#cullvelyan
WIP Wednesday/Whenever
Thanks for tagging me @starsandskies! <3 I don’t have anything new to share this week (or nothing I’m ready to reveal yet anyway) so here’s a lengthy snippet from an older WIP: my Cullvelyan Trespasser epilogue, featuring my canon Inquisitor Siobhan.
“Seeker,” Varric said in a strange voice.
“What?” Cassandra snapped.
“Look at her arm.”
Cassandra inhaled sharply and Dorian swallowed, feeling suddenly ill. The Inquisitor’s left arm—the one that had previously borne the Anchor—was missing. From the elbow down, it was just gone. Only a stump remained, blackened flakes peeling off it. The unmistakable feeling of magic clung to it.
“Maker’s breath,” Cassandra breathed. “Who did this to her?”
“Solas,” Dorian said flatly. “You heard her, when she came out of the mirror. She said his name.”
“Come on, Sparkler,” Varric said, “Solas may have lied to us about who he is, but he wouldn’t do something like this. You know that.”
“Well if not him, then who?”
“I don’t know! The Qunari, maybe. Tell you what…when she wakes up, we can ask her.”
“Stop it, both of you,” Cassandra said. “We can argue about who or what did this later, afterwe get her to a healer.”
“All right,” Varric said. “Just one problem…how are we going to do that?”
“I’ll have to carry her,” Cassandra said.
“I’ll do it,” Dorian told her.
She raised her eyebrows. “Are you sure?”
“We can’t all be muscle-bound warriors, but I’m stronger than I look. I’ll manage. Besides, someone needs to watch our back in case the Qunari decide to ambush us and all credit to Varric and his Bianca, but you’re the one with the heavy armour and really big sword.”
“All right, if you insist.”
“I do, actually.”
Kneeling by Siobhan’s side, Dorian slipped one arm around her shoulders and the other under her knees, lifting her carefully. “Hold on,” he told her, “We’ll get you home, don’t worry.”
Her eyelashes fluttered as her head lolled against his shoulder, but she didn’t respond. Given how bad her arm looked, perhaps it was better that she was unconscious.
“Cullen’s going to kill us,” he said.
“Come on,” Cassandra said. “We need to move.”
“Yeah,” Varric replied. “I’ve had enough of this place to last me a lifetime.”
It was a long trek back through the Eluvians, especially carrying Siobhan who remained unconscious the entire time. Twice, Cassandra stopped to check if Dorian was okay and twice he insisted he was fine, thank you, please stop asking.
They didn’t see a single qunari, or anyone else for that matter. Eventually they reached the final Eluvian that led back to the Winter Palace.
“You go first,” Cassandra said, nodding to Dorian.
“Great,” Dorian said, “Let me be the one to break it to Cullen and the others that we brought our Inquisitor back minus one arm.”
Cassandra rolled her eyes as he stepped through the mirror and then he was standing in the store room at the Winter Palace, with Inquisition guards, the Commander, Leliana and Josephine all staring at him.
“Not much of a welcome party,” he said, as Varric and Cassandra appeared behind him. Snapping out of their surprise, the advisors moved into action. Leliana started giving orders to the guards to secure the Eluvian, while Josephine quickly issued instructions on having a room prepared and a healer summoned for the Inquisitor. Then Cullen was there, taking Siobhan gently from Dorian, much to the relief of his protesting arms.
The Inquisitor’s eyes fluttered open briefly as she was transferred from Dorian to Cullen—her husband now, Dorian reminded himself—who cradled her like she was something precious, which Dorian supposed she was, in a way.
“Cullen?” Siobhan said weakly.
“I’m here,” he replied, voice firm but gentle. “You’re safe now.”
“Good,” she said, closing her eyes again. The look on Cullen’s face was one Dorian had never seen on the other man before. Tenderness and worry, an expression so out of place on their normally stoic Commander that it made Dorian uncomfortable to witness. He looked away.
A little late this week, but tagging @ashalle-art,@simper-fi,@charlatron,@diccix,@hobo-apostate,@a-shakespearean-in-paris,@sidhelives,@briarfox13,@ragesquidff & anyone else who feels like doing it!
thanks for the tag @fiannans@thedastrashand@starsandskies@knuttydrawsand@noire-pandora <3 It seems I only have time for short writing spurts lately. Been a busy week, been working non stop preparing for an interview, but I did manage to get this for a prompt I have in my box <3
Lydia is a celebration. As he dances, or tries to anyway, he finds her his own brand of intoxication. How does she know he loves the way the little whisps of her hair hit her shoulder? How does she know he loves it when she pushes her hair away from her face, revealing that small and tantalizing widow’s peak at the top of her forehead that’s almost a crown? Her sleeves fall off her tanned shoulders, her embroidered corset cinching in. He gulps at the valley, sighs at the closeness of her. She doesn’t take proper form anymore as more couples and some singles scurry to the floor to dance, pressing them in. Lydia pulls him closer, too concerned with him than proper form. He’s always more concerned with her than proper form.
before this I had a line about her “sticking to him like honey” and I really liked the imagery, lol.
tagging@fiadhaisteach@roguelioness@isk4649@retrowondergirl@a11sha11fade@alyssalenko
