeve; a wide scar twists around the limb. “That one was shit. Flask broke before I was ready.”

But Lavellan whisks her off to the Winter Palace not long after and Dagna’s left alone--not alone, there are plenty of people for company, but none of them are Sera. She knows she likes pretty things but not enchanted things, she knows she likes reds and golds and pinks and blues and agates, and working stone comes second only to working metal for a Smith Caste girl.

Flowers, she decides. Flowers are pretty, and, Sera’s pretty, too. That’s a thought she doesn’t dwell on. She forms stems Navarrite wire and leaves from veridium, shining iridescent pink and purple and green in the soft light of the Undercroft. She hammers with a lightest touch, and shapes the veins on the leaves with a stylus. The flowers are blue-white agate, scraped from solid fist-sized chunks she finds in the river down below the undercroft, shaking with cold. She turns them into trumpet-shapes, crystal grace with delicate edges and carnelian centers.

It takes three weeks.

The Inquisitor keeps them in Orlais for five, Sera and Iron Bull and Dorian, and then a side trip into the Hissing Wastes; she likes Mahanon, he’s a decent man and funny, but. The flowers sit on the barrel outside Sera’s room for far too long. She has to stop and dust them when she hears the party is finally coming home. Her heart flutters in her chest and she wants both to lurk outside Sera’ door and wait for Sera to come find her even though she knows her friend--

A friend now? Only a friend? Something more?

--that Sera will be caught up in meetings and debriefings for hours.

(“Debriefing, yeah? Sounds like--oh, never mind.)

She takes a seat in the tavern, by the Chargers’ first lieutenant, standing on his chair watching the bard with wide, nug-love eyes. Krem doesn’t mind her there, and they talk sometimes, but he’s good to sit with when you don’t really want to talk, too.

“You like her,” Dagna says, after a while. She’s had two cups of ale flavored with sarsaparilla. Krem sighs deeply.

“I’d like it more if she didn’t make me feel like I was fifteen years old and tripping over my own feet.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Dagna says.

They raise their mugs, and when Sera comes in and tromps up the stairs Dagna’s face is hidden behind her drink.

She’s a storm of muttering, slammed doors and curses at royals and nobles and spies. Mahanon jogs in not long after, stomps up after her. Their conversation is intense and hushed and above it the words, “People died! Good people! Died, Herald!”

Sera’s door shuts, and stays that way for a long time--even after the Inquisitor slinks back down the stairs and out the front door of the tavern, muttering.

She didn’t notice the flowers, Dagna thinks, and excuses herself to go back to her quarters.

The Undercroft is too big and too hollow the next day, and none of her runes sit right in her hands, the enchantments of them just a little off. They aren’t right. She picks up a ruined runestone and flings it out into the waterfall with a guttural sound low in her throat.

She didn’t notice. Dagna wipes at her eyes with the heel of her hand and gets back to work on the next rune. She’s angry, yes, though mostly at herself--and hurt, too. Because the plan was that Sera would go back to her room and see her gift and come looking for the person who left it immediately, not spend an afternoon shooting arrows at her door while while Dagna simmered in her own inward loathing.

It was silly, she thinks, and, I probably should’ve just got her actual flowers.

There is a very nice embrium growing in the Skyhold garden, and she’s seen Embrium in Sera’s room before.

The runestone snaps in half between her fingers and Dagna can’t today, she just can’t. She gathers up her tools and pleads headache, telling Harritt she’s going to head back up to her quarters to lie down in a quiet dark room for a while. It’s not all a lie.

Why do I like her so much? I don’t even really know her that well!

She makes it to the garden with hands tucked into her pockets and halfway up the flight of stairs by the small Chantry and the storage room their new witch won’t let anyone near. She remembers Morrigan, remembers her arguing with the Hero of Ferelden that they didn’t have time to go back to the Circle, and keeps her distance. It’s one more reminder that nothing gets to be easy.

And halfway up the stairs, the sound of running feet slapping the cobblestones distracts her.

“Wait up, you!” Sera calls, and Dagna turns.

She has an armful of stone flowers in one arm, and she’s waving the other wildly above her head. Dagna’s eyes well, and she blinks back emotion that threatens to overwhelm her right there on the stairs.

“Did you bring me these?” Sera asks, holding out the offending bouquet. “Regular flowers wilt and die and go all moldy. These don’t. Might tarnish, though. I don’t care. Why?”

The thing she wants to say is: because I like you, because I want to spend more time with you, because I think we could be something really amazing together. The thing she actually says, is, “I made them for you. Do you like them?”

“Like them, what are you, daft? They’re perfect! Whaddyou mean you made them?”

Dagna tells her, from the idea of them to the pinch in her chest when she left with the Inquisitor for Halamshiral, quiet nights spent alone with stone and metal. She does not mention how Sera came home.

“You should’ve told me,” she says, “It’s not like I can see inside your head. That’d be weird. And creepy.”

We’re the same height Sera three steps down, Dagna realizes. They’re so close. She leans in, and suddenly she’s very dizzy, because Sera is very close. She drops the hand with the flowers, holding them just-away from her body and takes Dagna’s hand with her free one. It’s easy, warm, and Dagna touches her cheek with her free hand and kisses her.

Bright sparks, hot metal, the smell of alchemy clinging to her hair, and Dagna doesn’t want to pull away. Sera’s the one who steps back and licks her lips.

“Right,” she says, “What was that?”

“A kiss, I think.”

Sera rolls her eyes, “I know that part, what I mean is--”

“--Why?”

“Yeah.”

Dagna shrugs. Her word bubble up and stick in her throat, suddenly swollen and hard to work. Finally, she manages, “I like you a lot. Not just because you’re interesting. You are interesting, but--”

“--You’re really cute,” Sera says.

Dagna blushes.

“And I’m gonna … go. Think. About this.”

“Sera?”

“Yeah?”

“Forgive me for startling you,” Zevran said as he stood from the table and approached her.  She was in a strange stance, as though she had reached for her weapons but came up empty-handed.  “Sera, yes?   Leliana introduced us.”

“Oh, right,” Sera said, drawing out the first syllable.  Ohhhhh, right.  She relaxed her stance.  “You were in the Blight with her?”

Zevran gave a small bow.  “Zevran Arainai, former Antivan Crow, current free agent assassin, momentarily wondering exactly what you can’t make up your mind about in the Undercroft.”

“That’s!” Sera said, blushing.  “That is none of your business!”

Zevran smirked.  “If I may guess, there’s someone down there you find very interesting?  Someone, you hope, might find you interesting, too?”

She put her fists on her hips and glared at him.  “What did I say about your business, and this being none of it?”

He held up his hands and took a step back.  “Of course, I apologize. Only I am a very talented flirt, and currently a very bored one,  too, so I only want to offer my time and skills,  if you wish to make use of them.”

“I wish you’d piss off!”

“At once,” he said, and turned to leave.

Just then, the door to the Undercroft opened, and a cheerful dwarven face appeared.  “Oh, Sera!  Would you mind doing me a small favor?”  The woman extended a folded piece of paper and Sera took it wordlessly.   “Can you get that to Leliana please?  I’d do it myself but I’m in the middle of—Zevran?”

He recognized her as she said his name, though ten years separated him from the last time they’d met.  He smiled, laying on the charm.   “Dagna of Kinloch Hold.”

Dagna laughed.  “Oh, not for years!  I didn’t know you were—”  She was interrupted by a bang from the room behind her.  Her face brightened.  “We’ll catch up later, alright?”  She disappeared.

Slowly Sera turned to Zevran.  Her eyes narrowed.  “She knows you?”

Zevran picked an invisible speck from his shirt.  “Certainly.  I met her during the Blight, too.”  He met her eyes and smiled.  Sera frowned, her eyebrows forming a sharp angle on her face.  “Are you reconsidering my offer?”

Sera chewed her lip.  He wondered what was at work in her mind, what factors were being considered and discarded.  In the end, she had a grim look on her face, like she wasn’t sure if she’d regret this later.   “Alright, fine, you can, ugh, help me out.  I’m gonna deal with this.”   She gestured at him with Dagna’s message.  “Then I’ll meet you at the tavern, alright?  My room’s on the second floor.  And I swear, if anyone sees you going in there—”

“Don’t worry, I have seen you training in the yard.  I wouldn’t dare cross you.”

A lie, obviously, but she brightened. “That’s right you wouldn’t.  Ten minutes.”

+

It was simple enough for Zevran to sneak across the roof of the tavern and into Sera’s window.  She was already there, pacing and wringing her hands.  She glared at him.  “This is stupid.”

“I can go any time you wish,” he said.  As much fun as this was likely to be, he wasn't about to force his company on her.

“Nodon’t!” she said, holding out her hands.  She sighed.  “I probably need your help.  I don’t know what to do.  I’ve never had to try so hard.  I like someone, usually she likes me back.  And if she doesn’t catch on or doesn’t, you know, feel the same way or whatever, I forget about her and move on.”  Her expression was strained.  She covered it with her hands.  “It’s different this time.  I can’t stop thinking about her, I can’t—ugh, I’m so stupid.”

“Not to worry, my friend,” Zevran said.  He patted her arm sharply.   “You’ll have her naked and shaking in your arms in no time.”

“Ohhhhh Andraste’s dirty drawers, what have I gotten myself into?”   She dragged her hands down her face and looked at him from between her fingers.  “Well?  What should I do?”

“Tell me first what you have already tried.  What methods have you used to woo her?”

“Er...methods?”

“Yes, your techniques, your strategies, your moves, so to speak, that you use to attract a woman.”

“Errrrm...?”  She trailed off, looking at him expectantly.  Zevran pursed his lips.

“I see.”

“Oh fuck off, who cares if I don’t have any moves?”

“Dagna, it would seem.”

“...Shit.”

Zevran looked around the room.  He said “aha!” and picked up a well-worn lute from its place on the window seat.  “A romantic ballad is the first step into anyone’s heart.  You play, I assume?”

Sera looked at the instrument in his hands.  “Erm...yes.  Yes, I can.  Yes!”

“Excellent!”  He handed her the lute and smiled.  “This will be easier than I thought.”

It turned out he’d spoken too soon.  It attracted Dagna’s attention, to be sure, but only because she heard the racket from behind the thick stone door to the Undercroft and came out to ask if everything was alright.  Before Zevran could step out of his hiding place to smooth it over, Sera blurted out “It’s a prank!  On Solas!”  Pretty good cover, overall, because Sera’s aggressive rendition of “The Naughty Elven Cowherd” felt, to Zevran, like a joke someone was trying to pull.

“Well that’s...very funny, Sera,” Dagna said, “but I’m in the middle of something, and it’s really distracting, so could you—”

Sera shouted “Surenoproblem!” and fast-walked out of the hall.  Zevran followed and stopped her short in the entryway.

“You said you could play the lute!” he hissed at her.

“I was playing!”  He looked at her, hands on hips.  “Alright, well, you didn't ask if I was any good.”

“Of course,” Zevran sighed, “it’s my fault for assuming you wouldn’t think it wise to woo someone by screeching a dirty song at them while abusing an innocent lute.”

Sera tossed her hair back.  “Well, I forgive you.”

Zevran laughed.  “How generous!  Come, let us think.  I’m sure you have some other talent that will grab Dagna’s attention.”

+

Three burnt-black pies.  A vase of flowers, shattered on the stairs. Seven poems so awful that Zevran felt obligated to burn them himself.  A rabbit that chewed a hole in its enclosure and returned to the mountains and anyway, was a wild rabbit really the sort of animal to give as a pet?  These and a dozen other gifts or gestures were tried and failed, and Zevran was starting to think that even he had his limits.   Some people, perhaps, could not be helped.

He sat in Sera’s window seat, staring out at the courtyard and fantasizing about how his day would be going if only Isabela had walked into the great hall instead.  Sera was face-down on the floor, looking defeated.  Suddenly she sat up, a huge smile on her face.

“Wait wait!  I know!  I have these fire arrows that—”

“No!” Zevran said sharply, a look of panic on his face.  “No more fire!”

Sera sighed and fell back to the floor with a thump.  Zevran stood and climbed out onto the roof.  “I'm going for a walk,” he said, thinking that if she changed her mind on that fire arrow plan, he wanted to be as far from her as possible.

It was just turning from day to dusk, and he slunk through the shadows around the castle into the garden.  It was empty.  He stretched out on a bench and closed his eyes.  “What a mess,” he said.

“What mess?”

He opened his eyes and as Dagna entered the garden.  She had a tired, but triumphant, look on her face.  She sat on the bench next to him and sighed.  “I just got out of a mess of my own.  Maybe I can help with yours.”

He smiled privately.  “If I think of a way, I will let you know.”

“Well, you know me,” she said.  “I live to be useful.”

They were both silent for a moment, soaking up the calm of the garden, before Dagna spoke again.  “So Zevran, um, Sera’s pretty fun, huh?”

Zevran thought his heart stopped beating for a moment.  He leaned forward and turned to look at Dagna.  She was smiling, with a certain sheepishness around the eyes.  “That is,” he said, “one word for her, yes.”

Dagna looked down at her hands, and—yes, yes! by all the gods of elves and men!—she was blushing.  “Others might be, strong, kind, thoughtful, witty, um, beautiful.”  She looked up at him, and as a lewd smile slid onto his face, she laughed.

“Well, well,” he said, feeling like himself for the first time in hours.  “It seems the lovely Sera has caught your eye.  Have you made any efforts to catch hers?”

“I don't know.  No.  I'm just so busy, with all my work.”  She sighed.  “Who has time for getting a girl to like you?”

“Ah, Dagna.”  He took her hand and squeezed it between both of his.   “I may have just the thing.  But!  We will have to talk strategy.”  He let go of her and hopped to his feet.  “Let us meet in the library, after I gather a few things.  That quiet corner at the back, to make sure we aren’t disturbed.  Half an hour?”

“Uh, sure thing!” she said.  “Half an hour.  I need to change out of these smelly work clothes anyway.”

“Yes, good idea!” Zevran said, walking backwards across the garden to keep her in his sight.  “Perhaps you might wash up a bit, too.”

“Okay?” she said, as he disappeared up the steps to the battlements.

+

Sera didn’t know what Zevran was cooking, but she was too tired argue.  It was all feeling pretty pointless, trying, because if this fucker couldn’t get Dagna to notice her, it probably wasn’t possible.   But why not play along, she supposed, on the off chance?

But when she got to the quiet back corner of the library, she was confused.  There were lit candles on the large square study table, along with some bread, cheese, fruit, a bottle of wine, and two glasses.  She was staring at the table, trying to get what was going on, when Dagna walked out of the stacks across from her.

She looked gorgeous.  Her face was pink like she’d just scrubbed it, her hair was in a sloppy bun at the back of her head, and her off-hours clothes were simple but…form-fitting.  Sera felt her heart pounding in her ribs and had to fight the impulse to run.

Dagna was looking at the table in as much apparent confusion as Sera, but she was smiling when she met Sera’s eyes.  “Did you do all this?”

“I was going to ask you that,” Sera admitted.

Dagna looked back at the table, and plucked a folded piece of paper from the center.  She opened it, read it over, and chuckled.  “It figures,” she said, and showed it to Sera.

Sometimes, it’s best to keep things simple.  -Zev

  Sera laughed, relief seeping out from her chest to her limbs.  “Keep things simple,” she said.  “Why didn’t I think of that?”  Dagna was looking at her, and Sera could sense her giddy nerves.  A small voice in her mind said oh she wants you bad.  Sera smiled with half her mouth and picked up the bottle.

“Thirsty?”

+

Solas was half-distracted as he approached the library, and almost ran straight into Zevran, leaning against the empty doorframe.  “Pardon me,” he said, and tried to step around him.  Zevran blocked Solas’ reach and shook his head.  “Excuse me?”

“Sorry, private party,” Zevran said.

Solas paused.  “In the library?”

“Strange but true,” Zevran said, and threw on a charming smile.  “Try back in, oh, an hour?  Two maybe, if things are going well.”  He sighed.  “Maker, I hope things are going well.”

“I see,” Solas said.  “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

Here’s these 2 girls who have made careers out of not fitting in. They’re there and they’re useful, but no one really knows what to make of them. Most ppl become confused and then annoyed by their way of speaking, but when they’re talking to each other, that doesn’t happen.

Just picture Dagna’s face lighting up when she ‘gets carried away’ with an explanation and instead of rolling her eyes, or joking about how incomprehensible it all is, Sera offers one of her gracelessly spot on metaphors in reply. Imagine Sera, all anxious and trying to hide it as she shows ‘the genius Arcanist’ a design for a bow she’s been doodling for years and being called ‘brilliant’ by the smartest person she knows.

Imagine them having their first kiss on the roof, tasting of cookies and the slightly acrid scent of the forge that never quite leaves Dagna’s skin. Imagine them joking about liking each other (because what if she doesn’t feel the same way?) and slowly growing serious, going from animated conversations and bawdy jokes, to being quiet together, frightened by the uncertainty of the future and yet, for the first time, not having to face it alone.

Imagine their wedding, their apartment above Dagna’s worship.

Imagine them old and wizened, and Sera calling her Widdle away from the workbench to watch the sunset together, still happy after all these years.