#Tel’uth Viral Laima Ma = never gonna give you up

[mogwaei]

[Codex: Debauchery with the Dread Wolf]

It was late, well past midnight. And yet, there they were, raiding a cellar for its spirits.

She proposed it. Or maybe he had. He doesn’t recall who did, but in that moment he wouldn’t have hesitated to jump into a volcano if she so desired.

He’s not sure how he ended up here. Not physically, of course, he remembers that. He doesn’t remember how he came to find himself in these situations with her of all people. She’s foul and rough and her wild crone’s cackle grates against his ears like coarse gravel. When she laughs, which always seems to be at his expense--particularly when Sera pulls her antics or Blackwall opens his mouth...she howls at the Inquisitor’s puns. Her sense of humour is about as questionable as her morals.

But perhaps most inflaming of all is her stare.

He’d known her eyes were trouble from the start. He’d sensed her gaze often, cursory and light as though she thought he would not notice. He had caught her a handful of instances, fully expecting her to avert her eyes meekly or quickly occupy herself with a menial task. But no, she locked with him like a sword catching a blow. Interestingly, after a time it had become a silent game of who could outlast the other. He was loathe to recall she had won almost every time only because his attention was needed elsewhere. And she wanted him to know she was the victor, because she’d always pull a face as he turned away, some infuriatingly childish expression of triumph that made him clench his teeth.

It did not stop there. Somehow she knew how to get under his skin in the littlest ways. Modifying his barriers in the heat of a fight, casting after he announced he would, asking him for something as he’s doing it...challenging or questioning his knowledge despite it (usually) being easy to confirm. Or maybe she really was stupid. He did concede that her mask was quite effective, so it was difficult to tell.

He could never catch her giving the same treatment to the others. Then again, she was uncannily good at slipping from notice--enough that he’d thought she was doing it by magic. He didn’t like the idea of her getting away unnoticed.

Not that...not that he paid such close attention to the bothersome midge.

Not at all, he thinks, as she pulls a cork from a dusty bottle with her teeth. Like a raccoon with a good find in the refuse.

I'm only keeping an eye on her, he thinks after they’ve shared a whole bottle in the dark, whispering like a pair of thieves. Which they are, he reminds himself as he drinks more wine.

She’s trouble, he continues after they’ve found a table in this well-stocked basement. She continues to pull bottles from shelves. She wants to taste them all. A small keg with an ouroboros stamped into the wood. A dingy bottle with a man’s gap-mouthed face on it.  A few tankards. She lights the hearth--she looks like a demon standing with the fire at her back. He thinks he’s going to die of alcohol poisoning tonight.

She’s wicked. But he’s nearly wheezing at her joke about licking frogs.

Demonness, as he slips the dirk from her boot so they can vandalise the table.

They carve out the lyrics to Tel’uth Viral Laima Ma, the most abhorred song in Elvhenan. Is this what his existence has boiled down to? Cavorting with a rival in some dark hole bored into the earth?

She drinks him under the table. She sings, terribly. He hates it, and no, if anyone asks, he didn’t hum along.

A door slams somewhere. Footsteps above. The owners are back--she’d sworn this place was abandoned! He can’t move his legs, at least not in a quiet or effective way. She’s laughing at his panic again.

Then she’s lifting him to his feet--no, she’s carrying him. She’s absurdly strong for her size. But it doesn’t matter--they’re going to be caught, he just knows it. She snaps at him to shut up--apparently no one can see them. Magic? Or stupidity?

They slip into the night, around the back. The crisp air is refreshing on his skin, his mind. Some clarity returns--then she dumps him unceremoniously against a wall. He can’t remember if they’re in the city or deep in the forest at an elven chateau. He doesn’t remember when they are.

But he catches her moonlit gaze and her crooked grin that’s as crooked as her soul.

“Wanna fight, Solas?”  

He laughs. He stammers, but no words come out. The thought of touching her sets his ears and face aflame. That thought makes him balk. But he won’t deny that the idea of a good brawl with her wouldn’t be a balm on his wounded pride. Her grin is broad as the sickle moon in the sky as she fists his shirt and swings him.

The sky wheels above, melting into a smear of starlight, shadow, and too-bright, jovial eyes.

Too bright.

The sun is shining in his face. He’s on his back and his hands are tangled in sheets. His head aches.

He turns blearily, searching his night stand for water...and finds a crystal bottle filled with a golden liquid. Why is it so shiny? It feels like it’s mocking his delicate constitution. But he doesn’t have to read the label to know it’s an elvhen hangover cure. There’s a note folded in half beside it.

Even her handwriting is terrible.

I like being rivals. Let’s do it again. Maybe the stick will finally dislodge from your arse next time. Then we can beat each other with it. I'm only half kidding.

[There’s a lewd drawing at the bottom in place of a signature. Wait. Had he carved that into the table?]

The words are absurd. They bewilder him.

“No, absolutely not. Never again,” he insists to the empty room. He falls back on his pillow, crumpling the letter it in a fist and pressing the cool crystal to his forehead.

Then he starts to laugh. He laughs until his stomach cramps. 

He’s lying to himself again.

Read more about their bastardry in “Ouroboros” on Ao3