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There’s only so long she can hide in her quarters, and Araniel knows it. The Inquisition stops for nothing, not even its heart, stuttered and broken as it is.
It takes her ages however to get ready. She isn’t ready to look at herself in the mirror—isn’t ready to see her red eyes, tear-stained cheeks, her missing vallaslin. So she doesn’t, simply scrubbing at her face, and pulling her hair back as always. She takes a few deep breaths at her doorway, and then descends to the throne room.
Thankfully, the hallway is empty, though Araniel wonders if anyone would have noticed her. The only thing that set her apart from the other elves was her vallaslin—and even her markings hadn’t been enough to keep her from being mistaken as a servant. But the anonymity only lasts so long; the moment she enters the war room and her advisors look at her, the truth is there for all to see.
I let him take my vallaslin. I let him take my vallaslin.
Leliana’s eyes go wide. Josephine’s face falls. Cullen blinks at her several times. Araniel isn’t sure what her face looks like without her vallasin—she knows she would be a child in her clan’s eyes, and she tries to not let that in her voice as she says, “Report.”
It comes out cold, her voice. No trace of the woman with a broken heart and bare face. No hint of the elf who can never go to her clan again now that her vallasin is gone. No clue to the young girl who believed in true love, and lost everything because of it.
It is the voice of the Inquisitor. A person that is an idea, rather than a living, breathing, hurting person.
For once, Araniel embraces it.
Leliana is the first to recover. “Your worship,” she says, while shooting Cullen and Josephine a warning glance. They too slip into their roles, and begin discussing troop movements, requests from nobility, and the latest reports from their various outposts. The Inquisition stops for no one; the heart must beat on.