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In Kinloch Hold, the older templars told him that lyrium gave you wings, but it didn't help you fly. Cullen hadn't really understood. The templar's bright lyrium wings were as iconic as the flaming sword, as much a meaningful part of the Order's history as their heraldry - and they were beautiful.
When he came to Kirkwall, the Knight Commander's wings dwarfed his own, still little more than two clusters of jagged blue crystal, poking through the carefully measured gaps in his polished backplate. Meredith's were true wings, with layers of sharp, glittering lyrium crystals erupting from her armor, and even the hard, steely look in her eyes brought to mind a bird of prey. Cullen gathered that the width of the doorways in the Gallows had been altered to accommodate them. This was why the Order's initiates trained in heavy armour, weighted in the back, before they even so much as glanced at a vial of lyrium for the first time - and none of that could prepare them for the searing pain when the first crystal expanded, puncturing the skin. But the span of Meredith's wings was unusual, even for a more seasoned templar.
Stranger still was the colour. When he first met her, they'd been the same ice blue as her eyes, but over the last few months a deep crimson colour had begun to seep into the lyrium crystals protruding from her back. Cullen had never seen anything like it, and neither had the other templars. He spent hours in the library poring over musty old tomes, yet not even the most dubious text offered a single lead. Eventually, the red devoured the blue.
Meredith assured him it was of no concern.
He wanted to trust his Knight Commander, who'd known of his failures at Kinloch Hold, yet had only ever tried to help him better himself. They'd all made mistakes with mages, she'd said softly and, though he didn't know what hers had been, that gave him comfort. He wanted to trust Meredith, but she was hiding something more than a secret about her past. When he decided to approach her in the courtyard, he promptly dropped to his knees. He couldn't understand or explain what he was seeing, though he had a name for it.
Flight.