#shakescommiss

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

The Taste of Home

For @gugle1980, a piece with Cullen and her character Anya, as thanks for donating to my ko-fi. Thank you!

Raptly, Cullen watched as Anya kneaded the dough against the table, her hands covered with flour. Once done, she flattened it just like his mother used to and pinched it inside the pan. She intended to make a peach pie for him, and she grinned as she began placing the ripe peaches in. Had he would have known she meant the here and now when he told her he’d like a peach pie, he wouldn’t have said anything. The Inquisitor brought in some peaches, Anya said, wrapped in his arms after making love. So many peaches. We’ll be making peach pies and tarts for months.

My mother used to make peach pies, Cullen said. With cinnamon. I’d like one now.

Now?

His mouth watered. Yes, now.

Then let’s go.

That was what happened--they hastily and haphazardly dressed at half-passed midnight and escaped to the kitchen where they began work on the pie. Cullen cut the peaches as Anya made the dough, and once it was done she began to work at the lattice wrap on top of the pie. “

“Wait,” Cullen said before she could begin. “Where’s the cinnamon?”

Anya grinned and obliged, finding the tin in the spice cabinet and topping the pie before working the lattice. They waited the long hour for the pie to bake, doing nothing and everything as he held her in his arms and kissed. “Remember the first time?” she asked, glancing at the kitchen table, and Cullen blushed as he recalled taking her on his desk. Just as he could entertain the notion, take her, the thought becoming more enticing as they kissed, Anya chuckled as he parted and informed him the pie was likely ready. Removing herself from his arms, she took the pie out. She began cutting the pie, the sugared crust brown and the peaches still juicy. She served them, but didn’t take the first bite. She waited for him.

The peaches were sweet and caramelized, the cinnamon strong but not too strong. He wasn’t the Commander anymore, and Kirkwall never happened. He never became a templar. He stayed at home in Honnleath always.

“...how?” he asked Anya, shoveling another forkful of the pie. “How did you know this is what it used to taste like?”

She touched his hand. “I...I’m not sure if i did.”

Her lips taste like the peaches from home, and her arms feel like home. It took him time after they were done with the pie, time to realize that it wasn’t that Anya had a secret power that made all her food taste like his mother’s at used to taste, but it was that she was like home.

Anya was home.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Renewal

Thank you so much for your continued support @schoute <3 Here’s a piece that features your Piper Lavellan (Rutherford) and Cullen post Tresspasser! :) Rated E for sexual content. 

Once, not too long ago, mornings were for the two of them. In that not too long ago time, Cullen would wake first, a symptom of early life spent in the chantry, and think he would let Piper sleep a little more. He would think that until he realized how precious their moments were together, and delicately trace Piper’s shoulder with the pad of his forefinger. Sunlight spilling through the open windows would wash her in orange and yellow golds, and she would wake. They would kiss, maybe do more. Usually more. Mornings were precious because they didn’t always have them together. They had to make them last. Somewhere ingrained even after mornings weren’t so much for the two of them, Cullen still wanted to make them last.

Yet after the Exalted Council, there was some comfort in knowing mornings were still for Piper and Cullen. Yet it shifted from kisses and other things to helping her out of bed, pulling her hair up and helping her dress. She thought herself a burden in those moments, but she could never be a burden. He loved taking care of her. He adored helping her. She thought it pulled them apart yet he saw it as bringing them closer. How often did she help him when he was going through the throes of withdrawal? To do the same was no burden. He loved her. He wanted to see her as her again.

“Cullen,” she said that morning, stirring as he yawned and stretched. “You promised. It’s today.”

Nodding, he kissed her forehead before rising and dressing quickly. He let the dog out, feeding him first, going back to the bedroom. Piper had already dressed herself, managing to do everything save lace her tunic, breeches, and tie her hair up. Wordlessly he helped her, taking her to the vanity after where he brushed her hair and pulled it in a braid.

“I’m getting better at this,” he said, half to himself, half to her. She smiled, half of it genuine and half not. He was glad to see it still.

They went outside where he had set up the training dummies the days before along the side of their home. They lived in the outskirts of South Reach, near enough to his siblings, yet isolated enough so that they had some privacy. Since the day they moved Piper wanted him to teach her one handed techniques with a sword. Perhaps before that even, but he needed time to prepare and time to install the training equipment. He promised he would because he would promise her anything, but he was still apprehensive as he handed her the starting rapier.

He was right to be apprehensive. She took the rapier, and frowned.

“Cullen, give me a sword like yours,” she said, attempting to hand it back to him.

“This is for starting out,” he replied.

Reason wasn’t in her terms that day. She demanded a larger, broad sword, but Cullen remained unmoved.

“You have to walk before you fly.”

“I did fly! Cullen—”

“Piper, I don’t want you getting hurt.”

She shook her head, apologized. She sighed deeply, telling him she understood. “Show me what you know,” she asked of him.

“Come here.”

She held an upright position, fit for an archer but not a swordswoman. He held her body to begin, positioned her and guiding her steps. He moved her about in an invisible duel, instructing her how to move her hand, how she may parry a blow.

“This is how we learned in the chantry,” he reminisced, “The instructor would come around, show us where to stand and how to hold a sword. Shields came later, then actually moving and sparring after that.”

“We’re going to spar much sooner than that.”

He understood, yet still he was unmoved. “Piper—"

“I have to be able to protect Cullen!”

She spun around, tossing the sword on the ground. “Don’t you understand?” she asked, “This is all I know.”

“That’s not true.”

“It is,” she insisted. “All I’ve done is protect people. In Clan Lavellan, I was a hunter and made sure we were alright. It was the exact same thing in the Inquisition. It’s all I am or ever will be and now that’s taken away—”

“It’s not,” Cullen promised. “Piper, you’re worth is—”

“That’s why I have to learn,” she said, looking to their feet. “You have to teach me.”

“Val Royeaux wasn’t built in a day.”

She repeated the oft repeated phrase, “it has to be now. You must teach me now.” He set his sword aside, took a string of Piper’s white hair and tucked it behind her pointed ear. Any other time such a gesture would have been welcomed. A rain of kisses would have followed, her pinning him to the wall. A rain of kisses, and maybe more.

Not today. He would have considered himself lucky if he got one smile

“I will teach you,” Cullen said, still holding on. “But Piper, please don’t think that this is all the good you ever were. You’re more than your skill with a bow, more than what you lost.”

“That’s not true,” she said, and she had begun to cry. “My skill with a bow was sometimes all I had. If I can’t protect people, if I can’t save anyone anymore…then what good am I?”

“You didn’t need a bow to save me.”

She fell into his arms. Her tears wet his shirt. He didn’t remember her crying at all since the Exalted Council. He hated her tears, yet knew they needed to happen. He was glad he was there for her.

He needed to cry to, he realized as a tear fell from his cheek. How easily exactly, could he have lost her? How much relief did he have, joy, when he found out he didn’t, and they would have that life that they promised together?

“Cullen,” Piper said, standing on her tiptoes and wiping the tears away with the pads of her fingers. “You can’t cry too.”

“I almost lost you.”

He cradled her, back and forth, observed the pliancy of her limber and sinewy body against his. In his haziest daydreams he had the thought that the Maker made them so they could fit together, but that couldn’t be true. The truth of the matter, and one that was far more romantic—was that they learned to fit together.

They kissed, exchanged heated breaths, and it was dizzy and dancing. She led him to the wall. “There she is,” Cullen whispered as she nipped at his neck, made him even dizzier, made him want to dance longer. “There’s Rowdy.”

She chuckled into their kiss, not hearing that name since the Exalted Council. It was Varric’s nickname for her, Rowdy Piper Lavellan. He had more names for her he wanted to give, and so did she. It had been a while, a long time, Cullen whispered as she led him back to their room, and she tossed him to the bed. It thrilled him when she climbed atop him, grinded against him. Rowdy really was back.

“Piper,” he rasped, “let me…”

“Let me.”

“Let me welcome you back.”

He laid her gently on the bed. They helped each other take off their clothes, and when they were bare, sun spilling through an open window, he began his reverence. He kissed every part of her face, her neck, relished the soft moans she made as he did. His fingers drifted between her thighs as she mewled, impatient, and he himself rubbed against her thigh to somewhat abate himself. He teased her clit as his warm open mouth kissed between her breasts. He traveled to her right shoulder, skimmed his lips down her arm. She twitched underneath him as his fingers pressed harder, moved in circular motions. She came, and he took her hand in his, cradled it, kissed every fingertip.

She froze when he kissed down her other arm.

“No,” she said. “Cullen—”

“I love you.”

“I’m not—”

“I love you.”

She wept again. He stopped his ministrations, resting against her, shifting so he wouldn’t hurt her with his weight atop her. He kissed away the tears. “I thought you were back,” he whispered. “What’s wrong?”

“Every time I feel like myself, I remember. I can’t—”

“You save me every day.”

“Every day?” she asked, voice cracking, tears still streaming.

“Every day.”

“Lay down for me.”

He was pushed to his back. She climbed astride him, let the warmth of her folds envelope him. She moved like that, coating him in her arousal, and though he wasn’t inside her yet, it was welcoming warm exquisiteness as his head rolled back against the pillow. Her nails were against his forearms. His body shivered. She coaxed, teased, as she shifted against him and prolonged the before. He opened his eyes. He saw beautiful her.

She undid her hair. The curls fell and kissed her shoulders. She grinned wickedly at him, more than aware of how spellbound she made him, his wicked, wicked woman. She leaned down. The tip of her tongue glided against the corner of his mouth. The kiss she gave was deep and sweet.

“Ride me,” he breathed.

“Cullen. You’re going to have to hold me.”

She rose, then he rose, and they began to learn together. It was something they had been doing since they met, but they found that that time, making love was neither different nor foreign from before. There was an edge to it, an exquisite sweetness in the way she moved, her arm wrapping around his neck, and his hands leveraging her as she sank on top of his cock. So sweet because it had been a while—their wedding night, but other than that, it was warm familiarity, a pattern and a routine. He had been a man of routines all his life, and yet Piper was his favorite always new and thrilling routine.

“I love you,” he said. “I will teach you all I know, but please, please, don’t believe that all you’re worth or all you ever were was on the bow and protecting people.”

“It’s not, I know,” she said, pressing her lips to his collar.

Long and deep kisses passed as he held her, and she sank again and again on his cock. “Then why,” he began, moaning as she pressed herself even deeper, “is it so important that you learn?”

“What else can I do?”

“Be with me.”

“I am with you.”

“Live with me. Build a life together, travel with me. Would you go somewhere with me?”

“Anywhere, I’d go anywhere.”

He laid her down. She squeezed his arm. An ankle rested on his shoulder as he teased, the tip of his cock at her entrance. She whined, taking him, stroking him once, twice before removing, and he was so addicted to that feeling of her that he couldn’t tease either him or her any longer and thrusted himself inside.

“Anywhere,” she said as he began to rub her clit, make her come quickly and softly. “Let’s see everything.”

“You won’t be held back.”

“No,” she promised. “I won’t be.”

He came, spilling inside. He remained inside as he came back to earth, falling against her, letting her move the two of them to their sides. He was inside even still. She stroked his cheek and dampened hair, tenderly kissed and stroked down his side. She took care of him. She always did. She took care of everyone. It was up to him to take care of her. How lucky he was.

“Cullen Rutherford, you promise me one thing,” she said, pointing a finger at him.

“Anything.”

“You have to know. I didn’t save you. You saved yourself.”

“You lifted me up though.”

“Cullen—”

“You lifted me up.”

He was going to hear none of that talk. There were things he knew to be true, and her helping him forge and reassemble was one of them.

“Fine,” she conceded. “I may have assisted lifting you up. But you did the rest. And today—”

He knew. He lifted her up, but she was going to forge and reassemble herself, find herself again. And they were going to travel, make love, maybe adopt more dogs…and other things.

He couldn’t wait. For that moment, he treasured the beautiful, wonderful moment of Piper entangling them further, and him helping Piper begin the process to learn. Learn, forge, assemble again, and renew.  

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Maps

for @alyssalenko. Thank you! 

Features Cullen reuniting with his Inquisitor, Victoria in the war room. passion ensues :)

He wouldn’t ever get peace from the dreams, would he?

It took only a single moment to realize it was all a dream and he wasn’t back there again, but that moment often felt an eternity. Then once the realization came, that he wasn’t back there and it was only a dream, panic had to quell, his beating heart had to ease. He would then have to wipe the sweat from his brow, and then reach for his coin. A ritual of a thousand nights. Unavoidable and sporadic, but never something he could completely rid himself of. That night was no different, save when he tried to reach for his coin, he remembered it wasn’t there. He gave it to Victoria. She had it with her, the same way she had his heart.

He sighed when his feet hit the cold ground. He stretched and remembered she wasn’t home at Skyhold. Whenever she was gone it was difficult when he woke up. In the middle of the night he had nothing but his thoughts and his worries. Her being home alleviated them, her being away somewhere far off on a mission exacerbated them. He could hear her then without her even having to be there, Cullen, try to go back to sleep. Don’t you dare think about getting work done.

Perhaps if she was home he would have convinced himself to stay in bed, somehow lull himself back to sleep. But he didn’t want to go back there, and he didn’t want to think of her gone, even if she now had his coin, and childlike he thought that would keep her from harm. He had to stay awake, there was much work to be done anyway. He stuffed on his boots and threw on a discarded white tunic, and he lit a candle at his desk downstairs. Realizing he left a few papers in the war room, he took the candle and began the walk.

He hardly needed the candle, the moon and stars through the window illuminated the map. Strange, celestial beauty it had, and Cullen sighed as he stretched out. The Inquisitor needed troops in the Arbor Wilds. Funny how she was the Inquisitor in the War Room, Victoria anywhere else, and Tori when they were together, kissing and in each other’s arms.

Maker, it was more than missing her. It was craving, pining, hungering like he never hungered before. Why didn’t he tell her he loved her? Anything could have happened while she was gone. She had his coin, yes, but….

“Cullen?”

The moon through the windows made her a near ghostly apparition at first, but it was her. It was her.

He rushed to her side and threw his arms around her, she doing the same. “Tori,” he muttered, his joy turning her into Tori instead of the Inquisitor or Victoria, “you’re here. You’re back. When did…?”

“We rode in early,” she said, standing on the tips of her toes to meet his embrace. “Oh Cullen. I’ve missed you. Why aren’t you in bed? One of the servants said they saw you come to the war room. Did you have trouble sleeping? Cullen…”

“It doesn’t matter. You’re here.”

In a long moment he held her tightly and fiercely. In a second long moment, he kissed her gently. He had the thought that he should take her elsewhere but that thought was fleeting before he became lost in the kiss again. Maker, he had her again.

“It’s becoming harder,” he admitted, squeezing tightly. “Tori—”

“You can’t worry about me Cullen.”

He sighed. She held his face in her hands. He kissed her palm. “I can worry about you a little,” he said.

“But now I have luck. And…”

She took his hand and guided him to the war table, closer to the stars that spilled from the window panes and closer to the light of the burning candle he brought. She took off her travel cloak, set on the table, her hands slowly traveling to the top button of her shirt after. She undid the button. Silver glittered at the base of her throat.

He instinctively touched it, his coin that he gave her for luck, and maybe too, to think of him when they were far. “I don’t know what to say,” he said, “I—”

“You don’t like it. Oh. I just—I didn’t want to lose it, and—”

“I love it.”

“Oh Cullen.”

Her lips tasted of thanks, underlined with a desperation. She moaned as he kissed lightly her neck and her jaw, and before he could think of it he was propping her on top of the war table. She laced her arms around his neck, his arms coiled around her waist, and it was Cullen, whispering through the deluge of kisses that he needed her.

Her thighs parted, legs wrapping around him. She said nothing, only let an eternity pass between their eyes. Decorum got the better of him. He apologized—it wasn’t proper to do what he had just suggested—on the war table no less where they had meetings with Josephine and Leliana and they talked and made plans with their Inquisitor. How would he ever look at the war table again without becoming hopelessly aroused? Or Maker forbid—embarrassed. It had been a long time for him, he worried it would be too fast, not good, and she wouldn’t enjoy herself, and—

“I want you.”

She whispered those three words in his ear, I want you. She deserved a proper session of love making, long moments of himself mapping her body with his lips and tongue. But his hands were so rough, her body soft and undeserving of that. He hesitated.

She pulled him in. Her lips captured his bottom lip. She breathed into his kiss, hummed softly at his taste.

“I don’t want proper,” she said. “I want it right now.”

“You’ll have me?”

She pressed their foreheads together. “Yes Cullen,” she muttered.  “All of you. Here.”

He blew out the candle and set it aside, wanting moonlight to be the only thing that bathed their bodies. She tugged at his shirt and he tossed it to the ground. He was littered with scars and burns. The light was low but she could still probably see most of them. He had a shiver of uncertainty, a no, until her hands slid down his chest. He was going to fall, but she was grounding him.

There was a moment before. He held her face in his hands, regarded every small part of her face. Her dark and short dark hair that framed a heart shaped face. Full lips he spent so long kissing. He longed for a thousand years of that. The small and subtle tattoo under her eye. Her unique eyes tinged with purple.

Her shirt fell the floor alongside his. She wasted no time taking off her breast-band either, and in a stroke of boldness he kneeled to the ground, took off her boots, and helped her slide out of her breeches and small clothes. He wanted to see her bare in the moonlight. Maker he can come at the sight. She was a goddess of the moon and stars, dusted with the powder of the light through the window pane. His hands don’t suit her. But—

But she took them in hers, silently entreated them to skim up her thighs, part them. He knew some things, but it wasn’t as though he was completely experienced, but either way she was the first woman that he thought he loved. He gave her his coin. He had never wanted to give another his coin.

“I want…”

She gripped his hair and twisted it in her fingers as his prickly and unshaven face left kisses on her thighs.

“My mouth?” he rasped.

She nodded eagerly, gasping when he gave her not his mouth, but his gentle finger at first, tentatively touching, seeing her reactions. She spread her legs further and it compelled him to give her what she so desired. His adoring tongue lapped at her clit, tasted her taste of salt and musk, reached around and grasped her hips as she inched closer to his mouth. He felt her orgasm around him. He touched his clothed cock, stroked himself at such a sight. That could have been it for him and he would have bee satisfied. Not for her.

She pulled him upward by the shoulders and stroked him through his breeches. At her mercy he moaned and panted, wrapping his arms around her and breathing hard into the crook of her neck. Her hands eventually wrapped around his back, sunk underneath his breeches. He helped her take it off. She moved to the war table and he had to chuckle. She chuckled too. That would be its legacy and everlasting memory in his mind. Not the hours of strategy they discussed or something or other, but the Commander making love to his Inquisitor. Cullen and Victoria, bare for each other. In love.

He thought. He hoped. He poured that hope in the way he mapped her body with his tongue, resting underneath the map of Ferelden and Orlais. So long he had studied those maps only for his favorite map to become her body—strong and muscular and kissed by the sun, yet with a feminine softness. His coin still rested at the base of her throat. He tried not to cry. And then she wanted to touch him, map his body with her tongue and they switched places. The table was hard underneath his back, but her lips were soft. She loved him and revered him. He was at the mercy of a goddess.

When he thought he could take it no longer and she straddled his hips, he thought maybe they shouldn’t in a moment of clarity he almost hated himself for having. “It’s alright,” she said when she noticed his concern. “I’ve taken the witherstalk potion.”

“Are you sure?”

He felt a scared little boy. It was a lifetime of ingrained inferiority speaking, thinking he wasn’t good enough. But Victoria. Beautiful, beautiful she…she leaned down and she kissed him.

“More than sure,” she said. “Cullen. I—”

She sank on top of his cock and he rose to meet her. It was more than he imagined, because his imagination couldn’t ever dream of such sweet bliss as her heat around his cock, the steady rhythm of her moving up and down. It had been so long, he knew it was going to be embarrassingly short. He warned her even and told him it was alright. It was the first time, they could practice. He nearly cried when she affirmed they would do it again.

He made her cum with his fingers and she cried out into a warm and heady kiss. He came a beat after, sweaty and in her arms, his goddess.

“I can’t say I regret you came here anymore,” she said, chuckling. “That…wow…”

“I love you.”

She blinked and he fell. It was the end. She didn’t love him back. She—

“I love you too.”

He kissed her and it was a kiss of relief. They removed themselves from the table and map after, and he prayed their secret wouldn’t be found out. It was futile though—he knew how things worked at Skyhold. Besides, he had to walk out with her hand in hand, grin on his face, back to his room where she spent the night with him.

In her arms, he fell asleep. And then in the morning, they made love again and mapped each others bodies again. The bed was much softer on his back, but her lips were far softer.

“I love you,” he said.

She said it back and he soared.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Autumn Leaves

A commission for @gingerbreton that features a bashful Alistair and his warden, Ysabelle or “Izzy.” Thank you so much for your support! :)

Alistair found Ysabelle outside. The rest of the party was in the tavern, (except for Morrigan, who sauntered off somewhere, thankfully.) and Alistair hoped Izzy wouldn’t think the fact that he happened to notice her slipping outside to the garden was done because he couldn’t keep his eyes off of her all afternoon and evening. It was true, but not in a lecherous way—no, certainly not. It was only they had so few moments for quiet. She was lovelier in quieter moments, not as worried or frightened of the seemingly impossible task that they had.

Maker, she was lovely. He could be struck by her presence a thousand times and still be overwhelmed with that simple fact. In the orchard, a small woodland area away from the woods farther in, she was sitting on a stone bench, framed by the trees. The leaves were golden red. They were like her hair.

“Alistair,” Izzy said, seeing him, much sooner than he would have liked too—but he was rather tall and hard not to notice.

“Hello,” he greeted, rubbing the back of his neck.

She grinned. “I was hoping you would find me.”

He stared. “You did?”

“Of course,” she said, low, giggling. “Why do you think I slipped out?”

“You wanted to be alone?” he suggested, shifting. “Which I’m, uh—"

“I wanted us to be alone.”

She suggested they perhaps could be alone together, outside where surely no one would notice. His heart leapt as he sat next to her. Their legs touched, and he felt an odd sort of thrill when she didn’t move it away.

“Leaves are pretty here.”

Maker’s breath, had he actually said that? Next he was going to wax about how beautiful the moon was or something equally as overdone. Izzy was going to laugh, he was sure of it.

She didn’t laugh. She smiled instead, tucked a red lock of hair behind her ear. “They are,” she agreed.

He supposed it was now or never. “They reminded me of your hair.”

She cocked her head. He realized, indeed, she did want him to go on and wax poetic. Such a woman Ysabelle was. In battle she could be a dance of red death, duel wielding her mother’s rapiers and turning it into an art as he lumbered his sword and shield, protecting the party. She could be that woman, but she could also be the woman who blushed crimson and scarlet, wanting to hear things from someone else. From him.

“Your hair,” he continued, wanting to be that man. “It really is, quit…red. And gold, in the sun. Reddish gold, like the leaves. It’s really pretty.” He didn’t like where it was going, he wasn’t a good poet, but he opened a gate. He had to continue. “You know, I never used to like autumn or Harvestmere, but I do now. A lot.”

“It gets a little chillier in Autumn,” Ysabelle said, her thigh touching his. “Chillier nights mean we have to find creative ways of getting warm.”

“Izzy? Are you suggesting…?”

“Oh yes I am.”

She rested her head against his shoulder. He was unburdened of his usual plate armor, as he only decided to wear a simple tunic underneath a larger overshirt for warmth. Izzy took the red cloak she was wearing and wrapped it around his shoulder, and the two passed in comfortable silence in the chilly autumn. He could have sat there for a thousand years without talking. Being with her was more than enough and more than he could have ever hoped. But he loved the sound of her laugh too much, he knew he would say something eventually, even something embarrassing and ridiculous to hear her laugh again. In hearing it he would be happy, because she was happy.

He was about to say something about how they’re likely taking bets inside about the two of them—it had been happening since he gave her the rose—but Ysabelle broke the silence first She had a question on her mind, something she had been pondering since the Korcari Wilds.

“I was wondering,” she began, not breaking that sweet contact they had, “but what changes after the joining?”

“You mean other than becoming a Grey Warden?”

He had to say it, the sarcastic quip was on the tip of his tongue. She smirked, smacking him lightly on his thigh. “Oww,” he over-acted, making her laugh. He got to hear his favorite thing, and he rode that brief high before she asked him to elaborate. The truth was there was no guidebook. In fact, after his joining he asked Duncan the same thing. ���You’ll see,” he forewarned, but that was it.

“You’ll see?” Izzy repeated. “Just try that line on me.”

“I can think of much better lines for you.”

“Well, why don’t you use them?”

“Perhaps I will,” he said, voice honeyed with promises. “Later though. When you least expect it.”

She was practically wicked, Alistair knowing he was going to have to find a particularly good opportunity for the lines he truthfully hadn’t thought of, because they usually came right at the moment he blurted them out. Like the compliment of her hair being the same as the autumn leaves, he had thought of it then and decided there was no time like the present. Other than that, opportunities were not so easily afforded to them. All the grand plans he could make when he was alone in his tent, coming up with just the right thing to say and sweeping her off her feet—maybe after a grand battle with darkspawn, the two running toward each other—usually had to be left to the wayside in the heat of desperate moments. Unfortunately, they were usually more concerned with staying alive.

That concerned him then—staying alive and not dying of embarrassment as he went through all the things he observed after the joining. She said she didn’t notice much of an appetite change, though he noticed how she had wolfed down food. He even thought once it was a good thing she got a lot of exercise.

“What can I say? I’m a growing girl.”  

“I’ll say.”

They shared a knowing look. He asked her not to hit him. She didn’t thankfully, but she did inch closer. Her hair was under his nose. It smelled like the autumn air and something that he couldn’t name, other than that it was distinctly her. He was glad they were so close. Talking of nightmares and how they got worse wouldn’t have been as easy had they not been so close, and how they got worse when a Grey Warden knew their time had come.

She lifted her head. “His time has come? What do you mean?”

Alistair fell. In the midst of everything that happened, he never got a chance to tell her before about the taint and what it did. He swallowed. He took her hand.

He sighed. “The taint. Eventually…it’s a death sentence. When a Grey Warden knows their time has come, they usually go to the Deep Roads for one last glorious battle.”

She didn’t day anything, but she had grown pale, nodding in understanding. She called it a high price to pay, and he agreed, though he told her what Duncan always told him: they were the only ones that could stop the Blight.

“It’s true,” Izzy said once again inching closer. “But if that’s the case then…I really think you really should get on with those lines.”

She chuckled, merry, and he was lifted again from where he had fallen. Her lips were such a delicate coral—involuntary he bit his bottom lip, trying to figure out what her lips would taste like between his, what she would do if he leaned in and did that thing he had been thinking about since the moment they met.

“Izzy,” he began, low, “I think I have something else in mind than a line.”

“I’d like to see,” she said, breathless. “I’d like to see very much. Especially if it involves the steamy bits.”

He chuckled. He said when he gave her the rose that he was looking forward to the awkward and embarrassing stage to end and the “steamy bits” to begin. However, there was something nice about the courting stage, how every little thing she said or did thrilled him. He had a feeling though, that that would always be the case.

But he really, really, really wanted to kiss her.

He took a deep breath. He grew more aware of the sounds of wind and rustling leaves, the progressing sound of drums and lutes that swelled from the tavern. He became more aware of his thundering heart.

She closed her eyes. He cupped her chin in his hands, hoping she wouldn’t find them too rough. She sighed instead at the touch, she liked his touch, it encouraged him to lean in.

“Izzy…”

“Alistair.”

“I—”

“Shit!”

Izzy pulled herself away and Alistair fell again, this time to the deepest corner of the earth. It was the Bann—putting his paws on Izzy’s leg and startling both her and him. It was funny—once Alistair said he wasn’t mangy, to Morrigan of all people.

The dog was looking awfully mangy then.

“Come on boy,” Izzy said, scratching behind his ears, his whole body wagging. “I’ll take you back inside.”

The Bann followed Izzy, leaving Alistair by himself with nothing but the autumn leaves to occupy him. He sighed, knowing Zevran or Wynne would see his grim look of defeat. Another moment, gone. They had so few that would dwindle away, the progressively cheerier music that played in the tavern was mocking him of that lost moment. And it wasn’t the darkspawn or Morrigan that ruined this one, but a dog.

Well. He did say there was something nice about that before stage.

Leaning back, Alistair laughed. He laughed so hard he put his hand on his stomach because it began to ache. Onward for more adventure, another day and another opportunity.  

He was going to go back inside when she came back.

“Alistair,” she said, hands on her hips. “I believe we were still in the middle of some lines, don’t you?”

She invited him, all but asked. But he did have time to kiss her, all the time in the world. And there were so few times with music.

“Actually, I have another idea,” he said, rising. “Would you indulge me? It’s not a line, exactly, but…”

He outstretched his hand. She took it. He had never learned to dance, but he hoped he made up for it with his gusto.

They danced among the autumn leaves, Alistair dipping her when the drums and lutes progressed into a crescendo. Izzy laughed, red hair cascading behind her, her hair like the autumn leaves. He loved her laugh. He even wondered if anything would beat her laugh.

Kissing her probably would have. But they were going to dance then, and enjoy the sweet before. The before really was something special.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Everywhere

for @savbakk, thank you so much! 

Cullen and Solona Amell, the last few weeks at Kinloch Hold. And make sure you check out Sav’s art with this pairing! :)

The not quite boy yet not yet man from Honnleath stands tall and proud in the library of Kinloch Hold. He’s nineteen and sometimes he thinks about the steely lyrium vial he drinks every morning and every night. He feels more attuned, more aware of his surroundings, powerful. Invincible even. He’s a knight of old, as he always wanted to be. He may not take up his sword and adventure Ferelden as they did, but he watches Kinloch Hold with a quiet, contemplative eye. He stands ready.

He thinks of what his mother said in her last letter. I’m so proud of you, sent along with treats of fresh baked cinnamon bread. It wasn’t as good as it would have been had it been fresh, but it was enough to make him miss home. She even sent him a copy of Cliodna, and other myths and legends from Ferelden folklore. There were so many stories he treasured from that book, but the story of the Avvar priestess Cliodna, who roamed the world on her white horse, looking for the one she loved was his favorite. It’s still his favorite. Now, the book sits on his bedside table for him to reread at night. He’s already read it twice. The words, though the same words from before, are just as wonderful, and the new illustrations vibrantly bring the words to life. Mum used to read the story and act out different voices, and he, Rosalie, Bran and Mia would all sit huddled around her. It’s like when Solona reads to the little ones. She always acts out the voices, tells every story with passion, holding the tome with one hand while the other gestures. He’d like to see her become Cliodna one day. He thinks she’d be a wonderful Cliodna.

He doesn’t know what love is. All the same, he feels something when he sees her. It can’t be love, because he doesn’t think he’s earned the pleasure of the word. Yet it is something, especially with the few letters they’ve exchanged. You’re warm, and you’re good. she wrote him last, Cullen hiding behind a bookshelf in the library after hours, devouring every word. I wish we could just be a boy and a girl under a tree, just holding hands. Isn’t that the strangest thing to want? But I do. I want us to be us.

You’re the brightest part of my day, he wrote back, sticking the letter in the book she was reading. I want to be there with you.

Often he sees her in the library, her nose buried in a book. They’re both there now, standing only a few feet apart. It feels like so little and it feels like a wide sea. Few things pull Solona from a book, but sometimes he can feel her eyes flitter over to his frame. He blushes when that happens. He thinks about her too often and sees her too little—that’s why evenings are so precious. All the better, because there are fewer people around. She’s the quiet one, with the dark brown braid and brown eyes that are warm. Tall, though he is still taller, strong. Kissed by the sun even though she cannot live in the sun. Mage’s robes are like templar uniforms, they aren’t made for flattering one’s appearance, but she makes the robe suit her frame. Irving speaks well of her and even Greagoir speaks of her talents, though Greagoir wishes she wouldn’t choose the company she chooses. Rumors and whispers have spread about her friend, Jowan, and how he’s turned to blood magic, though there’s no proof yet, and Greagoir waits for more information.

Her Harrowing is soon. During the morning and evening prayers, when he should be asking the Maker for strength to carry on his sacred duty, he asks Him to bring her safety.

Solona peers over the book. He looks away from her. It’s a game they often play, if you could call it that. He tried so hard to hide it, still tries, though the others tell him it’s a bad idea. She is trouble, Bevel says sometimes, all mages are trouble. Cullen tells him not to, he’s wrong. He doesn’t share that wariness so many others do. Why are you so caught? They all ask the same.

Maybe it was it her soft, low contralto that thanked him once when he picked up a book for her that had fallen to the floor. Maybe it was the kindness she displayed in the way she taught the young mages. Maybe it was just when he helped her reach a book she couldn’t reach, his glove hand touched hers and she was warm.

He’s caught because she’s her. He feels himself caught every day, especially as she passes by him and smiles. He can’t wait for that smile every day. He can’t wait for every evening when they’re together. That’s all he needs and wants—just them together. He blooms when they’re together.

He stands while she sits and lounges. She tucks a stray lock of hair behind her ear, and there is no question in his mind, she notices him noticing her.  He thinks she chuckles behind her book. It’s a new one, as earlier she finished the one with the note he left inside. He saw her stick it in her back pocket to be read later. He wrote of summer days, perhaps she reads of summer days in her book.

Curious, he looks at the title. She reads of Cliodna.

He blossoms. Solona and he are so different, yet the most wonderful things link them. She reads Cliodna, and other myths and legends from Ferelden folklore and he thinks of the conversations they could have. She certainly can’t be there yet, but he wonders if she would feel as he did when he was a child, and his mother got to the part in the story where Cliodna asked where the one she loved was, and the Lady of the Skies told her look around, and Cliodna saw the one she loved everywhere. The fact that they read the same book was already so much.

He thinks they have another thing in common too, or at least, he hopes. He hopes that they both like each other. And maybe it’s not love, but perhaps it veers to it.

It’s such a raggedy book she has, with illustrations long faded. He thinks of the one his mother brought him. The blue of Cliodna’s eyes pop, her dark hair luxuriant like Solona’s.

When they part for the night, he writes one more note. He sticks it in his mother’s book.

***

The book, Solona finds the next night, is not where she left it. What has taken it’s place is a different version of the same book, much less worn, newer, with a note inside. She opens it and finds the note is in the same place she stopped reading the previous evening. The same book of Cliodna and different myths and legends of Ferelden, but it is vibrant, it is alive. It is Cullen’s.

Solona, the note says, take this. My mother used to read it to us when we were little. I should warn you, you may cry at the end. I know I did. Cullen.

Cullen is not there that night—he must have been called away. In fact, no one is there save Solona and Cliodna. She wishes he could be there, she likes it better when he is. He makes her feel good and more than what they say she is. But she reads the book and sees Cliodna on her white horse, roaming the lands and searching for her lost love. The illustrations take her far and away from the Circle, and by the end of the story, when she reaches that part where the Lady of the Skies tells Cliodna that she never lost the one she loved, and he is everywhere, she has to quickly wipe away her tear, so it will not ruin the image of a free Cliodna, her arms spread, her hair in the wind, sinking into the stars.

She reads it again that night in her room by candlelight. She then takes a piece of parchment and scribbles her note to him. He is there the next evening, thankfully, and the only other person in the library besides her and him—Niall, is asleep on one of the desks. Even so, she wordlessly lets it be known that she is behind the shelves. He follows.

They speak with nothing but their eyes of Cliodna and her revelation of how the ones you love never truly leave you, and they are everywhere. I loved it, I loved it, she says with her enthusiastic nod, her sparkling eyes. Thank you Cullen, thank you.

She hands it back to him. He shakes his head.

“It’s yours,” he says.

She stares. “Cullen, you said your mother brought it to you. I can’t—”

It shocks her, that its one of the few, if only words they have spoken directly to each other. Yet he doesn’t speak again, perhaps that might break the spell. Instead, he breaks the distance between them ever so slightly. His hand, though gloved in leather, rests against her cheek. It’s a kiss but not a kiss. Precious all the same.

She takes the note out of the book and hands it to him. It speaks of how she still wants what he says he wants too—the summer days with him. Just Cullen, just Solona.

Perhaps someday it will be so, and they can talk about Cliodna.

***

She cannot take the book with her, when weeks pass and Duncan recruits her into the Grey Wardens. She brings it back to him the evening before she leaves. They both regret.

There’s one last note inside the book. She can’t remember what she wrote. She would never be able to remember.

He holds her face in his hands one more time. It’s their silent, unspoken wishes of another time, another life.

She leaves the next morning. She thinks of Cliodna. She thinks of Cullen. Cullen. He is everywhere.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Overboard

A commission for @princessbatteringram from @agentkatie! Here’s a surprise with Lottie Hawke and Isabela! 

Varric made it clear: the ship was ready to sail. Lottie wasn’t. Neither was Isabela. But Varric also made it clear that if Lottie didn’t get up from her spot, the boat would sail away without her. She was half sure he was joking. That however, would all depend on Isabela.

“Done yet?” Lottie asked.

Isabela toyed with the black feather that adorned the top of Lottie’s sailor hat. “Not at all, sweet thing.”

Sweet thing, she said. Involuntarily, Lottie melted. Isabela had been clinging to Lottie’s hat all morning, fiddling with the feather on the cap and outlining the embroidery detail. Occasionally she stuck it on top of her head and posed, Lottie making the appropriate googling eyes. “You’re overdoing it!” Isabela would say, hitting her on the arm, but the truth was that the googly eyes and oohs and aws of appreciation weren’t something Lottie had to force. Isabela was stunning as far as mermaids went. Granted, Isabela was the only mermaid Lottie had ever seen, but out of all the human women Lottie had seen, Isabela was also in the top tier. Of course, there were no such thing as an unattractive woman, but Isabela soared high in Lottie’s mind. There was a reason she fell overboard in The Siren’s Call anyway.

As Isabela still fiddled with Lottie’s hat, Lottie recalled the grand adventure she thought sea-faring would be. Or at least, that’s what she said to Varric at the Hanged Man when she had the grand idea to buy a boat off a seller near Kirkwall’s docks. Lottie had a good feeling about it all when the purchase was finalized and they were off, but Aveline gave a hard stare before the captain’s boat, dubbed The Siren’s Call departed. She had a catchy name, until it became a reality, or at least of sorts. Isabela was no siren, she made sure to mention it when Lottie woke up stranded on the beach. “I’m a mermaid,” she proclaimed, showing off her dark blue tail, scales shimmering and fin flapping against the sand, and though insisted she was compelled to fall overboard by the siren on the rock. Yet Isabela assured repeatedly as Lottie continued to spit out seawater that she was, indeed, a mermaid, and sirens didn’t exist. And if they did, Isabela was sure to note they would have better things to do than lure pirates and seafarers to their doom.

It had been a week. They ate coconuts from the trees, swam, and talked by a campfire at night. Lottie asked if Isabela had some Mermaid’s Lagoon to head off to, but Isabela said there was nothing of the sort. Give it a week, Lottie said. She knew Varric would find her, but she was ambivalent when he appeared with The Siren’s Call Two that afternoon.

“Come on Hawke,” Varric said, Lottie and Isabela still in the sand. The Siren’s Call Two even had an experienced crew that Aveline hired to rescue her—a boat where she was unfortunately not the captain. At least Lottie still had her hat.

“I can’t believe you found her,” Isabela scoffed. “You’re better than I thought. A lot of dwarves have fallen at sea.”

“Dwarves don’t go to sea unless they’re dragged there by other people,” Varric said, glaring at Lottie. “Come on Hawke,” he ordered. “Time to go. I’m sure you can sail back here any time. Just don’t do it yourself.”

Sighing, Lottie stood, looking to the ship, where the crew was waiting for her. She looked at Isabela, her blue tail flopping against the sand. She grinned at Lottie, sashaying her shoulders in such a way that made her coin necklace glimmer in the sun. It first caught Lottie’s eyes when she was sailing, the open sea, that golden coin necklace that draped across Isabela’s chest. She made it out of coins she had found at the bottom of the sea, she had said one night.

Isabela must have mistook Lottie’s look. “I suppose you want this back,” Isabela said, holding onto Lottie’s hat.

“I—”

She looked at Isabela. She looked at the boat. She looked at Varric, staring with his hands on his hips. Wait a minute, she silently asked, eyes trailed to the dwarf. He rolled his eyes, but otherwise said he would be waiting in the rowboat, and they’d leave from there. From there, Lottie walked to Isabela. Isabela wasn’t a patient mermaid, but she sat quietly, waiting for Lottie to say something. She didn’t, not at first, electing to plop on the sand next to her instead.

“Thank you again,” Lottie said after a moment, breaking the silence “Really. You didn’t have to save me.”

She grinned. “I noticed you noticing me. Partially my fault you’re here. Maybe if I didn’t wave you wouldn’t have fallen off.”

“Well, I wanted a good story.” Lottie laughed. “I got one.”

“I’m going to miss you.”

It was the softest Isabela had spoken since Lottie had fallen overboard and came to the island. Pulling the hat off her head, she tried to give the captain’s back. Though Lottie held it in her hand for a moment, even considered putting it on,  she shook her head and handed it back to Isabela.  

“You mean to give it to me?” Isabela asked, flabbergasted. “But—"

“I’m not a real captain anyway,” Lottie had to admit. “You though—well, you’re not a captain either, but the hat looks better on you.”

“Oh, Lottie.”

Isabela reached around, unclasping her necklace. It took a moment before Lottie realized Isabela meant to give it to her, and not merely show off her breasts as Lottie first thought, and perhaps lecherously so.

“For you,” Isabela said, clasping the necklace around Lottie’s neck, Lottie trying not to look at Isabela’s breasts longer than necessary. Unfortunately, Isabela noticed—of course she noticed—and appropriately angled herself just so. Her dark hair was caught in the wind, and wearing Lottie’s hat, Lottie understood the Siren’s Call Two may take her back to Kirkwall, but she would always be that overboard sea captain who had fallen into the water, and into Isabela’s arms.

“Miss you,” Isabela murmured, a hand gentle in her hair.

“…goodbye.”

There was no embrace. Instead, Lottie rose from the sand, sensing Isabela outstretch her arms to lead her back. Lottie couldn’t look back, what if Isabela lured her? She said she wasn’t a siren and they didn’t exist, but Lottie was skeptical, moving from the beach to the water to the rowboat that would take her away from Isabela. Lottie fell, and fell hard, and shit, there was no way around it, she was a siren. She had lured her, almost convinced her to stay too, and not with a voice but with all her, all her, and—

“What’s wrong?”

Lottie hoisted herself into the rowboat, her bottom half sopping wet. Varric hit her leg with his when she didn’t respond.

“It was a…nice island, that was all,” Lottie muttered. “Good coconuts.”

Varric’s face was blank. “Somehow,” he began, leaning in, “I don’t think you’re talking about the ones on the trees.”

“No…Isabela!” Lottie shrieked, wiping tears away, and longingly toying with the necklace that hung around her neck. “Never met one like her before. She’s beautiful, she makes me feel like I’m actually a captain, and…and—”

“Go to her.”

She stared, mouth agape. “What?”

He put his hand on her knee. “Hawke,” he began, gentle “the island isn’t even a mile away from Kirkwall. I can come every week, I—”

She embraced him tight, he hit her back with comradery and happiness, encouraging Lottie to go to her. She jumped from the boat back into the water, overboard again, this time to her, to Isabela. Yet it was her excitement that did it, that made her legs and arms turn to lead. She couldn’t swim. She knew how, but she couldn’t.

And then arms were around her, welcoming, saving, and Lottie broke to the surface. “Isabela!” she cried out, coughing out seawater. They swam to the surface, or Isabela more swam and Lottie more held on, and still held on as she found herself encased by sand and water, on her back with nothing but sky overhead, until there was all Isabela. Isabela laughed, alive and in love, holding Lottie’s face in her hands.

“Couldn’t stay away from me, huh?” she asked, laughter still in her eyes.

“You stole my hat,” Lottie smirked, getting a glimpse of the captain’s hat from the corner of her eye.

“You stole my heart.”

“Well…” she played with a dark strand of Isabela’s hair. “You’re the siren. You’re the one that lured me here.”

“Would you want to be anywhere else?”

Lottie’s answer was a kiss. She tasted the salt from the sea and she tasted Isabela. She looked to the Siren’s Call Two, Varric at the top, waving. She wove back, knowing he would at least be visiting once a week, and brining snacks too.

But for the time being, there was Isabela, reaching for the hat Lottie gave her. She donned it, wore it well. She wore it better than Lottie, who frankly would have lost it anyway if she hadn’t gone overboard that first time. Isabela wasn’t going to lose it, not at all. Like how Lottie was, it was hers.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Free in the Sun

For @storybookhawke! Features Karl and Anders in a universe where Karl never became tranquil, and Anders managed to rescue him from the chantry during his first quest in DA2. takes place in his clinic directly after the quest. A touch of angst, mostly fluff. 

thank you for the support!

His hands shake. He can’t say why—his greatest fear, that of Karl wearing the tranquil brand, did not come to pass. What’s more is that Karl is back. He is alive. He is alright. It’s what Anders wanted, needed, though he doesn’t dare assume Karl’s home, though home ran through his mind in the chantry when they found him. He doesn’t assume anything yet, other than Karl knows what he did and likely disapproves. But there’s time to think of that later.

Now Anders offers a stifled “thank you,” to Hawke and Hawke’s collection of odd companions—a heavily armed ginger, a beefy looking boy with a giant sword that he assumes is the little brother, and a dwarf with a crossbow. There is the matter of the Grey Warden maps to attend to, but Hawke made it clear he’ll be back. Anders made a promise, he is going to attend to it. Hawke has nothing to worry about.

Hawke’s a good man underneath it all, Anders thinks. It also seemed to him that he could see something more in the way Anders rushed to Karl’s side, nearly cried when he saw he was alright. Then the burn of rage was too much. They used Karl to get to him, like they used all the mages. It could have happened. They could have branded Karl. And then—

The rage. The burn. The fire. It overflowed and spilled to his hands and through his being. He didn’t mean for Justice to spring forth. He couldn’t help it. He came out when it was too much, when he could not suppress it any longer. Karl knows, and he disapproves, Anders knows. He must. But he’s alive.

It’s been an hour and they’re back in his Darktown clinic. His hands still shake as he tries to peel away those contemptible and awful Circle robes. But they are awful in both basic fashion sense and with what they represent. Karl needs healing, needs everything, but as Anders tries to take it off to get a better look and heal him, Karl stops him.

Karl’s hands are on his, holding them and squeezing them tightly. He’s sitting on the cot that’s usually for patients and Anders thinks of how he started that day like any other. He didn’t dare hope he would be able to bring Karl back. After everything that’s happened, he very rarely hopes. It makes it too much and too overwhelming that Karl is alive, but he cherishes it. Despite everything he can still cherish some wonderful luck, something beautiful.

But then Anders starts to drift. He wonders of what would have happened had they waited to get Karl. He thinks of all the others that have worn the brand of tranquility and how many more well. He squeezes Karl’s hand tighter and Justice is close to emerging. Justice whispers through him that they were lucky, but something must be done now. If Anders doesn’t do anything…if he remains silent and hidden at Darktown…

You must help them all, Justice says. All of them. They must be—

“Anders?”

He breaks free. His own, he finds himself holding Karl and holding him close. Their arms wrap around each other. Anders tries not to weep into his shoulder, but in his pretending his shoulders shake and his whole body shakes and he tells Karl they’ll pay for using him as bait. They’ll pay, they’ll all pay—

“Enough of that,” Karl says. “Please Anders. Just…hold me.”

Anders nearly cries with such a simple want, but he says “I need to heal you,” and he starts to. He wasn’t hurt, Karl says. They roughed him up a bit, but nothing serious. Never the less the magic pours from Anders and onto Karl. He takes a discarded cloth and wipes the blood from Karl’s lip, and presses his finger against it so it will heal.

Karl takes his hands again. Anders looks into his soul and tells him that if he waited, he would have never forgiven himself.

“I thought you had long given up on me.”

Anders curses himself that Karl ever thought that. In Kinloch Hold they had to keep their relationship a secret, and it occurs to Anders then that with Karl he unconsciously goes back to old habits of hushed tones and secrecy, the two hiding behind bookshelves and cupboards for a brief reprieve of paradise in the cold and dark Circle tower. It’s still dark but they don’t have to be a secret anymore. They can be as loud as they want. Maybe someday they can even walk hand in hand down a street in the sun, proud and happy and in love.

But he’s giving himself too much hope.

“I couldn’t give up on you,” Anders says, holding Karl’s bearded face in his hands.

“I never thought I’d see you again.”

He has been given few sweet reposes in his time. Because of that Anders has always worried he’ll take too much and then it’ll be too much when the moment is finally over. He doesn’t cling to the too few moments of happiness for comfort. He’s learned to cling to his anger, his justice. Fitting he now merges with that spirit of the fade Himself, Justice and all that He stands for.

“I didn’t either,” Anders admits.

“How did you even get here?”

“A long story,” Anders says. “But Kirkwall. It’s a place for old washed up Fereldens like us.”

Karl chuckles and Anders chuckles and he can’t help it. He kisses Karl’s hand not out of habit—back in the Circle there was hardly any time for such casual yet beautiful intimacy—but out of a desperate want and starvation for comfort. He’s had not one since he’s arrived.

But he has it now.

“When I heard you were here, I had to do something,” Anders says. He kisses Karl’s hand again.

“I’m worried about what you’ve become Anders,” Karl whispers. “You brought the fade to the chantry. You merged with a spirit, didn’t you? Anders, what if—”

“Karl, please,” Anders begs, holding onto him all the more tightly. “I know.”

“How?”

It’s a long story, he admits. Maker, Karl doesn’t even know Anders is a Grey Warden and he’ll never dream a peaceful dream. Not that he would anyway, after everything.

Now, Anders just wants to be kissed. He wants perhaps not to be loved, but to feel wanted and needed. He wants to be touched.

He asks Karl, the first he ever felt for, who he never thought he would see again, and didn’t dare hope for but wanted all the same. Karl gives, Anders sinking down to the cot. They hold each other, and they kiss. It’s soft at first but it becomes more and more intense and hard, Anders nipping softly at Karl’s lip, Karl tugging at the furs Anders wears. It’s so much and it’ll disappear. It will—

“I’m here,” Karl whispers. “I’m not going to leave Anders. I’m safe.”

They have so much to talk about. For now, Anders nods and indulges in a moment longer than he’s used to. Then, later in each other’s arms, they speak of trying again. It will be hard, yes, but nothing has been easy. It doesn’t mean it’s not worth it.

And as they fall asleep, Anders does allow the hope, that one day they can walk free in the sun with Karl, hand in hand as any other lover.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

In Dreams

This was my half of an art trade I did with @scharoux! thanks for trading with me! Features Rhaella Lavellan and Solas :)

He traces her lips with the pad of his thumb. It’s a dance they have often partaken in since the kiss on her balcony. In the dance so often done, they steal away for a moment alone to indulge in fevered kisses and sometimes more— but not quite more. It’s all Rhaella and Solas in the dance, all the more precious because they have to be something other than themselves and wear masks any other time. Rhaella especially. She’s the Inquisitor, the Herald. More symbol than woman, but he makes her feel more like Rhaella.

The soft butterfly kiss but not kiss of his delicate fingers against her bottom lip entices her to open her mouth. He kisses her open mouth by encasing her bottom lip with his, while long fingers weave themselves through her hair. She wonders if this is a dream, but feels her feet rooted the earth, feels the soft wool of his shirt and warmth of his fingers against her cheek. It is real. She’s obsessed with all of his kisses, but clings to the ones that happen in waking life.

They part and she holds onto him still. He laughs and mentions a scout, or worse, one of her companions will find the two of them huddled behind the Herald’s Rest. They’re lucky enough already that Cassandra hasn’t come back yet, as she can usually be found nearby training or reading. But they have had some luck of late.

Rhaella chances the breadth of Lady Luck, (she owes her after everything anyway.) and pulls Solas in for another kiss. They haven’t had the luxury to be alone in some time. She wants to take the moment, draw it out into a thousand moments. The feverish kisses in the fade he sometimes bestows upon her, they can only satiate her so much.

“Let’s sneak away.”

A brow lifts and he studies her with no small measurement of curiosity, innate within his being, not something he thinks is found in others. She has intrigued him. She’s in no small amounts, thrilled.

“Sneak away?” he repeats.

“Yes,” she says. “Let’s sneak away, you and me. There’s a small grove just outside of Skyhold. Or we could go somewhere else. Maybe—”

“Sneak away,” he says again, amused. “How romantic.”

“You’re rather romantic yourself,” she points out. “Do you remember the Winter Palace? You were so happy to dance with me.”

“And what a fine partner you were,” he says with a grin, before the grin fades. “Rhaella, is it—”

“I’m not sure how much longer it will be before the March to Adamant,” she says, knowing what lines he will use about duty and responsibility. Cullen’s report estimated three weeks’ time for the army to march to the Approach, and Rhaella heeds his advice to wait until there is more training, wait until Harritt has time to assemble more pieces of armor. They have time. It is the perfect time for the two of them to sneak away.

“Ah,” Solas says, understanding. “Rhaella—”

“Solas. Kiss me again.”

He more than obeys. His lips pressed against hers are warm and real. It tastes different when he kisses her in the fade that night. In her waking life his lips are earthy and pliant, soft. In the fade his lips taste less like earth and more like air, though they are still pliant and soft and Solas. There are other differences as well when they are in the fade. Sometimes the colors aren’t as vibrant. It’s blurred and disoriented, like Haven was when he took her there—but never Solas—and she is not as rooted to the earth. She floats.

It’s blurry to start with in dreams. Even Solas appears as if through rain, dissolved almost until the lines sharpen. His face is all sharp angles, and even in the fade she’s mesmerized by the line of his jaw and dimple in his chin. She caresses it with light, airy fingers. He laughs and it fills the empty space.  

“See?” he says, and he takes her hands in his. “We’ve snuck away.”

His lips are there against her forehead, though not as present as they would be in waking life.

“Where?” she asks.

“Where would you like to go?”

She has no answer, and Solas laughs. She laughs too, for she knows it was her idea in the first place, and she didn’t think it through enough to come up with the most basic of things to conjure: where exactly they would sneak off too.

“Name a place,” he begins, “Any place.”

“That’s broad.”

“A place that meant something to you,” he amends, smiling and conceding.

She doesn’t have to think far, because it hits her suddenly, a memory of sneaking away as a young girl, her clan wandering the Eastern Forests. There was a meadow, littered with flowers of purple, yellow, blue, red, and so many colors between.

“There was a field of flowers once,” Rhaella says, “and…”

And they are there. They stand in the purples, yellows and all the other colors and it’s as vibrant and as much as like colors spilled from a paint box as it was when she was a little girl, filled with wonder at the sights before her. She had seen magic before that day, but she had never walked through it, lived through it.

Solas and she, they recreate that wonder of the day, and it’s all the better, because is here to live it with her, even if it is through dreams. He picks a blue bloom that matches her eyes, and he tucks it behind her ear. He dances with her like he danced with her at the Winter Palace, and the petals and blooms are their symphony. They’re not sneaking away, but they’re reveling. He kisses her, and then—

She wakes.

***

The advisors call her away from his side the next day. They prepare for Adamant and then Harritt talks of the necessary precautions made. 

But he isn’t there when she can finally go to him.

She falls. She wanted to dance again, and the dancing at the Herald’s Rest isn’t the type of dancing she wanted. She wanted it slow and soft, not frantic and noisy like it is there. She should have known he was up to something then.

She is, however, in the tavern when he finds her. She’s with Sera and they’re trying to learn Wicked Grace with Bull and Dorian when his graceful hand touches her waist, and fingers splay across. He’s not one for public kisses, but his hands entice. They are more than enough.

“Rhaella,” he whispers. “Let’s sneak away.”

Her companions say nothing as she slips away with him hand in hand, and though she’s too much enthralled, she notices their snickers. Solas doesn’t say anything but he takes her outside of Skyhold’s grounds, and he tells her to close her eyes. He has some place secret he wished to take her to. For him, because she trusts him, and that fact almost frightens her, she does close her eyes. She never has to worry with him.

When it seems as though he’s been guiding her for too long and they’re about to march to Adamant, he stops her. She doesn’t open her eyes yet, but from behind her he moves until his hands are covering her eyes.

“Alright,” he says, “We’ve snuck away. Now…”

He uncovers her eyes. She’s in dreams. She’s convinced she’s in dreams, surrounded by colorful flowers as she is. They are everywhere. Even the tree of Skyhold’s grove she mentioned the previous day is lined with the purples, the reds, the blues, and the yellows. There’s more colors too, the emerald green of the stems, the soft pinks of other blooms. He’s created that spot she stowed away to once as a child, but he has made it more.

There is more, he says. He moves his hand with one graceful motion, and they sparkle like stars under the stars and moon. He’s taken the fade and he’s made it real—and yes, she knows it’s real—for her feet are rooted to the earth, it’s vibrant and bright, she can see him perfectly clear. Oh, Solas. He is perfect with his verdant eyes and what he did for her, taken her in a waking dream.

She rushes to his arms. They fall in the flowers. He toys with her long strands of hair as she kisses him in dreams but not dreams.

“For you,” he says. “Rhaella. You’ve brought the fade to waking life.”

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Love in the Passion Tent

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Kisses and Croissants

From my ko-fi commissions, for @chillyrose. Cole and Heidi Lavellan during their first date at Val Royeux :) thank you so much for the support!

She suggested they hold hands, not with her words, but with outstretching her hand and waiting for him to take it. It was their first outing together and her cheeks were permanently stained pink, her heart thundering like mad. He must have known she was nervous, known what the day meant to her, but he only smiled as he took her hand. He squeezed. Without words, he let her know he understood perfectly, and it was the same for him.

“There’s something I want to show you,” she said, tugging at his arm. “Come along.”

She saw it during her first visit to Val Royeux, and she had been dreaming of it since. It was a small yet lavish bakery, or as the Orlesians called it, a boulangerie, tucked away from the main street. Heidi took Cole there and pointed at the display. She looked through the glass at the little cakes adorned with frostings of a thousand colors, tall and elaborate cakes for weddings, and chocolate croissants in their own little box. Before leaving Skyhold for the city Josephine made a point to tell Heidi that the chocolate croissants were divine, and she absolutely had to have an entire box.

In honor of her Josephine, Heidi ordered just that from the baker. He must have thought she and Cole would share the box, but Heidi had it all to herself as they sat by the fountain near the boulangerie, Cole studying her from his hat as they sat and she ate. The chocolate was rich and sweet, the croissant buttery and warm. So long she spent thinking about the moment they would finally be alone and what she would say. Yet in the moment, as a soft lute played and a woman sang in Orlesian nearby, Heidi found it profound that they could say nothing at all. Being together was already a dream.

“Heidi?”

“Hmm?” she asked, wiping crumbs off her shirt.

“You have something on your face.”

Slowly, he broke the distance between them. The pad of his thumb was gentle as he wiped chocolate away from the corner of her mouth and chin.

“Oh.” Her finger drifted to where he had touched. “Thank you Cole.”

“Your welcome.”

She turned away but he drifted closer. “Don’t be embarrassed,” he said.

“I’m not embarrassed,” she replied, though she could feel her cheeks grow hotter.

He said nothing once more, but once more, he didn’t have to. Of course he knew. He knew and she certainly knew. Her laugh was her surrender, merry as it was. Rising, she set the box down and took both his hands in his. She swayed him along to the lute, the fiery “Empress of Fire” playing

“Are we…dancing?” Cole asked, moving along with Heidi.

“Not very good,” Heidi admitted. “But we can practice.”

“I like it.”

“Good! I’m glad.”

They drew closer. Her heart beat even faster than the melody, and then he was looking down at her, whispering remembrances of a time before.

“Dancing along the aravels, shadows near the camp fire,” Cole said, channeling her memories. “I’m weightless and I’m free.”

She remembered that night that Cole spoke of, and there was the pressure of tears. It always flashed through her when she danced at the Herald’s Rest, she didn’t want it to happen then. Not on that happy day.

Cole knew her sorrow and he took her away. He put his hand on her shoulders and she felt anew.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“Don’t be,” she replied, not wanting to cry any longer. “You’re here.”

She thought that was when it would end, and the two of them would be happy again, sharing their first outing together in Val Royeux. For a moment it was, the two of them were like any other couple, and she was free and he was free. But a folly and error in judgement led her down to the pier to see the water. She didn’t understand at first when he stared not at the water, but at the overhead. She didn’t realize until she saw it too—the White Spire.

He looked away, told her he was alright when he wasn’t. She knew better.

“Cole,” Heidi pleaded. “I’m sorry, I should have known. I—”

“You’re here. It’s alright.”

She interlocked their palms. She squeezed. “You treat me like I’m special,” he said suddenly. “But not because of what I am, but because you see me. All is right.” He stood straighter. “He is here,” he continued. “All is right. I like it here.”

He channeled her feelings again, he channeled her beginnings of love. “Your everything to me,” she told him.

“You want to. I want it too. I like it here too Heidi.”

He was tall, She had to stand on his boots and then stand on the tips of her toes. She kissed his cheek and he kissed her cheek back.

“Warm,” he said. “Right. Good. Real.”

“Is that me or you?”

He kissed her cheek again. “Both,” he said, and Heidi knew it was the truth, that everything was warm and right, good and real.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Sleigh Ride

Gift for @fourletterepithet from @bitchesofostwick featuring your Velthei and Cullen! <3 Happy Hollidays! :)

Velthei couldn’t have been serious—or at least, that was what Cullen thought originally.

She was.

“Come on!” She said at the top of the mountain, one arm snuggly holding onto the sleigh, the other wrapped around his and tugging on him. “It’ll be fun!”

“It’s dangerous,” he protested. “Velthei....that’s a long drop! What if we hit a tree? We could get a concussion! And then what?”

“The trees are all at the bottom of the slope. Besides, if we begin right here, we’ll be fine. We won’t hit any trees.”

Cullen had his doubts. If he had known when he woke up that morning that Velthei would suggest sledding outside the gates of Skyhold, he may have feigned a cold and insisted a day of cuddling indoors by the fire rather than an outdoor adventure. Not very heroic of course, but what would he tell Josephine if he had lost the Inquisitor to a sleigh ride? He thought they would make snowmen, and perhaps he would start a snowball fight. But sledding? The last time he went sledding, he was ten years old, and Mia told him the sled didn’t go down that fast down the hill. “Nice and slow,” he remembered her saying. It was anything but.

“I don’t know about this,” he admitted, Velthei setting the sleigh down. “It’s too dangerous.”

“I walk into danger every day Cullen. This is hardly like going into battle.”

“Maybe it is.”

She marched over to him. He was far taller than her, so she stood on the tips of her toes to cup his bearded face in her gloved hands. Her kiss was deep and enticing, but he knew her tricks.

“Velthei,” he muttered as her lips moved to his neck. “I know what you’re doing, and—I…oh….”

“Cullen.” She took his lobe gently between her teeth, her lips making the cold air warm. “It can’t be dangerous. I promise. I’ll be there to protect you.”

“You win.”

She squealed with delight as she motioned for him to sit at the top of the sled. She took the seat below him. He wrapped his arms around her middle.

“Promise me one thing,” he said, his heart beating like mad. “This won’t go too fast.”

“By the creators it’s just a sleigh ride.”

“Just a sleigh ride? Nothing is—”

He would have said “nothing was ever as it seems,” yet before he could they were hurling down the snowy peak, sights of mountains and trees zooming past the two of them. Sounds Cullen didn’t even know he could make sounded throughout the hill. Cullen further wrapped his arms around Velthei, burying his head against the crook of her shoulder. They were sliding, the sights of the trees and mountains continuing to whirl past Cullen’s peripherals, and after that moment where it felt like that was where he would die, he realized he wasn’t dead. He was wonderfully, wonderfully alive. Alive, and  when he closed his eyes, he was soaring.

“Velthei!”

“Cullen! It’s over!”

He opened his eyes. They were at the bottom of the peak, the sled to a full stop. It didn’t feel like it was over. He didn’t want it to be over.

“Velthei,” Cullen said, “we should do it again.”

They did do it again, and again after that. But not before she tackled him to the snowy ground. “I knew you would like it,” she said. “Cullen…I knew you would.”

But that, he realized, was quintessentially Velthei. She taught him how to be free;

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Blooming

@chillyrose commissioned me to write to a pre-relationship drabble between Heidi Lavellan and Cole! Thank you so much for the commission! :)

He watches from above as they celebrate below. From up above he sees but he doesn’t feel or hear their thoughts, and he’s both there but not there as they revel in music and dance with merriment. They live more vibrantly here than they did before.

They must. They must because each moment alive is precious. War is what makes them live the way they always should.

Silence below, silence as she stands near the center of the room. Then, she sings for them.

She sings and he blooms. Once we were, she sings, and he thinks it the song of her people. And it makes her sad, but it makes her happy as she shares with her Inquisition her voice and her song.

He is blooming and brimming. She is everything.

But. But—

He recalls. She blooms when she’s near him. It’s a warm fire that’s foreign anywhere else, except maybe when she sings. Heidi is warm, the warmest person he knows, but it’s different when she’s with him. Quaking, Breaking.

He knows her thoughts. She wonders if what he feels for her is more. There’s a blooming, bubbling, and bursting. It makes his chest thunder. Longing. A feeling.

What if she bloomed for me instead?

Longing to be near her and by her side, he watches from above. It’s loud, but he should feel quiet. It’s always quiet when he’s alone up above. It’s not tonight.

It’s never quiet when he thinks of her.

“Cole?”

Heart going like mad when she stands in front of him. She came to find him. It’s not unusual, he shouldn’t think himself special in her eyes, even though he wants to. She only does that for all her companions. Heart still goes like mad when he sees her baked in a light of the moon and stars. She has hair like gold that falls only past her ears, the swipe of Mythal across her cheeks. He tells her hello.

She sits beside him, crosses her legs like he does. “Did you see me sing?” she asks. Their shoulders slightly touch.

“Yes,” he whispers.

“Did you like it, by any chance?”

He nods.

Her cheeks redden. “I’m glad.”

“You bloom when you sing. You…”

But he stops. Eyes are purple like the evening sky before the moon, blinking at him. Her thoughts are like stars. There are so many.

She blooms. She beams. She looks at him and he feels more.

“Heidi,” he says, “Why is your heart going like mad?” He thought it only went like that for Solas, not him.

Her hand rises, slowly. She asks with her eyes, may I. She’s wants it to be alright, wants him to want. He does want.

She acts, her delicate fingers sweeping the fallen hair away from his face. He’s both surprised and not surprised that he wants more, needs more. Heidi is the only one that he can spend all day hearing, and still always want more.

She gives. She wants to give.  

“Cole,” she says. “I thought it was obvious. I thought you would know.”

“I know that you’re blooming. But it’s like that with Solas too. It—”

It’s light, and it’s warm. She kisses his cheek, and she makes him bloom.

“It’s you,” she says. “It’s always been you.”

They don’t say anything more the rest of the night. Her thoughts are like stars. He doesn’t read a single one, because together, they simply are. They are here. They bloom.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

On Satinalia Morning

A gift for @haloneshiral from @bitchesofostwick featuring your Letheia and Cullen! <3 Happy Hollidays! :)

Cullen registered Letheia wasn’t next to him in bed before he heard her cursing.

“Oh for the love of everything…stupid thing…ugh….”

He rose. “Letheia? What are you doing? Why are you so upset? And why are you up so early?”

It wasn’t typical that she rose before him. For a moment Cullen wasn’t even sure he was seeing what he was seeing—her, wearing his tunic and mantle for extra warmth, adorned with tinsel around her neck, and hunched next to a tiny Satinalia tree.

“Cullen, you were supposed to stay asleep,” Letheia said, running a hand through her white hair. “It’s Satinalia! I wanted to surprise you!”

Cullen blinked, taking a better look at the small tree. It had not been there the night before. In his deep slumber she must have brought the tree up his ladder and set it in the farthest corner before decorating it with small red bulbs, and gold and silver tinsel. The only thing missing was the star.  

Rising from the bed, Cullen came over to Letheia, wrapping his arms around her. “It’s beautiful,” he said.  

“You told me when you were a child, you used to decorate the tree with your family,” she said. “Maybe it was silly, but I thought…maybe if I could surprise you when you woke up—”

“I love it. Letheia. I love it,” he said, though he found his words couldn’t match how he felt. He was gob-smacked. He was in love. “Thank you.”

He kneeled a little to kiss her, capturing her bottom lip. Her kiss tasted suspiciously like hot cocoa.

“Oh,” she said with a small laugh. “That was another surprise. I may have had some already though, sorry. But first…” She brought it out from her pocket, the small gold star. “Here. I’ll let you do it.”

Taking the star, Cullen adorned the top of the tree, and Letheia took the tinsel from around her neck and wrapped it around the tree. The ornaments and star gleamed from the sun’s light through the unfixed roof. Letheia took Cullen’s hand, brought him back to the bed, and after they curled under the covers together, she handed him a warm mug. The chocolate was sweet, and she giggled when he took a sip and some whipped cream got on his nose.

“Cullen…” she said, wiping a tear away from Cullen’s cheek, a tear he didn’t even know was there. “Why are you crying my love?”

He set the hot chocolate down. He took her hand, kissed every finger. Because he loved her. Because she did this for him. Because he thought the days of happy Satinalias were over. He was convinced he would never get them again. Not the decorating the tree, not waking up and knowing everything was right and real, not the hot cocoa, cocoa that tasted almost exactly like his mother’s.

He kissed her again, brought her into his arms. “Because this is our first Satinalia together,” he said.

She kissed his cheek. “I love you Cullen.”

“I love you too.”

Her kiss was the promise of all the other Satinalias they would share together.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

A Renewal

A piece commissioned by @the-sith-in-the-sky-with-diamond! The piece features their OC Luhcy, sith, and Theron Shane. Thank you for being patient with me and letting me play around in a new world :) 

She was accustomed to sharing a bed with him. Or at least, she had been accustomed to sharing a bed with him. When he first left, her frustration did not blind her to the fact that when he was gone, the bed was cold and empty as she was cold and empty. She recalled how during the night, her hands would drift over to where he would have been, grasping for something that wasn’t there. Despite believing he betrayed her, she still wanted and needed to know that he was beside her. He never was.

Never, not until he came back.

She didn’t want to share a bed with him when he came back and she found out the truth. It took him some time to recuperate from the infirmary, and it took even more time for her to warm back up to him. After all, she grew accustomed to being alone again. During the long and cold nights, her hands eventually stopped searching for something that wasn’t there.

Yet that morning, when remembrances of a time before were innate, her hands did drift to his side of the bed. He was there.

He was there.

Theron still slept and as she gazed at his sleeping form, and even though she shared a bed with him that night, wanting that at the very least to remember what it was like before everything changed, she thought it would take a while to grow accustomed to having him again. She didn’t expect to have any ease in the way her hand caressed his cheek, the red of her hand striking against his paleness, or have her heart flutter when he stirred, hand taking her wrist, holding the hand that held his cheek.

“Good morning,” he said, still groggy from sleep, yet still gazing at her like she was the only thing that mattered.

She grinned. “Theron.”

Even though he was waking up, she saw the dilemma in his gaze, the should I kiss her, or should I not question. She wanted a kiss.

He didn’t. He rose from the bed instead of kissing and loving her softly and gently as befitted the early morning, going over to the chair by the side of the bed to his data pad. As he read the news and got up to date, the nexu cats sought his affection, rubbing up against his legs. He beckoned them to his lap, one climbing to his shoulder and nuzzling him as the other arched, seeking his delicate hand for a pet or two. It wasn’t what she would have expected that early morning, but none the less, Luhcy thought the moment a beautiful one. Theron was utterly boyish looking, his hair sticking out and in disarray, barefoot and shirtless, surrounded by the nexu. They hissed and purred when he got up and made himself a caf, and he admonished himself after for such a sin, pet them and lavished them with more attention as he sat back down and asked for forgiveness. It was a beautifully mundane morning, like it would have been six months ago before everything changed. A good reunion, or at least that was what some would have said. It was good because it was so normal.

Yet maybe she would have preferred a different sort of reunion.

“I missed these sorts of mornings,” she admitted however, because even though she wanted something else, it still astounded her how easy it was to have him again.

He looked up from his data pad. His eyes were soft. He told her he did too.

She went to her vanity, following Theron’s lead of taking care of herself as he took care of himself. She brushed her hair, studied how she changed since he came back from the infirmary. She was wearier, as he was. She felt him approach after a moment, putting his callused hands on her shoulders. Instinct lead her to rest against him. He leaned down, nestled his face into the hollow of her neck. He kissed her cheek.

“You hurt me so much.”

They were words she had been holding back. He knew, and she wondered why she had to even say what he already knew. Did she take delight in reminding him and seeing the pain that was so palpable and tangible on his face? Did she want to remind him over and over again so their reunion would be sweeter? So he would hold her longer, kiss her harder? None of that happened after. He left her side and sat back down on the bed—their bed, and looked away from her.

She followed his side, touched his cheek. “I’m sorry,” she said.

He outstretched his arms. She climbed atop him, and she held him as he held her. He breathed in her scent and her everything. She stroked his hair.

“Don’t be sorry,” he said. “I deserve it.”

“Make it up to me.”

He stared. He kissed her once. He did nothing after.

“Theron. Make it up to me.”

“Luhcy, what can I…?”

“I want you.”

He kissed her again, softly. But even though mornings were for softness, or at least they should be for softness, that wasn’t what happened. Her lips crushed into his, demanded his affection and his love, demanding he make up for the six months that she didn’t have him. She didn’t want to speak of the pain, of the miscarriage she endured, or anything else, she only wanted the two of them to speak in another way. It was a way without words, a way that had no reason, only blissful feeling and forgetfulness. A part of her knew it was no way to go about it, or if it was, it wasn’t the way they should have been. But as he pushed her down on the bed and stripped off her clothes, reason disappeared. It was only want, need, feel, kiss. Taking the pain away, letting her forget for a minute that he even hurt her.

“I’m sorry,” he breathed in that space between her breasts. “Luhcy, forgive me, forgive…”

“Make love to me,” she whispered, “make me forget…”

It almost hurt when he gripped her hips. Her skin, starved from his touch, her body, unable to bring herself the pleasure that he could bring it, hummed at the feel of his hands and his tongue.

He was going to give her his mouth. She stopped him.

“You,” she said. “Let me feel you.”

He obliged, quickly taking off his small clothes and throwing it to the side of the bed to be forgotten. He took himself in his hand as she spread her thighs, and he was so much and so thick. She had not felt him in so long that her cry pierced the room. It alarmed him so much that he pulled out, but her cry of protest was louder. She gripped his thighs and he pushed back inside. He was in bliss, brows bent and eyes closed, humming and moaning in pleasure. She caught his euphoria as she closed her eyes and arched against the pillow, throwing one leg over his shoulder. He gripped her calf and her foot, lightly kissed her arch before she threw her other leg over his shoulder.

He paused when he saw the burn on her leg. She got it when she saw him with shorter hair on that other planet, and he was with another. He felt for him, she knew. He still felt but she was the here and now and he felt for her more. He kissed the burn as if caused it before he continued to move. The stretch of her legs accompanied by his deep strokes elicited her to mewl, uncaring of who heard. She didn’t care. She wanted. She wanted to let everyone know that Theron Shan was making it up to his lover after how much he hurt and betrayed her by fucking her senseless, and she let them know, let them know good…

He wanted contact, he wanted to feel her writhe underneath him, she realized as he pushed her legs back down on the bed and sunk on top of her body. Instinct, part of their dance that they had done a thousand times before he hurt and left her led her to wrap her arms around him. But the gesture, so instinctual, seemed to sensual and loving for what she wanted and asked for. She wanted to be fucked senseless, maybe even used, used until she forgot there was even pain and ache in the first place. She didn’t want Theron to make love to her and remind her of a time when life was beautiful.

“Theron…”

He froze above her, the ache of him inside but not moving beautiful torture. “Am I hurting you?” he muttered.

She could feel the perspiration on his forehead and brows. “No.”

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s not supposed to be like this.”

“How is it supposed to be?”

“Fuck me.”

He chuckled a little. “Last time I checked…I am.”

“No…I…mhhmmm…” he hummed as he shifted slightly, fully inside her. “Hard. It was supposed to be hard.”

“Luhcy, I—”

He kissed her. It was beautiful kiss, tender. Too tender for her and for what she demanded. A kiss of lovers. She felt the pressure of a thousand tears she didn’t allow herself to shed before.

“I want to make it up to you,” he said softly. “Luchy. Please.”

She nearly cried as he slid from her, but he had other plans, other goals and means. He sought to touch her and worship her, and as he began, the tears streamed down her face. He wiped them away. He touched her breasts, kissed them after, and her body hummed at his reverent touches.

“Don’t cry,” he said, “I’m here. I won’t leave again…

“Please don’t.”

They shared a chuckle, it striking her as an odd thing to share in the midst of making love, but perhaps it wasn’t so odd after all. Fucking was for two people who didn’t know each other very well, making love was for those who had grown so intimate with each other that their words were the other’s words, their thoughts not part of two minds, but one. Making love was for apologies and making amends and asking for forgiveness. Making love was best for early mornings.

Theron gave her his mouth, and her body on fire, she game relatively quickly, crying and begging for his kiss after. He obliged, and she tasted herself and tasted him, entangling fingers through his hair and worshipping his body with her hands. She gripped his back, his strong shoulders and arms, kissed and lapped at the space between his neck and shoulder.

She needed him inside again.

She pushed him down on the bed gently, and he grinned at her dominance. Her mouth moved down the long line of his body, littering that scar on his stomach with kiss after kiss, making up for the pain he once had a thousand times over. She slid on top of his cock and moved slowly at first, locking their gazes together. He reveled in her body and their connection, danced in her gaze. She had a thought to go faster, but she realized she wanted to prolong their togetherness. Prolong, as long as she possibly could…

He rose. She wrapped her arms around him and their lips found one another’s. Another beautiful kiss.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “Luhcy. I’m sorry, I—”

“Now,” she said. “Love me now.”

He did. He loved hard through his softness and tenderness, the way he pushed the hair away from her face so he could better see her eyes, the way he pressed their foreheads together so their thoughts and minds could become one. His fingers drifted to her clit and she came that soft and hard way. He groaned. Feeling her end made his own grow nigh. She asked, begged even. Come for me, come, let me feel you…

And then he didn’t leave her after. They kissed and they remained locked, and in their afterglow of making love, they were renewed.

“I didn’t believe it at first,” Luhcy said, coming back to life.

“Believe what?”

“In a new chapter together.”

“It’s possible.”

“I know that now.”

“The Alliance may change,” Theron mused. “But I’m here to stay. I have you. I love you. I’m here to stay. Whatever comes, we face it together.”

“I love you too.”

They kissed and for a second time. She was renewed.

[a-shakespearean-in-paris]

Heart and Soul

Commission for @lady-cinder. Thank you for commissioning me!

 A romantic piece featuring Cinder Trevelyan and Cullen.

His heart’s hair was the color of flame. Cinder pulled it up when she was away from him somewhere far, lest one of her flasks of fire or lightning she used in combat go awry. That was how the pinkish scar on the side of her face came about. She was in the lab, tempering with fire when the flask broke and sent fire and glass everywhere. She disliked the scar sometimes. It only made her more beautiful in his eye. But it was part of the reason why she didn’t usually like wearing her flame colored hair up. The scar was more visible. So when she was home, she took the pins down from the coronet and allowed it to fall to her shoulders.

Cullen loved her hair the color of flame, pulled up or down. In her room, near Cullen, she took it down. It was part of her ritual, part of the way she let everyone know that she was home. She was home, and she was safe. She was with him. He loved every part of her. But Maker, it had been a long time since their last ritual. It was never easy, but he felt that the more times she left, the more slowly time moved. Someday time would move slowly when they were together rather than it fly by. He savored the time he had with her. Sometimes, he thought he was even greedy. She wanted him to be greedy.

He had a bath drawn in her quarters before her arrival, the hot coals underneath ensuring the water would remain warm. She sunk into the water, sighing at the heat. The water smelled of lavender and roses, some strange concoction purchased in Val Royeux. She always sought a bath when she arrived back, another part of their ritual. She also sought his arms around her, and she sought his hands to knead away the knots, the stress and the anxiety that came with being so far apart. His hands reminded her that no matter how far or wide she traveled, he would always take care of her.

“My soul.”

It was so easy for her to call him that, sometimes Cullen didn’t feel worthy. Again she whispered it, my soul, when he slipped into the tub to join her and his he began to work out the knots in her shoulder and back. When she was gone, he always missed hearing her say that, my soul. It was a name she called him as if she had bestowed it a long time ago, in another life even, and at last able to call him that, she was do it every chance she got.

She was bereft of the opportunity to call him that in their gap of time apart, so in the bath and in his arms, she indulged in the term of endearment. Likewise, he indulged in touching her. It was all so thrilling, to hear it bestowed upon him again. My soul. Not hard Commander, or even Cullen, but something sweeter. But as he began the second part of their ritual, washing her long flame colored hair for her, he asked her why.

“Why what?” she asked, Cullen careful as he took a pitcher of water and poured it softly against her hair.

“Well, I was wondering why you call me that name,” he said, lathering up the rose shampoo in his palms and working it through her scalp. “Out of all the names and terms of endearment, you chose ‘my soul,’ to call me.”

“Oh.”

She was silent for a moment. He stopped his ministrations. He asked if he offended when he asked.

“No, of course not,” she assured, reaching around to caress his stubbled cheek, resting her back against his chest, and leaving a kiss on his jaw. “The reason is silly. That’s all.”

“It doesn’t matter. I love it.”

She kissed him again, softly against his scar, surrendering. She told him that she remembered reading it in a book a long time ago, about how part of people’s souls could be found in someone else.

“And when I look at you,” she said, “I see that part of me. I know it’s silly, but—”

“Do you know why I call you what I call you?”

“Why?”

He chuckled at the turning the conversation as he motioned for her to rise continuing to lather and wash her hair. “Well,” he said, relishing the soft moans she made, “I didn’t know it or realize it at the time, but before I met you, I think I lost that part of me that knew there was more to life. More than duty, more than a routine. More than living and waiting for something. Before I met you, I wasn’t sure if I knew I was more.”

“Cullen,” she said as he rinsed out her hair. “You are more.”

“You are my heart. When I met you, I felt it beat again.”

She wasn’t merely content to have his hands through her hair anymore, or on her back or shoulders to knead away the stress and anxiety from being away. She wanted his hands everywhere all at once, wanted his lips to kiss the same placed. He wanted to indulge because she was made to be indulged, but more than that he wanted to tell her without words that he meant what he said. She was his beating heart. He wanted to give and continue to give, and not take that a part of her soul while she took his heart, but selfishly, he relished that gift that she so willingly gave.

It wasn’t the only gift either. Along with his heart, she gave him a beautiful beginning.

He would give her a thousand more things, a thousand things for the thousands of gifts she gave every day if he could. He started with that night.

“No matter what happens,” she said, laying on his chest after. Her flame colored hair had long since dried, and it pooled against his chest. “It’s true. You are my soul.”

“I can’t live without my heart.”

They kissed. She promised he would never have to.