#he is still concerned w the mage-templar war even as the breach rages. and he is incensed that fiona is just. around. influencing things.

[oopsallmabari]

like here’s the thing. i do not have many ocs (for DA, at least) that deep down at their core are not good people. there are some that fuck up, some that are yknow. may have some questionable ethics, but i consider them mostly people that want to see good in the world and will contribute to the greater good. but eric is not a good person, and he is very deeply convinced that he is, and he is good at convincing others that he is. i think he would make a good inquisitor, but i also think that that inquisition would be a quietly horrifying one.

[emerald-amidst-gold]

casual affections: 19. tugging at the other's clothes to keep them close for Fane and Solas <3

Fluff time? :3 FLUFF TIME! >:3

19. tugging at the other's clothes to keep them close (This one is set before the destruction of Haven! :D)

He was tired. So, so tired. Not that that was any big revelation, what with his life being literally twisted upside down and turned inside out. Anointed 'Herald of Andraste', a title that sickened him more than any magic or night terror. A foreign mark of familiar essence constantly spiraling out of control every time he went off the rails, whipping up his arm like a flail, telling him to heel like his father had ordered with his own brand of torture. Slowly, steadily losing his face, a face that even he didn't know the true identity of, so grey, so confused as the world he ventured out into appeared nostalgic, but wholly wrong.

But the worst, ohhh, the worst, was what was happening right now, he and his small party having just returned from the horror that had been Therinfal. Despite how his head throbbed, how his body ached from battle of mind and body, Fane had done his duty and convened with the 'advisors' of this infant organization that he had somehow become the de facto leader of, making decisions he didn't want to make, leading people he didn't want to lead, posing as a figure he didn't want to pose as. He had laid out the happenings with as much indifference as he could muster, concealing his agony and inner turmoil as best he could, but the Commander's words about his decision had snapped the leash holding the beast within him back.

"...Disbanding the templars should have been the Inquisition's decision, not your's alone, Herald.", Cullen said, eyes hard on his own, hands gripping the pommel of his sword with two things Fane couldn't both to pinpoint with how his tired mind suddenly became acutely aware of heat.

"I'm sorry?", Fane said, feeling his face twist with a snarl as he suddenly slammed his hands down onto the table, dislodging various markers and eliciting a quiet gasp from Josephine, but he didn't care. "I'm sorry?!", he roared next, voice dropping even as it rose.

"Herald, that is en--", Cassandra attempted to curb the flames, but Fane turned on her, nostrils flaring, his chest heaving with frenzied pants. He didn't want to hear her drivel, her platitudes!

"No, I'm done being silent!", Fane snapped, turning back to level a venomous glare at Cullen, who was watching him warily, but with just as much fire. Oh, the sight nearly had him snapping this pathetic table in half and vaulting over it! "Who went to that hell hole, Cullen? You, who for all instances is a templar? Oh, no, wait, it was me!" He leaned forward on the table, brow furrowing further, lips twisting with an enraged snarl. "Not you! You were here hiding while someone else did the dirty work of seeing what your order had become! You were hiding while an Envy demon attempted to shatter my mind and take my face!!" His voice bouncing off the stone, the flames within his mind beginning to burn away reason, memory. "But none of you care about that, right? As long as your personal feelings are catered to, as long as your 'Inquisition' survives, as long as you get what you want then, who gives a damn about the 'Herald' and his own feelings? I'm a tool to you all, and don't tell me otherwise. I know the truth. I always have."

Fane pushed off the table at that, the room stagnant, tense, as he stood up straight. He kept his eyes on the amber set glaring back at him, but he did not flinch, did not cow from the message swimming within them, even as his mind tried to wrap around why. His body was tingling, prickling with the fires of simmering rage, but somehow he felt numb, he felt done, and it was why he made the decision to turn on his heel to leave the stifling atmosphere he was currently embroiled in.

"Herald, where are you--", Cassandra's voice sounded his ears again, but he kept his strides long, his focus on the door that would offer him escape.

"Fuck you, Seeker.", Fane said flatly, evenly as he put a hand upon the door, his fingers curling against it, his eyes going hooded as smoke threatened to choke him anew. "Just fuck. you. No demon could ever hope to take my face as you have. I'll close the Breach, and once it is, I'm leaving. That's final."

With those biting words, Fane pushed the door open, striding through it without a glance over his shoulder, or a care as it slammed shut behind him, the resounding boom making his head rattle, but not his legs as he began to walk down the corridor of the Chantry.

His gait was slow, no purpose to be had, lost as a piece of wood in the sea. He kept his eyes straight, unwilling to see sneering statues gazing down at him like he was on trial. He clenched and unclenched his left hand, the mark sizzling and crackling with awakened magic from his outburst, but he felt no pain, no heat, no anything. He only felt grey.

Grey, grey, grey, grey, gr--

"Herald?"

Fane's legs halted upon the sound of a familiar voice, blinking and looking up to see that he was suddenly...outside? When had he gotten outside? He hadn't even felt the cold. He had only felt...grey. With a tentative turn of his head, Fane turned his gaze towards the direction of the voice he had heard, seeking it, inwardly yearning for it, but unable to determine why. He never knew why, but he had stopped caring after so long.

"...Solas.", Fane echoed, voice flat as his eyes landed upon the elf, who was standing just a few yards away from him, and from the way he could see a usually steady chest rising and falling a tad quicker than normal, it would appear he had rushed over to where Fane had just exited. "Something you want? If not, I'd rather be alone." Yes, alone. Alone where no one could make him dance on strings.

Solas frowned a bit. "I felt the sudden influx of your mark.", he said, pointing to where his left had was lightly flaring. "I take it the meeting did not go well?"

Fane stared at Solas for several moments, the only sound between them the whistling of the mountain air and the distant clattering of war time happenings. He took in the way blue and grey watched him, no condemnation, no ulterior motive other than genuine concern, but he had no idea as to why such a thing would be evident in those two colors. When a quiet glint of indigo appeared when the elf tilted his head a bit, Fane had to look away, the odd hue stirring something in his mind, in his...soul. What was that? What was that?!

"...No. It didn't.", he said after several more moments of confused quiet, beginning to walk towards Solas, but to the side in an attempt to slide past despite his larger frame. "Now, leave me alone." His voice dropping low with a growl as further confusion wrapped around him like a blanket until he felt a a ginger touch to his forearm, slender fingers wrapping around the leather of his jacket, but not so deep as to aggravate his scars.

Fane halted immediately once again, head snapping downwards to glare at the one who dared to touch him, but it abated when he saw blue and grey slightly wide in quiet shock and...equal confusion. He felt his brows furrow, Solas' doing the same, but the hand upon his arm stayed still, stayed present.

"I..apologize.", Solas apologized, but actively taking a step closer to him, eyes fixed on his own as if seeing something for the first time, blue bursting forward like the sky above, grey no more than a light haze.

"Um..", Fane uttered, swallowing hard as the swirling of blue and grey made his body feel flighty, feel as light as air. "..It's...it's fine, but your eyes.." He cringed a bit, internally berating himself. No, no! The last thing he needed was more questions that he didn't have answers to! Oddly, however, Solas' lips only harbored a tiny smile, even as his eyes swam with thought.

"What about them?", the mage asked, seeming genuinely curious as he took another step closer, gingerly tugging on his sleeve to coax him closer, but to what end, Fane didn't know, even as he moved without protest.

"They...", Fane hesitated, but let out a shaky sigh as the colors before him were more apparent, more bright; their bodies only a few inches apart now. "...remind me of the sky. That's all." They held so much for than just that, but he couldn't say. He couldn't.

Solas blinked. "I..see.", he said slowly, fingers lightly digging into his sleeve, but Fane still felt no pain, so lost in the quiet wonder before him. He wanted to lose himself in that expanse, but why? Why did this feel so right amid the wrong?

Why did he want to speak to the sky looking back him when he otherwise had scorned the actual one?

"W..What I mean is..", Fane stammered, twisting his arm in Solas' grasp to carefully take hold of a hand. "...they're nice. They calm me when the world is otherwise painted in red." What was he saying? Why was he saying this?

Solas blinked again, but smiled a bit more, hand lightly twitching in his own. Fane felt the air leave his lungs at that small, light smile, feeling his cheeks heat up, but not from rage that had ensnared him so tightly earlier.

"I believe your eyes are far more calming.", Solas said, his own cheeks lightly pink, but Fane knew it wasn't from the cold due to how blue sparked with tender lavender deep within in. How many hues did the sky possess? It was eternal. Eternal..

"Is that so?", Fane said around a tired chuckle, resisting the urge to lean down and rest his forehead against the elf who felt so familiar to him, so real amidst grey and the unimaginable. What was going on with him lately to have such urges? Why did he feel as if he was forgetting something?

"It is.", Solas affirmed quietly, voice lightly tinged with a note of sorrow before his free hand suddenly came up towards his face, but halted as if catching itself, shooting back down. "And...I imagine you are tired, Herald, so I will let you rest." The statement a deflection, a backpedal from where an invisible line was scored.

Before Fane could think of an apology of his own or any kind of protest, Solas' hand slipped from his own, the sky staring at him for several more moments with confusion and longing before it turned away, striding back along the path it had come without another glance. And Fane only watched, transfixed and bewildered, his mind whirling as if something wished to sprout forth from the blackened walls that lined it, as the sky turned its back on him. But, he didn't feel grey from that, he didn't feel ignored.

He felt blue, calm and at peace, for the first time in what felt like centuries.

***

THEY PINE! >:D Hope you like it! X3