Chapter Text
Solas was a quick learner.
Even back in Elvhenan, he learned fast. Mastery was a different matter, but grasping the basics of whatever he’d put his mind to? He was near peerless. A consequence of his burning curiosity, his eager hands, his restless mind. No wonder he’d been cocky. Would you not be, in his position?
However, that may be the problem now.
Lavellan watched how swift he was to learn knots and aravel mechanisms and halla herding and how the clan operated, watched him perform his tasks with barely any hiccups, as though he’d been doing this all his life. And yes, he did have the worldly experience, skills he’d picked up over his long life that he’d apply to the current task, and skills he’d also picked up during their time with Clan Venalin.
But still, the Dalish had learned to be uneasy around the perfect. To suspect the good deals. Rewards from toil and hardship were more trustworthy. A fruit offered on a platter could be poisoned while the fruit you planted and brought to bear yourself would be safer.
Lavellan leaned back against Hal, the halla currently lying down among the herd. Vergala glided through the skies above.
“Maybe it just needs more time,” Lavellan murmured. Hal’s ears flicked.
No matter how Lavellan had explained Solas’ skill, it still hadn't sat easy with any of the elders. The kids were a different story. They were kids. A lot of things impressed them.
Speaking of, there Solas was again, sitting on a tree stump, surrounded by a gaggle of children.
Lavellan smiled and patted Hal’s flank. She flicked her ear again. He stood and made his way over, catching the tail of their conversation.
“How big can you turn as a wolf, ha’fen?”
“In dreams? As big as I need to be,” answered Solas.
“What about outside of dreams?”
“As big as a dragon, but that is as far as I can push it.”
“Can we ride you?”
Solas chuckled. “If you can hold on.”
“Ha’fen, is it true you eat little kids who get lost?”
“No, da’len.”
Lavellan sidled up beside Solas on the stump and slung an arm around him, grinning at the kids.
“He can’t,” said Lavellan. “It gives ha’fen terrible indigestion.”
The child who’d asked nodded his head solemnly. “I get an upset tummy when I eat cheese.”
“I do not have an appetite for children,” Solas sighed.
Lavellan leaned in, still grinning, and murmured, “Just me?”
“Behave,” he muttered.
“What do you like to eat, then?” asked a little girl.
“I like cakes,” said Solas, “and home-cooked meals.”
“Do you hear prayers?”
Solas paused. Lavellan looked at him from the corner of his eye.
Yes, for all that the Evanuris were hailed as gods, they couldn’t actually hear prayers. But Solas had done his best to answer the call of the downtrodden and the chained, nonetheless.
How would he answer this question?
“No, da’len,” he said, his tone and smile gentle. “I cannot.”
“Why not? I thought gods could hear us when we need help?”
And what was he supposed to say to that? ‘Gods can’t actually hear you’? Or a false platitude?
Solas paused and searched for a satisfactory response. The children weren't the only ones waiting for an answer now. A few of the adults also lingered nearby under the pretence of being busy with their tasks.
“Fen’Harel sealed them away, remember?” said another child near the back. He was a gloomy one. He never spoke much, always lingered at the edges, but still, he followed along. Whether because he was just sticking with the group or if he had a genuine interest, Lavellan wasn’t sure. “Nobody will hear you.”
“You will be heard,” said Solas softly, fiercely.
The kids looked at him in surprise, even Lavellan.
“You will be heard,” he said again. “It need not be gods who hear your call for help. The divine can be found within the mundane ― a neighbour who offers you food when you are too swallowed by exhaustion to make your own, a friend who lends you their shoulder to cry upon, a father who lifts you after you have fallen, a lover who brightens your day with a simple smile. The holy are what you make of them.”
The children stared.
“Too advanced, I think,” Lavellan whispered to Solas. Still, he couldn’t help but smile. “What he means is that praying to gods is good for giving you strength. Like… an invisible friend who’ll cheer you on! But also, you can call the people around you for help. Never forget that.”
That same child asked, “What if there’s nobody around you?”
Lavellan smiled. “Then you carry yourself until you can reach someone. This is when asking the gods for moral support may come in handy. To give yourself strength.”
He couldn’t expand any more because someone else asked a question.
“How fast can you run in your wolf form?”
Lavellan had a feeling he knew why these kids were asking so many wolf-related questions. The question was, did Solas?
“Fast enough to catch a star,” said Solas.
Never mind, Lavellan hoped Solas didn’t know why.
“You’re lying,” said one of the kids suspiciously.
“I never lie, da’len. Even in the stories.” He smiled at Lavellan. “Isn't that right? You were there when I caught the star.”
The kids looked at Lavellan.
Lavellan crossed his arms. “It's true. He tripped a lot of times while trying to chase it.”
Unfortunately, his attempts to embarrass him just made him more sympathetic to the children.
“I trip when I chase something too,” said one gravely.
“So even gods can trip…”
“Ha’fen still caught the star though!”
Solas’ smile grew smug. Lavellan pressed his elbow into Solas’ ribs.
“Caught me, did you?” Lavellan asked, teeth bared in the darkness, breaths sharpening under Solas’ lips.
Solas bared his teeth back because some part of him had always been wild.
“Caught,” he whispered, grinning. His hands grabbed Lavellan’s hair and twisted, pulled. Some of the fight left Lavellan’s limbs. “And taken.” Solas kissed the bared length of his neck, lips brushing over his racing pulse. “Thoroughly.”
Lavellan swallowed, throat dry. “Not as thorough as you think.”
Solas’ eyes flashed in the darkness.
“Then allow me to try again,” he said sweetly.
He was anything but sweet.
Lavellan gasped and writhed, Solas’ fingers clever and sliding, coaxing him from inside.
“Sol―” He choked on his breaths. “Solas―”
“This isn’t thorough yet,” he said. Now that sounded like a threat.
“Fuck you,” Lavellan whispered. “You’re so cruel.”
“You think this cruel?” He kissed Lavellan’s trembling lips. “My love, this is cruel.”
His coaxing became an onslaught. Pleasure speared through Lavellan’s spine and he threw his head back, arching off the furs, lips parting, eyes flying wide. A strangled cry left him.
Solas kept him strung like that, varying pressure and speed to keep him on his toes. Every press of his cruel fingers tore a broken noise from him, muddied his focus, left him suspended in the dark and the heat. He quivered. He clawed at the furs beneath. Tears pricked at his eyes, but they didn’t fall.
He shattered after what could have been minutes or hours, reeling in the aftermath, catching his breaths.
“I am not finished with you,” said Solas.
Lavellan whimpered.
Solas flipped him onto all fours, grabbed the back of his neck, and shoved his face into the pillow. Lavellan’s arms gave, left him with his ass raised. He turned his head to the side, cheek pressed against pillow, his face flushing from this humiliating position.
“Bastard,” he snapped.
Solas’ response was to take him like that, just as cruel as he’d been earlier.
Lavellan clung onto the furs, breaths coming out punched, his body still sensitive, the sensations tiding him over.
This was how you drown outside of water.
“Solas,” he gasped out, rocking from the force of his thrusts. “I can’t, I can’t― hah, please― Too much―”
But he couldn’t move, pinned down by the weight of him.
“Shall I stop?” asked Solas, slightly breathless, teasing.
They both knew his answer.
Lavellan hid his face into the pillow; Solas didn’t stop.
The tears returned and fell this time. Lavellan squeezed his eyes shut, slurred and ruined pleas spilling from his tongue, tears smudging all over his lashes.
“Solas,” he sobbed, as though it would deliver mercy. “Ohh fuck, Solas, Solas—!”
Until he couldn’t even manage that much, only able to wail and whine and shake.
Distantly, through the haze of sharp pleasure, he thought, Thank fuck we put up silencing runes.
By the time Solas finished having his way with him, Lavellan was a wreck. A star caught between the wolf’s jaws.
Solas’ kisses were sweet, this time.
“Cruel,” Lavellan whispered, lying limp in his hold.
“Thorough,” he corrected, a gentle kiss falling upon Lavellan’s eyelid.
It wasn’t all easy sailing. Lavellan and Solas occasionally argued ― in the forests, far from the clan, because that was just good manners ― though it rarely came down to those. Discussions first. But sometimes, frustration would mount and tempers would snap.
They’d work something out after. Once both have cooled off.
Still, Solas had a point during their arguments. His frustration was understandable. He was doing so much work to bridge the distance ― it was only fair for the Dalish to meet him halfway.
“One class,” said Lavellan, tailing Hahren Dahnarethi. “Let him take one class, just one, Hahren! You’ve seen how good he is with the kids. And he’s right there. It’d be foolish to not make use of his knowledge.”
Creators, for an old man, he sure was fast.
“You said you’d give him a chance.”
Hahren Dahnarethi finally stopped.
He faced Lavellan with a sigh. “It is not that I do not wish to give him a chance, da’len.”
“What, then?”
“We are… wary of earning his wrath, or disappointment, should our reactions to his knowledge be unfavourable.”
Lavellan recalled all the arguments they’d had of the Dalish and resisted grimacing. But Solas was no longer that same man, no longer so lost and alone.
“Maybe a year ago,” he admitted. His tone turned teasing. “But don’t worry, I did the hard work of arguing with him for the past year already. You’ll be alright.”
Hahren Dahnarethi paled. “You did what?”
He held up a finger. “One class.”
Hahren Dahnarethi rubbed the bridge of his nose, his forehead wrinkling, Mythal’s vallaslin shifting with the pull.
“Very well,” he said. “One class.”
Lavellan beamed.
Solas took the class on the afternoon of the next day. The children bounced with excitement, already familiar with ha’fen and his stories. Hahren Dahnarethi explained to Solas how he would usually structure the classes, what he would ask of the children, and what tasks he would give. Lavellan sat close by, smiling at the nostalgic activities. He’d been one of these children, once.
What would he have done had the Dread Wolf been his teacher for one of his classes?
Honestly, he likely would have pestered Solas. Not unlike how he’d pestered him back in the first timeline.
For today’s class, Solas taught Elvish script.
“Elvish has no alphabet, unlike most Thedosian languages,” said Solas. “Rather, words are represented by characters. Some characters may even represent a full sentence.”
He drew the characters for basic words in the air using magic, allowing the children to touch and interact with them.
“The ancient elves would also occasionally write with isil’ve, or veilfire as it’s now known. This allows them to store complex information such as emotions, ideas, visions, or sensations within the character. In that case, the character becomes a glyph, or a rune. Do you know how a reader may activate the glyph?”
“Veilfire!” they answered.
He smiled and showed the children a glyph on a stone tablet. “Well done, da’lenen. Do you have your torches?”
The children raised small, unlit torches and they each took turns coming forward. Solas would light their torch and the child would read the glyph, giggling at whatever emotion or vision it would impart, then he would extinguish their torch and the next child would come forward. They moved on to writing afterwards.
Lavellan watched them fondly, gaze softening at Solas’ gentle joy at guiding the children as they wrote the characters.
“Ha’fen! What’s the character for wolf?”
Solas’ smile returned. “Fen” ―he drew it in the air― “is written like so.”
“What about bear?”
“And flower!”
“Bees!”
Solas dutifully wrote the requested characters, his small smile never fading.
One of the older kids raised their hand.
“Yes, da’len?” he asked.
“Ha’fen, what is the most complicated character?”
Lavellan raised his brows. Good question…
Solas frowned and looked towards Lavellan.
“It’d be the jasal’anoan[1], wouldn’t it?” asked Lavellan.
“I believe so.” He began writing it in the air ― a character comprised of seventy strokes. The kids made exclaiming and bewildered noises as Solas kept going, and going, the character growing more and more complex. Lavellan smiled. Of course Solas would have memorised it.
The ridiculous character drew the attention of adults as well. Hahren Dahnarethi raised his spectacles and ogled it.
Solas finished. The result was… an impressive network of curving lines.
“Looks pretty,” remarked Warleader Aenoreir. “But a pain in the ass to write. What’s it mean?”
“It has no direct translation,” said Solas. “The word is hiralennarathe’venirast’asahngar.”
“Hira-what now?”
“It means a set of coincidences that are so perfect that they may as well be fate.”
Aenoreir gawked. “The ancestors used this often?”
“Oh, no,” said Solas, amused. “It is a word one would write to show off. In the same way one would recite the longest word they knew. Although, some teachers would have their students write this character repeatedly as punishment.”
Lavellan would know. Thalamya had made him do it―
His hand was getting sore just from the memory.
Solas ended the lesson there, dictating what tasks the students would need to have done for Hahren Dahnarethi by next class. Hahren Dahnarethi bowed at Solas and Solas bowed back. The two shared words too soft for Lavellan to hear, before they went their separate ways.
Lavellan made his way over to Solas.
“You know, I’m a little jealous,” said Lavellan. “I wish class had been that fun when I was younger.”
“I am certain you made it livelier yourself.”
He laughed and leaned against him as they walked. “That’s one way to put it. My hand started aching when you started drawing the character. My mentor in Elvhenan made me write it too many times to count.”
“What were you being punished for?”
He laughed nervously. “Punching my classmates, talking back, challenging the teachers and their lessons…”
Solas raised a brow.
“In my defence,” said Lavellan, “their methods were not optimised.”
“Yes, people do seem to dig their heels in when faced with an alternate solution.”
Lavellan eyed him.
Solas pinched his side.
Spring passed and summer arrived with a dry heat.
The hunting competition would be held tomorrow ― an event hosted at the beginning of every summer. The participants would ride their mounts into the forest and shoot at the targets hidden throughout, while also racing one another. Whomever earned the most points would receive the Summerbloom crown, and they would have command of the losers for the rest of that day.
Lavellan entered the clearing Ellana was practising in. Abelas sat napping nearby beneath the shade of a tree.
“You’re participating in the contest?” he asked.
“Participating.” She nocked an arrow and drew, the wood of her bow creaking. “And winning.”
Ellana loosed the arrow. It hit dead centre.
“Don’t get cocky,” he said.
She grinned at him. “I’m coming for your ass, prepare yourself.”
“You’re on.”
Lavellan left her to it and wove his way through camp, found Solas helping set up for tomorrow. He sidled up beside him, grinning.
“Participating tomorrow, vhenan?” asked Lavellan.
“No. You know I have never been one for archery.”
“You’re pretty decent at it.” His grin widened. “Or are you just afraid of being bossed around by me?”
Solas threw the banner in his hands over Lavellan’s head. “I had not realised you were after my name.”
“And I had not realised you had swapped yours out for Gelelan[2].”
Solas walked away. “We shall see. Be a dear and hang that banner for me.”
The day of the competition came. Lavellan, of course, chose Hal as his mount. The others brought their own mounts forward, all of them just as eager as their riders, hooves stamping.
Lavellan placed the last of his arrows into his quiver, two bands of yellow painted on the arrow shafts. He’d spotted Ellana earlier with one green band.
Aenoreir stepped forward, absent of his mount. His arrows had two bands of white and blue.
“Throwing the competition already, dear cousin?” Lavellan teased.
Aenoreir grinned. “I wouldn’t be so sure. I’m just waiting for my ride.”
Lavellan frowned. Waiting?
After a few minutes, Solas entered the scene, also without a mount. Or a bow.
“Come to cheer me on?” asked Lavellan.
Solas stared at him coolly. He made his way towards Aenoreir and stood beside him, tilting his head and smiling.
“Not quite,” said Solas.
Lavellan looked between the two, frowning deeper.
His frown melted.
“You’re joking,” said Lavellan.
Solas shifted into a wolf in answer and Aenoreir climbed on.
“You’re siding with him?” Lavellan asked. “Hey, how is this fair?”
“The adjudicators said it’s completely legal,” said Aenoreir, still grinning. “So long as Solas doesn’t help with my archery, which I won’t need, because I’m great.”
Lavellan scowled and got on Hal’s back. “You’ll regret making an enemy out of me.”
“I was merely looking out for you,” said Solas. “I am ensuring your head does not grow too big. However will you fit in the aravel then?”
“You’re sleeping on the lower deck tonight.”
The hunting horn sounded and everyone took up positions, facing the tree line.
“May the best archer win,” teased Aenoreir.
“Thank you,” said Lavellan. “I know I will.”
The horn sounded again and everyone rushed into the forest. Lavellan poured magic into his brace for a better grip on his bow and shot at the first target hanging from a high branch. Bullseye.
Everyone spread out. Lavellan kept shooting at the targets, saw flashes of Aenoreir and Solas through the trees. They were gaining ground. Lavellan gritted his teeth.
“Come on, Hal!” he urged. “Are we going to let a smelly wolf beat you?”
She moved faster. The wind whipped at his hair.
“Atta girl!”
His arrows kept flying. Hal caught up to Solas. Lavellan gave Aenoreir the finger; Aenoreir drew a line across his neck.
They raced through the trees in a way almost reminiscent of the time Lavellan had hunted with Fen’Harel in a dream. Except, the bastard had sided with his cousin this time. No, Lavellan wasn’t jealous. That was absurd.
He focused on kicking their ass and shooting more arrows. Patches of sunlight needling through the trees flashed in his eyes as he made his way through.
They passed the segment of the forest with the targets, the path funnelling towards the designated finishing zone.
Lavellan urged Hal to put on a burst of speed.
He and Aenoreir crossed the finish, neck and neck.
Hal and Solas slowed to a stop.
“Who beat who?” Aenoreir asked.
The Dalish in charge of the finish wrote into their notepad. “That would be you, Warleader. You were slightly ahead.”
Lavellean threw his head back and groaned. Aenoreir crowed in victory.
“Don’t be so smug,” said Lavellan. “They still have to tally the points.”
Once everyone returned, the tallying began. They had lunch while waiting, feasting on the generous dishes that had been laid out, some having been prepared since yesterday morning.
Everybody gathered in the same area and sat in their groups. The hunters widened their circle so Lavellan and Solas could fit, and they conversed as they ate, telling stories of the hunt, bragging and boasting. Although, inevitably, Lavellan and Aenoreir got into another light-hearted argument.
Afterwards, Solas leaned in towards Lavellan and teasingly whispered, “So this is the reason for your aptitude for yelling.”
Lavellan stuffed a slice of roasted eggplant into Solas’ mouth.
They announced the results at the end of the feast, beginning from the lowest value of those who’d gotten above eighty points. Aenoreir and Lavellan listened in rapt attention.
“Aenoreir, 102. Mahanon, 103.”
Lavellan threw his used fork at Aenoreir’s head. “Hah! I win―”
“Ellana, 114.”
Beside him, Ellana howled with laughter.
They crowned Ellana the winner and her first decree was for all the other contestants to prostrate before her and say, “All hail, the great and mighty Ellana Lavellan, Master of Archery, Better Than All of You.”
She made Lavellan wait on her for the rest of the day.
“This is the worst,” he muttered, hand feeding her grapes. He considered throwing it into her mouth so hard that it dislodges in her throat and makes her choke.
“You died twice,” she reminded.
“This is the worst.”
Ellana later made him read her a bedtime story and do the voices, and she cackled the entire time he gave his, quite frankly, touching performance. Ungrateful.
He brushed her hair and fluffed up her pillows, gesturing at her cot with a flourish. It had stopped being about the punishment at that point. He tucked her into bed without being asked, stroking her head and humming the lullaby. All of it still done with a touch of levity. Otherwise, it would mortify the both of them.
Lavellan reached for her lantern and turned the knob down, the fire flickering out.
Maybe he missed being a big brother. Somewhat.
“Goodnight,” he whispered.
“Goodnight,” she whispered back, their voices sounding like a secret carried on the wings of a passing butterfly.
Lavellan left her aravel and returned to his and Solas’, his affectionate mood morphing into a healthy desire for a burning vengeance. He entered the aravel and changed into comfortable clothes, then scaled the ladder onto the upper deck.
Solas was folding clothes beneath the light of the hanging lamp, sitting on the spread of furs above the padded mat serving as their bed. He looked up at Lavellan’s arrival and smiled as if he didn’t just betray Lavellan eight hours ago.
“Welcome back,” said Solas. He placed the last of the folded clothes aside.
The bastard got to escape the punishment because he was technically the mount.
Fine, if he wanted to play that way…
Lavellan straddled him, knees braced on either side. Since he wanted to be a mount so goddamn much.
“I still beat you,” said Lavellan. He whipped his braid into Solas’ arm.
He undid Lavellan’s braid. “How can such a thing occur if I was not a contestant in the first place?”
“I cannot believe you’d betray me like this.”
“It was hardly a betrayal.” He finished with Lavellan’s braid and combed his fingers through the strands. Pleasant, tingling pinpricks raced over Lavellan’s scalp. “And you beat your cousin, in the end.”
“You still sided with him.”
“You had chosen a mount. My services were not needed.”
“You could have offered anyway.”
Solas grabbed a fistful Lavellan’s hair and pulled. Lavellan’s breath caught.
“Do you not ride me often already?” he murmured against Lavellan’s neck.
“That’s―” Lavellan’s ears warmed. “Irrelevant to the issue at hand.”
Solas hummed and brushed feather-light kisses down the column of Lavellan’s throat. “Is it?”
Every kiss, so lovingly imparted, threatened to undo Lavellan’s focus. He gripped Solas’ shoulders.
But as lovely as this was, Lavellan still had an objective.
He shoved Solas onto his back.
Solas let go of him in his surprise and tried to push himself up on his elbows. Lavellan pressed his hand over Solas’ chest and stilled him. He flicked his other hand and snuffed the fire in their lantern, leaving them staring at one another in the dim.
“It’s irrelevant how many times I’ve ridden you,” Lavellan said. “Fact is, I was denied that opportunity today.”
“Have you come for vengeance, then?” Solas asked, his eyes aglow in the dark.
“A punishment.”
“Is there a difference?”
“Vengeance is getting even.” Lavellan squeezed his thighs around Solas’ sides and leaned in, his hair falling over his shoulders, his voice softening into a dangerous murmur. “I don’t want even; I want you at my mercy.”
“And how will you exact punishment?”
“I’m going to take what I’ve been denied.” Lavellan grinded against him. Solas breathed in sharply, and his hands moved to grip Lavellan’s waist.
Lavellan slapped his hands away.
“No touching,” he said, smiling.
Payback was a sweet, sweet thing.
It began with a simple question.
“What is the truth about you?”
Solas stared at the young woman who’d asked it ― Hearthmistress Lailani’s apprentice, Harea.
Four months since Solas had met Clan Lavellan. Lavellan supposed it couldn’t be avoided forever.
Solas took a deep breath in. He found a comfortable surface to sit on and gestured for Harea to do the same. Once she was seated, he started.
“It began with a spirit of Wisdom.”
He spoke of his early days, crossing for Mythal, his travels… then, the war. The centuries of blood and steel and ashes and death. He gained an audience as he spoke, until the entire clan had gathered around him, listening to the truth of the Dread Wolf, who had not been so dreaded in the beginning. The wolf who’d given his allies the strength to continue fighting, who’d been seen as a formidable figure of protection and might.
Elgar’nan’s greatest general in the war against the Forgotten.
Until the fatigue had set in. Until the dismay and disillusionment from uncaring nobles and corruption had driven him to shatter his sword.
And he spoke of the All-Father’s ire scorching the backs of his loyal soldiers.
Nobody spoke. None tried to declare him a liar.
The pain in his voice was sincere.
And so, Fen’Harel had been born. A mockery of a title made into a threat. The man who’d become a god against his will ― and yet, he was the one who’d answered the calls and prayers of those who'd been suffering.
He said nothing of the vallaslin, but he spoke of the slavery. Lavellan scanned the crowd, heart aching at the crestfallen, shocked, or heartbroken expressions of those around him.
And then… the Veil.
“The stories of my fluctuation between the Forgotten and the Evanuris were true,” he said. “I informed each side of the other’s movements, but in my heart, the side I had chosen was mine. To protect those dear to me.” His gaze lowered and his head bowed. “What I will tell you next is not what you would like to hear, but it is what has happened. It pains me that it has gone this way, but it is important that you know this history.”
He looked up and spoke of the events leading to Mythal’s murder, summarising the plan about the Titans and the seals.
The death of Dirthamen’s spymaster.
The chaos that had followed.
And Solas’ greatest regret and sin.
Once his recount finished, the crowd was quiet. Some were still locked in disbelief, denying the story, but Abelas and Lavellan would quietly affirm that it was true.
After a few more minutes of heavy silence, Harea stood and closed her notebook. She set it aside and approached Solas.
He watched her, apprehensive.
She knelt beside him and hugged him.
Solas froze, eyes wide. Then, he tentatively returned the embrace.
One by one, the rest of the clan either left to digest the new information on their own, or they came together and held one another. A few more offered Solas comforting touches ― brief embraces, a pat on the shoulder, a rub on the back. Some bowed. Lavellan’s aching heart warmed slightly.
When the crowd dispersed, Lavellan crouched beside Solas. He looked at Lavellan, expression a little lost. Lavellan offered his hand. Solas took it.
Lavellan brought Solas' hand to his lips and kissed it. They returned to their aravel, and only once in the safety and privacy of it did Solas hold him tightly and allow himself to weep.
As with all complicated topics, reactions varied, but each was respected and allowed space. Along the same vein, Lavellan allowed nobody to deny Solas of the same respect and space, defusing any hostilities, or outright herding people away if they were being difficult.
Most were understanding, if shaken.
Life went on. Little by little. Solas taught more classes, Lavellan practised his magic, Abelas and Ellana continued their lessons, and occasionally, letters from the inner circle would grace their hands.
Some days, Lavellan’s hand would ache. Solas would massage it and place a kiss upon each knuckle.
Some days, melancholy would seize one or both of them, and they would simply exist near one another, taking solace in the fact that should they reach out, the other would take their hand.
At the dawn of autumn, Vergala came to Lavellan with a letter.
Lavellan opened it and read its contents.
Good tidings, Inquisitor. I hope you are doing well.
Professor Bram Kenric of the University of Orlais, along with his assistant, Colette, have sent word to the Inquisition. They believe that the last Inquisitor’s resting place may be found in the Frostback Basin. Shall I send word of your interest in investigating the matter?
-J
P.S. Please let Ellana know that my next correspondence to her will be late. An incident with some tea and a noble’s pet mink.
He folded the letter.
“From an advisor?” asked Solas beside him, not looking up from his writing. A plan for his next lesson with the children.
“From Josephine. You best grab your winter coat.” He grinned. “We’re going to go fight a possessed dragon.”