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He's beat her twice, and she's beat him once before he sits back and laughs that he might actually be too drunk for chess anymore, and she agrees. He's had... four glasses? Five? He's not sure. It's been maybe two hours since Evelyn showed up at his door in the middle of the night, disheveled and bashful. She'd seen his room lit and she couldn't sleep either, or so she said. They'd talked for a bit, and eventually she invited him to chess and a lovely bottle of wine they'd nick from the cellar on their way over. He'd practically leapt at the opportunity - both to escape his stagnant room and to spend time with her. She'd been away, two months this time, Orlais, and he'd barely seen her the days she'd been home. Cullen had felt the Madame de Fer's sharp disapproval hot on his back as he opened the door to the Herald of Andraste's bedroom with one hand and clutched a bottle of Tevinter Malbec in the other. Fantastic.
Luckily, though, the inkling guilt had all but tricked away with the wine - They're small glasses! Six is reasonable! she'd argued, and he'd given her his most doubtful look - and has since been replaced with a nice buzz. Evelyn huffs and finishes shoving the board under the couch before sinking back to the entirely ridiculous cushions.
"Hmm... Wicked Grace? I've got a deck in the desk. It's easy enough to play drunk."
He approves, wanting an excuse to stretch this night out as long as possible, and pesters her about a Chantry sister with experience of playing cards inebriated. Her face scrunches up indignantly - of course not, she's the Herald of Andraste. Any ideas of her youth being spent stealing the sacramental wine are highly unfounded, not to mention blasphemous. Cassandra would have a fit.
She doesn't even play at hiding the fact that she's cheating, but Cullen, out of pure luck, keeps winning anyway. They pour each other more and more wine, and he's happy and sleepy and warm and he can hear himself laughing much too loudly and often but can't find it in himself to be ashamed. They get along well, Evelyn and him. In all honesty, he's a bit surprised at how well. They are, and have been, openly affectionate with each other but... they make good friends, too, he thinks giddily. He's made her laugh more times than he can count tonight, and his own face hurts from smiling. She teases him and he teases her back, and it doesn't give him any feeling of inadequacy or shame, worry of overstepping his bounds, just a strange sense of comraderie. It's nice. She's nice. She's so nice.
He's drunk.
"So... Lacy nightgown?" He raises his eyebrows at her dress, uncharacteristically confident. "Didn't expect that from you."
She pokes her feet out to kick him in the thigh - hard. "You are aware that I am a Lady? Capital L. I know the plate armor and greatsword suggest otherwise."
"Oh, trust me, I'm aware." Liquid courage, indeed. He imitates Dorian's eyebrow wiggle, and she rolls her eyes.
"Well! Before, I was almost always in Chantry robes, or a dress," continuing over Cullen's mumbled same difference as if she hadn't heard, " I was stuck being a Lady - Capital L - all the time. Hated it then, but, like it goes, I miss it now. Figures." Her smile turns sharp briefly but she continues, almost too casually, "I make up for it by wearing little lacy underwear now." He leans his head back to make a long, incoherent groan at the ceiling, and she chokes on the drink she's picked up before he's laughing too, and they laugh and laugh and laugh until his stomach aches and she's wiping her eyes.
"I'm tired. I'm so tired. I don't think I can play anymore."
Her legs are across the couch on his knees, and he's been idly holding her feet for the past few minutes. Not rubbing, holding, and it dawns on him that it's probably a bit odd, but his hands have grown accustomed to their positition and he might actually be too lazy to even move them. "We haven't touched the cards in nearly ten minutes anyway."
She shrugs halfheartedly, lifts, drops her legs to squarely heel him in the gut and snorts at his undignified grunt. "Bedtime. C'mon."
"I... What?"
"It's time for bed. I'm tired. Come on." Her emphasis sounds like his mother scolding him, and Cullen, despite their relationship, despite the casual intimacy of the past few hours, feels his face begin to burn.
"Is that... appropriate? Are you sure that's appropriate? I can go back to my tower." He sounds apprehensive to his own ears.
"Cullen. You are so drunk. I don't think you could actually climb that stupid ladder, to be honest." He opens his mouth to argue that yes, he could, he could climb it and not even fall once, he's the Commander of the Inquisition, but she cuts him off. "I'm much too drunk to be anything but appropriate, actually. Sorry. Though, judging from that off-key humming you were too drunk for anything less than appropriate hours ago."
He feels obligated to argue, and a bit like a child breaking the rules, but he watches her sleepily turn the sheets down and decides, to the void with it. Winces when his belt buckle bangs the floor too loudly before crawling in next to her. Like instinct, he stretches his arms out and she pushes him over, not gently, to lie in the space between his arm and chest, curling herself around him. He's more comfortable than he's ever been, probably, and he thinks for a ridiculous second about finding a way to bottle it up and drink it and his chest shakes with laughter before she digs her head in to make him stop. They breathe quietly in the dark, and he barely hears her whisper "Sleep well," before he's out.