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For the moment, the Inquisition was safe. They had settled into Skyhold and finished some of the most critical reparations, allowing Cullen Rutherford - Commander of the Inquisition’s forces – to move his office indoors. Well, mostly indoors. The second floor of his office where he climbed to every night still had its roof partially missing and the ceiling broken, allowing leaves and snow and even small birds to fall into his so-called bedroom. Never did he complain though, stating that he enjoyed the cool air, that it was healthy and that his sleeping arrangements were to be put to the low priority end of repairs in Skyhold.
What happened at Haven was still fresh in everyone’s memories. Even though the day-to-day life at Skyhold had started to become routine in the few weeks since the attack, many were nevertheless shaken. The help of the Chantry sisters and mothers they had living at the fortress was invaluable in healing both mental and physical wounds. Even so, on most nights someone woke up with a scream, terrified by their revisit into that night. Be it a soldier or a craftsman, everyone had received their fair share of trauma.
Cullen, as a former Templar, had witnessed war and strife before. Sometimes he wondered whether he’d ever find peace and quiet, or whether he was destined to exist at the edge of the abyss. The Circle Tower, Kirkwall and now this… His method of coping had always been overloading himself with duty, working until he fell asleep. His colleagues, Cassandra, Josephine and Lavellan, made sure to emphasize how important it was for him to rest. Cassandra knew how to best exploit his fears, taunting him with what would happen if they were attacked and Cullen would keel over from insomnia? Who would lead the troops?
Once again, Cullen was retiring for the night, exhausted, noting the passing of time from the candles and how short they had grown. It was somewhere around midnight, he surmised, when someone knocked on the keep-side door. Cullen was relieved that he wouldn’t have to go face his nightmares just yet.
“Come in,” he said, expecting another urgent report or an overly eager recruit wanting more challenging tasks. He enjoyed being approachable to those at Skyhold, regardless of hierarchy, trying to emulate a Templar instructor from his youth. He did not expect the Inquisitor to slip into his office at such a late hour, especially not without his armour, only in plain clothes.
“Good evening, Commander Cullen,” Mahanon Lavellan greeted quietly, almost shyly, stepping forward in the room. His tan skin seemed to glow golden where candlelight illuminated him, the pale tattoos on his skin luminous. Cullen didn’t know that much about Dalish culture, but he had learned that the tattoos were important to the Dalish.
There was something uncharacteristically nervous about the Inquisitor tonight, Cullen noticed as he stood in front of his table. Lavellan’s pale green eyes were scanning the stone floor instead of making bold eye contact as usual. Strands of his white-grey hair fell on his face and Cullen thought he saw the Inquisitor shake.
“How may I help you?” Cullen asked politely.
“I’m sorry to trouble you at this late hour,” Lavellan began in that lilting tone of his that reminded Cullen of Starkhaven. Though he was fairly certain that if he said that out loud, he would deeply insult both the Lavellan clan and the people of Starkhaven and be admonished on how they sounded nothing alike.
“I brought you… something,” Lavellan continued after a pause and a deep breath, and presented the object he had been holding behind his back.
“Oh?” Cullen asked and accepted the item placed into his gloved hand.
It was a… spoon?
In his hand was now a wooden, incredibly ornate spoon. The handle had been intricately carved, giving the appearance of twisted stems, knots, hearts and around it all, a dragon emerging from the oval bowl of the spoon. It was a magnificent piece of woodworking, its creator probably having spent countless hours on carving and polishing every little detail.
“This is amazing,” Cullen admired, turning the spoon over in his hands. “Where did you find this?”
The Inquisitor seemed to be troubled by the question. “I made it myself, Commander. It’s tradition,” he replied. “It’s… for you,” he added, turning his gaze on Cullen and finally making eye contact. It was obvious now that he was anxious, shoulders tense and eyes wide.
“Truly? I… er, thank you. It’s a wonderful piece of work. I shall keep it safe,” Cullen smiled, quite surprised upon having such a strange gift given to him by the Inquisitor.
“Safe? You will not use it?” Lavellan asked cautiously, tilting his head.
“Use it? Absolutely not! This is a work of art and should be preserved!” Cullen exclaimed with a laugh that turned awkward the instant he saw the Inquisitor’s face fall.
“I… see. Once again, I apologize for troubling you at such an hour. Good night, Commander,” Lavellan said quickly, bowing his head and making a quick exit, his face hidden by his long hair.
The spoon wouldn’t have caught Cullen’s interest as it sat on his chest unless Lavellan’s behaviour had been so strange. He woke up just before sunrise, thoughts going back to the ornate gift. It dawned upon him that the Inquisitor had mentioned something about tradition and thus sought Josephine’s knowledge on it.
“Lady Josephine,” he started, bowing courteously. Although they were colleagues, he had an utmost respect for someone like their Antivan ambassador who could smoothly navigate courts and delicate social situations with grace. Cullen appreciated and heeded rules and structured systems, but signalling your dislike of the food by placing your fork with the tines up – or was it down? - on the plate was just absurd. Josephine herself seemed to appreciate the decorum as well, smiling and nodding on his arrival to the antechamber.
“Might I trouble you with something personal?” Cullen asked, hands fidgeting, weight shifting restlessly. He felt like he was about to cross a line by even asking Josephine about the spoon.
“Of course,” Josephine responded immediately, sitting up taller behind her desk, placing her quill down.
“Do you know what this is?” Cullen asked. He produced the ornate spoon from a pocket in his mantle and laid it down on Josephine’s desk.
“Goodness!” Josephine said, her face brightening up even more. “I haven’t seen a love spoon since finishing school!” she continued smiling, picking up the spoon and turning it over in her hands.
“E-excuse me, what did you say it was?” Cullen asked. Love spoon? What on earth was a love spoon? And why had he been gifted with one?
“A love spoon, dear Commander,” Josephine explained, dark eyes full of mirth. “It is a courting gift among the Dalish.”
“A wh-what? C-courting gift?” Cullen stammered, his mouth and brain not co-operating once again. He hated his stutter and how it only seemed to appear in personal situations. He could lead an army against demons and monsters without a single stutter, but talking about personal and especially emotional topics always made his tongue twist.
“And quite the romantic one in my opinion,” Josephine said with a wistful sigh, gesturing to the spoon. “The potential suitor spends hours upon hours thinking about their beloved while they carve the gift, creating details and adornments that speak as much about their feelings that any poem would.”
Cullen felt his heart hammering in his chest. A courting gift? Why would anyone give him a courting gift? Why would Lavellan give him a courting gift? He felt faint but did his best not to show it. Maybe it wasn’t from Lavellan, not actually. Lavellan had probably brought it on behalf of someone else, likely one of the tittering girls always watching his morning exercises. Was any of them Dalish though? And why would Lavellan have been so nervous for another?
“Let’s see now… Twisted stems for ‘I want to be together with you’, a heart for ‘I love you’ and a dragon for ‘I will protect you’,” Josephine counted, pointing her finger at each detail in the spoon’s shaft. She seemed to have noticed Cullen face going pale and cleared her throat.
“Am I wrong to assume that you did not know the meaning of this gift before accepting it?” she asked politely.
“No, you’re not wrong. I thought it was just something he had found on his travels,” Cullen sighed, rubbing his neck. Maker, this is why he doesn’t understand court intrigues. He can barely figure out basic customs.
Josephine raised her eyebrows but made no comment about the possible suitor, diplomatic as ever. “May I ask whether you intend to use the spoon?” She leaned her elbows on the table, serious.
“He asked me the same thing last night,” Cullen puffed, “and I said no. It looks too valuable to use in soups.”
“According to the Dalish custom, using the love spoon means accepting the suitor’s advances while discreetly letting everyone else know that you’re spoken for,” Josephine explained, voice even. “Having accepted the spoon but not using it would be akin to… how do you say it, stringing them along? Giving them false hope?”
“Maker’s breath,” Cullen sighed, dragging his hand across his face. That explained the hurt expression on Lavellan’s face the night before. It was not his intent to string anyone along, and cursed again for having unwittingly insulted the Inquisitor. How was he supposed to know what a love spoon was? He had had very limited contact to the Dalish before in his life.
“Thank you, Lady Josephine, you have been most helpful,” Cullen said, regaining some sense of normalcy.
Later that evening, Cullen was staring at the dreaded spoon on his desk. What was he to make of this? Lavellan – if it really was from Lavellan directly – apparently liked him. In a romantic sense. There were so many complications in that simple thought. Lavellan was the Inquisitor. He was a man. For some reason, Cullen latched on to the fact that Lavellan claimed to love him even when they only had a working relationship. Cullen felt that he didn’t know much about Lavellan personally, yet, and the opposite should have been true as well. So why the heart?
Cullen decided to grab the proverbial beast by the horns and go talk to the Inquisitor about this. He didn’t want to spend any more time agonizing over a gift and its potential meaning without knowing the truth. He thought to check for Lavellan in his chambers and made his way across the stone bridge. It was late enough for the keep to be fairly quiet, grey wisps of clouds crawling slowly along the horizon.
As he made his way through the rotunda, he heard Dorian’s voice from the level above. The man apparently all but lived in his little nook in the library, staying there even this late in the evening.
“So tell me, what is it that bothers you so about our dear Commander?” Cullen heard Dorian ask smugly. Realizing he was the topic of the conversation, Cullen froze for a moment, debating internally whether he should leave. Eavesdropping was not a habit of his, but who was Dorian talking to?
“His hands,” Cullen heard Lavellan’s strained voice. Their conversation was quiet enough that if Cullen just took a few steps away, he’d be unable to hear it. Something kept him rooted to the spot, the excitement and dread of being caught paralyzing him. Wait, Cullen’s hands? What was wrong with his hands?
“His… hands?” Dorian asked slowly.
Lavellan let out a pained noise. “You’ve seen him rest his hands on his sword, I’m sure,” the Inquisitor said, the round vowels of his words a stark comparison to Dorian’s high-born manner of speech. “Sometimes, when he’s thinking“--Cullen hears a snort from Dorian—“he’ll start… rubbing the pommel of his sword with his thumb and it’s so… distracting!” The words halt and stutter.
Cullen looked at his hands. Did he do that? And what if he did? Surely he was allowed mannerisms or quirks of his own?
“A-ha!” Dorian exclaimed, loud enough for Cullen to hear clearly. “Let me guess, you would much rather have him fondle the hilt of your sword?”
Lavellan’s reply was muffled, like his face was buried in his knees.
Cullen’s brow creased in confusion. What was Dorian talking about, Lavellan didn’t even use a swo— oh. Oh.
He felt himself flush at the thought. He couldn’t go talk to the Inquisitor now. Not after hearing that. He needed time to pull his thoughts together, needed time to analyse this piece of information, to figure out what all of this means and how he feels about it and—
“Commander! What a coincidence!”
During Cullen’s freeze-up, Dorian had appeared at the end of the stairs with a wide-eyed Lavellan in tow. Dorian didn’t sound troubled or embarrassed at all, and Cullen suspects he was fully aware of Cullen’s presence in the rotunda.
“We were just talking about you. It seems you two have some unfinished business regarding swords and spoons,” Dorian gloated, remarking off-hand about how he needed to suggest a title for Varric’s next book.
Cullen was immediately immersed in prayer, hoping for an Archdemon or just a regular dragon, anything really, to attack Skyhold right at that moment so that he wouldn’t need to suffer this mess of awkwardness. He had never seen Lavellan quite so mortified, pale green eyes impossibly large and even the tips of his ears turning red. They were standing several feet apart, neither taking a step forward.
“Did you hear…” Lavellan started, words hanging in the air until Cullen’s curt affirmation sliced through any doubt.
“Yes.”
“Oh no.”
“I’m sorry. I, I need to—“
“I must go—“
Both of them opened their mouths nearly simultaneously, quickly turning on their heels and briskly heading in the opposite directions. Cullen had not been ready for a fight like this and indeed, needed to go and somehow forget about all this. He would go and try to sleep and definitely not think about what Lavellan had just said about his hands and the sort of situations he associated Cullen’s hands in.
Cullen tried to throw himself back to work until he’d be over-exhausted and would just keel over. But the whole situation with the Inquisitor kept replaying in his head, thoughts flying back to the blasted thing that started this all, the spoon that was still in his pocket.
Why was Cullen so affected by this anyway? He wasn’t interested in men. Although truth be told, he hadn’t been quite sure of Lavellan's gender until he opened his mouth to speak. He blamed the long, pale hair and the baggy garb he had been wearing. After observing him for a longer time, Cullen found that there was nothing dainty or docile about Lavellan. His willowy frame merely hid the strength in his body, the tenacity to hide in shadows and the explosive power to leap on his enemies, striking hard where they couldn’t see him.
He was honest and dedicated to the Inquisition and all the people it encompassed. He was reserved but reliable, clear and direct in his words, even to a fault. He was bright and a font of inspiration for other with the boundless loyalty he displayed and no one felt the need to question whether he would stick around to see the Inquisition's mission through.
And yes, Cullen admired him. As someone who quite literally fell into the battle and had great responsibility thrusted upon him. Not any man could accept and dedicate himself to such a task. But Cullen wasn’t interested in men. In general. He couldn’t even think about what to do with a man, or, well, he could. It wasn’t the sort of thing one could stay ignorant of in the Circles. But if Lavellan—If he—
Why was this so difficult? Why was he so affected by Lavellan's gift and the implications thereof? And most importantly, how was Cullen going to live through another War Room meeting?