(no subject)

[howtoactfereldan]

There's a large rock by the inlet. Cullen likes it -- likes sitting in the shadow of it, resting his head back against it, looking at the sky and the water and trying to get his mind to quiet. Sometimes it even works.

Here in Milliways the sun is setting; it's the middle of the night in Kirkwall. Cullen appreciates the option to sit in sunlight.

Yesterday -- today -- whatever -- it was long. Bad. Aid from Starkhaven was supposed to arrive, but they got held up on the road, and so it was Cullen and a patrol who found the dead children --



-- but he's not going to think about that. He's going to watch the light play on the water, feel the welcoming stone against his back, and if his eyes drift closed -- there's little harm, yes?

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[howtoactfereldan]

The stench of writhing, roiling decay surrounds him.

And, clearly, Cullen says:

"That is not the task of the Order."

Blessed are they who stand before the corrupt and the wicked and do not falter.

"No matter what you and Greagoir think. Or command others to think, to their harm."

Do not falter.

"I removed you from command for a reason. And Maker help me, I should have done it a long time ago."

[followers_of_she]

"And will you do it again, now? Can you do it again, Knight-Captain, tired and foolish and weak as you are?"

When rest is right to hand, a task and a purpose that one does not have to think to carry out.

What person could ever do such a thing?

Meredith's eyes are very, very blue.

[howtoactfereldan]

That's the question, isn't it.

"That is no longer yours to worry about, Meredith."

And he knows -- he knows -- that even though Meredith is right about his exhaustion, his foolishness, his weakness... that is how he arrived in Kirkwall, she could have helped, and she chose to make it worse.

"You are no longer in command."

Of me, or of anyone else.

[followers_of_she]

She screams in frustration, stabbing her greatsword into the ground in a burst of red light. The sound of stone cracking in its moorings is incredibly loud.

"On your head be it, Knight-Captain."

And then she is gone.

[howtoactfereldan]

Cullen's ears ring.




On my " -- conscience," he says, finding himself standing by the quiet lake. "More like."

Cullen looks around, breathes out -- and all the tension he'd been carrying rushes out too. He runs his fingers through his hair, stretches. Just another nightmare. A particularly well-aimed one, true, but just another nightmare.









At least that is what he thinks until he glances at the ground and sees the faint scorch marks on the grass from what was surely not really Meredith's sword.

Not really.