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Cullen doesn't care for Morrigan, and it's wholly mutual. Fortunately he has little enough reason to venture into the Skyhold garden, with the exception of prearranged chess matches with Dorian.

He's seen the child before, watching wide-eyed as people move around the garden on business, or just to rest. The child doesn't talk to anyone -- doesn't want to be a bother, Cullen guesses. He speaks respectfully to Morrigan, as far as Cullen can tell, and it's clear that Morrigan loves her son.

Still. It must be lonely.

***

Dorian went to the Hissing Wastes with some of the Chargers, to take out a nest of Venatori. Cullen forgot.

The chessboard is already set. Morrigan's boy is watching by the well. Cullen beckons him over, introduces himself.

"I know," the boy says. "The collar marks you. My name is Kieran."

Cullen laughs, quiet. "Well, Kieran -- do you play?" At the boy's headshake, he asks, "Would you like to learn?"

He's a quick study. Maybe not today, but soon -- Cullen will start throwing games.

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...what is he even supposed to say to that? Cullen's inclined to think things through before he speaks, but this --

"She'll notice, if you spend time with him." Cullen rubs at his forehead briefly. "But you've got to. I -- it's not out of the question that she'd be reasonable about it. Ten's old enough to foster. Old enough to train. Surely ten's old enough to find out."

"It's not up to me whether he finds out or not," says Alistair, very quiet. "Morrigan's the one who raised him. She ought to be the one who tells him. But I want to -- "

A brief laugh. It sounds nothing like his earlier laughter.

"You know I spoke maybe ten words to him before Adamant? That was the first time I ever saw him. But if I'm here, and they are, and we're going to stay for a while, I...yes. I want to know him better."

Morrigan doesn't get a say in that part.

"If there's going to be another Theirin bastard running around the least I can do is help take care of him. Somehow."

"The first Theirin bastard wasn't so bad, you know."

"I tried not to be."

He finally opens his eyes.

"Mostly because I tried not to be like my own father."

Cullen... loved his parents. Both of them. And they loved him. This is outside his wheelhouse. So what is he even supposed to say?

"I'd rather any child take after you than Morrigan," he says, finally, "and if that's the example she set for him... he's all right, Alistair. Knowing you in any capacity can only make him better."

Alistair's silent.

"I just wish we'd spoken more before Adamant."

Barely audible.

Cullen lets out a long sigh, and shifts an arm around Alistair's shoulders with a tight squeeze.

Alistair leans into the embrace, eyes burning.

Well, he thinks, bleakly. Maybe tomorrow will be the day I manage not to cry for no reason.

Cullen rests his head against Alistair's.

"He likes you." Low. "He really does. And the Fade didn't take your awful sense of humor. It'll be all right, Alistair. It will."

Alistair nods. If it's less because he believes what Cullen's saying, and more to acknowledge that he's saying it in the first place...well. Cullen doesn't need to know that.

"I'll have to test as many terrible jokes on you as possible to make sure that's true." It's a little waterlogged, but he manages to inject some lightness into it, too. "So you know."

"I'll brace myself." Wry. "I appreciate the warning."

A smile twitches Alistair's lips.

Deadpan: "A dwarf, an elf, and a Qunari walk into a tavern. The barman looks at them and says, 'What is this, some kind of joke?'"

Badum-tsss.

Edited 2016-07-13 20:52 (UTC)

Cullen throws his head (carefully) back against the wall. "Ugh."

He's been taking disgusted noise lessons from Cassandra. Probably.

(If you've ever wondered what happens when someone with dad-joke tendencies actually becomes a father, we present exhibit A: Alistair Theirin.)

A small snicker; discreetly, Alistair wipes his eyes, and says -- a bit smugly -- "You're right. I've still got it after all."

Cullen heaves a (slightly theatrical) sigh. "I hate being right."

"Just wait." Serene. "Should things go well, you'll have two people pelting you with terrible jokes all the time."

Beat.

"...Maker, I hope he got at least a little bit of a sense of humor. He's very -- serious, isn't he."

Maybe Kieran's just like that around strangers. Or while studying a game he's never played before.

"He doesn't know us very well," Cullen points out. "Give him time."

Pause.

"Also, you seem to manage to put up with me just fine."

"Yes, well."

His smile's gone crooked again.

"You've seen me at my worst and you're still bothering to talk to me, so I'm not as worried about what impression I'll make on you."

That ship, as they say, has long since sailed.

His head goes back against the wall again, eyes closing.

"Yes, well."

Distant.

"You saw me at my worst first. Don't forget that."

Alistair goes quiet. Looks at Cullen for a moment.

"True," he murmurs at last, and slumps lower in the chaise. It makes it easier to rest his head on Cullen's shoulder that way; he angles himself just enough to keep watch on the stars.

His arm tightens around Alistair's shoulders in reflex.

It's late enough that any runners coming in would do so in an actual emergency. Which means... it's quiet. Maker willing, it'll stay quiet.

Alistair's had a hard day. Cullen doesn't know, and oughtn't to speculate, whether Alistair has had a bad day. Either way, it's just... a lot.

Everything's a lot.

(Even now, his mind turns to the unfinished work: if he puts his head down when he's alone, and sifts through the reports, piecing together information to make his best guess at the enemy's movements -- the enormity of what they face, and the weight of all those lives, won't crush him back into that terrified nineteen-year-old. All those lives.

But here's one, who's safe. Who seems to trust him.)

"If you'd like me to keep watch whenever you want to sleep," Alistair ventures, quietly, "I can."

Keep watch for what, he isn't sure. It just -- needs to be done, he thinks. Someone keeps watch. That's how it works.

(He has no idea what Cullen's nightmares might be like nowadays, but that, too, ought to be watched for. No one should spend more time in the worst parts of the Fade than necessary.)

That -- wasn't quite what he'd expected to hear, from Alistair, but it only startles him for a moment.

"I can't promise to always be available to do the same," Cullen says to the ceiling. "Given what we're facing. But if -- if it's not any trouble for you..."

It's a nice thought. Entirely more in the manner of a child's security blanket than a grown man ought to appreciate, but a nice thought nonetheless.

"I'd like that."

"It's no trouble." A small smile. "And there's no need for you to do the same, if you can't. Don't worry."

Seeing as Alistair's sleeping hours are...very sporadic, when they exist at all.

Bull might be a reasonable substitute in Cullen's absence, what with his thing about demons, and what with how his experience in Seheron ended. Krem, too; Cullen's been impressed with his fiercely even temper.

He should think about it. Think about how to suggest it. Add both things to his to-do list.

"Impossible." Cullen stifles a yawn. "And if I'm in Skyhold, and I can help... let me help. All right?"