howtoactfereldan | (no subject)

"Do you want me to go?"

"Do what you need to do." Quiet.

For a moment it looks as though he might say something else, but then -- nothing.

What he needs to do is finish the letters. What he wants to do is stay here.

The letters will keep; so long as he finishes them at some point today, it'll be all right.

He stays. Keeps swinging his feet through the water, in a slow forward-and-back.

His fingers have wrinkled. They look withered.

Cullen's brow furrows, sudden and sharp.

(How did he deal with this in Kirkwall? He had distractions. (And denial.))

Enough of this. With a loud splash, Cullen reaches for a towel, and climbs out of the spring, wrapping the towel around his waist as he goes.

Jolted out of his thoughts, Alistair looks up -- and then back down again, swiftly.

That's. Well. That's a sign he should've left, then, isn't it.

It's on the tip of his tongue to apologize, but he doesn't know for what, and while he knows neither of them are at their best, and Maker knows Alistair hasn't been an easy person to deal with since he came back from the Fade, he's trying not to apologize for -- for his existence so much anymore.

He scrubs a damp hand across his face, and rests his forehead against his palm.

Cullen pulls his shirt over his head -- and takes advantage of Alistair not looking at him to get his trousers on.

Picks up his boots. Pads back over to the other side of the spring, sits on a bench.

He rubs at his hair with a towel, and doesn't say anything for a moment.

"I know you're angry," he says, finally, sounding exhausted. His hands drop between his knees. "Just... allow me this. All right? Allow me to keep you safe. Let me be glad about it. You don't have to be around for it."

Alistair sighs, very softly. He doesn't look up.

"I'm less angry at you than you seem to believe," he says, no louder. "I'm -- you remember what I said. About being angry at you as a soldier, not as a friend. It's like that. I know you're right. I just...wish you weren't."

"But I am a soldier."

Cullen gets to his feet.

"It's all I've ever been. Forgive me for expecting too much."

It's a sincere plea. He turns to go.

"It's a part of you. It's not all you are."

He finally raises his head.

"I'm not merely a Warden either, Cullen."

Tell that to the man who can't cope with being at loose ends for three days.

(Tell that to the man who spent days with his former recruits and comrades hissing his name as they tried to kill him.)

"You should spend time with your son," he says, finally. His back is still to Alistair. "While you can."

Since Alistair is something else.

Alistair closes his eyes.

(Does his best not to flinch, as he thinks of who might be listening just out of sight. The springs are much larger than Cullen's tower, after all.)

"I will." Still quiet. "I have. While -- everyone was gone."

And now Morrigan's back, and not who entirely who she was when she left. Kieran likely has other things to worry about besides entertaining the mad Warden of Skyhold.

"Good."

He starts the path back up to the cells, back up to the yard, back to his tower, back up the ladder. If it's snowing, and no one's here, and there's nothing to do -- might as well hide upstairs, where he can't hurt anyone.

Which leaves Alistair alone in the springs.

Warmth only gets him so far: he soaks his feet for ten more minutes -- maybe fifteen, if he's generous -- before grabbing one of the towels Cullen left behind and drying them off. He doesn't know where to go. If Cullen wants to be left alone, he should leave him alone. Which means he can't work on the letters, or do -- anything else, really, that doesn't involve retreating to his quarters for a while.

Maybe he should go build those snowmen. Or start a snowball fight with someone.

Or see how Morrigan's faring, maybe, if she'll entertain him long enough to ask.

Regardless: he puts on his boots and re-wraps himself in his layers before heading out into the snow.

Provisions are necessary, if he's going to hide. Cullen borrows a basket from the kitchen, loads it up with a few hand pies and a bottle of wine, and troops back up to his office.

-- Mia. He can write Mia, like she's always asking.

The things he took off the Warden corpses are still on his desk, along with a very smudged letter to -- someone. It's not his business. Alistair left it.

He organizes the letters in a pile, then pulls Mia's last letter out of another pile. She did something rude in her salutation, so he can do it right back --

Right. She provided a template. For him to use to let her know he's still alive.

Mia --

Still alive.

-- Cullen

He lets out a breath, alternately amused and exasperated. There. He's done the bare minimum.

What if he did more? What would he say? It's not like her last letter was that long. And it's not like he'd actually have to send anything unless he wanted to.

After a moment's thought he locates another blank page and starts to write, with plenty of scratch-outs and smudges.

Morrigan's in the garden, as always She's donned a coat in grudging deference to the weather. Alistair's boots crunch in the fresh snow as he walks toward her; she regards his approach, cool as always. Alistair.

Morrigan. He stops some feet from her. Kneads his left palm with his other thumb. I...heard some of what happened. Are you all right?

She makes a light scoffing sound and looks away. T'is none of your concern. Don't trouble yourself.

Alistair heaves a sigh and drops his hands. Right, yes. My mistake. Next time I'll divert all that pesky concern to someone who deserves it.

He starts to turn. He gets three steps before Morrigan says behind him, Kieran was glad for your company while I was away.

Alistair freezes. After a moment, he looks back. Morrigan's face is unreadable; she inclines her head, very slightly.

We should talk about that, he blurts before he can lose his nerve.

Yes. I agree. Her gaze shifts, indicating the garden; empty though it may be, it's still wide open to any passerby. Another time, perhaps.

He nods. (Makes himself nod.) He retraces the path of his bootprints out of the garden, hunched against the cold.

The letter-writing is a pointless exercise. Except for the very short one. But it's not as though he has any other responsibility to see to.

(Did Lavellan do this because she knew what it would do to him? Sera is a bad influence. Maker's breath, Lavellan might be a bad influence on Sera.)

A huff of breath; he looks up at his bookshelf, spies one of Genitivi's travelogues, and decides he'd rather eat pie in bed with a book than do anything else.

The book goes in the basket. The basket goes on his arm. Cullen goes upstairs.

(A draft ruffles the papers on Cullen's desk, leaving both of his letters visible.)

Not long after, there's the thump of Cullen's door opening and closing.

Alistair makes a beeline for the chaise, retrieving the blanket he'd tossed there before leaving. He wraps it around himself with an overexaggerated shiver and eyes Cullen's desk. A few hours, he thinks, and it'll be done. Then he can...start figuring out how in Andraste's name he'll get everything to their families when, in more cases than not, he doesn't know where their families are.

Letters first, though. Absently rubbing his cheek (the ink's completely gone by now), he takes a seat at the desk.

...That is not his handwriting. (That letter was not on the desk when he left.)

Under the terse letter:

~~Assuming you haven't burned my letters by now~~ I recall writing to you with news of my leaving Kirkwall to join the Inquisition, with something about how I cannot give the Order anything more, nor it to me. ~~That was a lie. They showed up in~~

You have heard strange things about the Order. By now I trust you have heard more details, but if you have not: they use a form of lyrium that makes them monstrous. It grows from their bodies as crops from the ground. ~~The regular stuff is blue. This lyrium is red.~~ Much of our work in southern Orlais has revolved around stopping the spread of the stuff. The Elder One, this Corypheus, feeds what remains of the order this red lyrium to make them ~~unstoppable~~ -- no, not unstoppable. But it was the red templars who attacked Haven.

We intercepted their communications, as we've been doing for months, and I saw names from my past. It's been going on for months, now. Someone I knew at the Ferelden Circle. The commander of the red templars is -- was -- I don't know -- someone I believed I knew well in Kirkwall. Some of my recruits from Kirkwall are now his trusted captains and lieutenants. And those were the men I cut down. They still knew me. I could even recognize a few of them, a little.

This is what awaited me if I stayed in the Order. I made the right decision. I have doubted that decision, sometimes. No longer. But did they have a choice? Truly? ~~I could h~~ I should have done more. That's what I heard, when they spoke to me. I should have done more. The Inquisition's forces won the day and I could not be prouder of them.

Every scrap of victory serves to further underline failures. My failures. I need our forces back. ~~I need something to shut down my mind~~ If I cannot serve, there is nothing to me. I failed them. I did not argue strongly enough for their recruitment to the Inquisition, back when there was still a chance. There were things I could have done.

I almost wish I could send this so you could understand what manner of monster your brother's become. You asked to know if I lived. I live. Do not give me any further thought.

Oh.

The twinge of guilt Alistair feels when he realizes what he's reading fades within moments. He presses his knuckles to his mouth, reading it again, then once more.

With care, he sets it aside and looks up at the loft.

(Do you know how difficult it's been, Cullen said. Bad enough that Alistair had to fight his former brothers and sisters at Adamant; if he'd had to fight them like that -- no. He didn't know how difficult it had been. He can't; not truly.

Andraste preserve them.)

He sheds the blanket. Drapes it over the back of the chair.

With the same care, he starts up the ladder.

Genitivi lies open, with a few crumbs along the page.

Some of the ache soaked out of him, and he's still -- much as he hates to admit it -- exhausted. His boots are lined up neatly on the floor. The wool blanket is draped over his legs. Cullen himself is curled on his side, facing the middle of the bed. One hand, palm up, fingers curled, rests by the book.

Clearing his mind, he'd say, if asked what he was doing. Old templar training exercise.

(One mastered by every toddler in Thedas.)

A quiet sigh. Alistair takes a seat on the other side of the bed, unlaces his boots, and sets them aside with much less precision than Cullen. Gently, he pulls the book closer so he can brush the crumbs off it; that done, he closes it and transfers it to the nightstand.

He hesitates a bit longer before reaching for the blanket, hoping to tug it higher so it's covering Cullen's shoulders.

Cullen starts awake before that can happen, drawing away fast, blanket tangling around his legs --

Oh. It's him.

"Oh," he says. Wary. "It's you."

Alistair jerks away in kind, both hands raised to show he's not carrying any weapons. It takes an extra beat or two for him to relax.

"Just me," he says, wry. His hands settle back on the mattress. "Sorry. I didn't mean to wake you."

Cullen sits up, looks away. "It's fine. Did you need something?"

"Not really." Quiet. "I just..."

Wanted to see how he was doing, because he just read an intensely personal letter Cullen left on his desk? Yes. That will go over great.

So Alistair leaves it there. No brief never mind follows, though, no dismissal, no stupid jokes. Instead -- bracing himself for another jolt of adrenaline at best, or a push away at the worst -- he touches Cullen's shoulder.