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Dorian was rarely summoned. No one ever really asked for him, and he was never really required to help around Skyhold. There were many other people in far better situations than he to help with small details. And big details. The only person who ever asked for him was Alexander, and that was usually just a kind heads up about leaving for another assignment on the morrow.
But this time, Dorian had been summoned to the war room. It was daunting to him at first, but eventually he managed to hold his head up high as he walked down the little hallway. Passing Josephine's empty office already made him realize he was headed for a meeting with all advisors present, but whether that meant ill for him, he wasn't honestly sure. He hadn't done anything wrong lately, and for the last two days he'd been desperately searching the library for any information he could find on Tevinter, the Fade, and entering it physically.
After all, that had been quite the ordeal. He wasn't done processing that yet.
Neither was anybody else. Blackwall seemed absolutely shaken, and Varric just kept staring off into the distance every now and then with a surprised expression in his eyes. Dorian had decided to be proactive in his reactions, but it wasn't really helping him keep his mind off another issue...
Dorian pushed the massive war room door aside, the sound of its creaking and groaning a foreign noise to him, and inside he found exactly who he expected. Cullen, Leliana, and Josephine, all standing by the war table looking concerned and at a a loss. Dorian entered casually, calmly, trying to mask the worry he too felt sprouting in his chest. "So then," he began, heading towards the table with a graceful nonchalance. He leaned on it. "What are we to make of this then, hm? Am I to lead the charge now? Is that why I've been summoned?"
"You know very well why we've asked you here," Cullen said. He sounded annoyed, but it was still hard to hide the concern on his features.
Dorian sighed. "Where is he then?"
"Where do you think?" Josephine said, her voice much snappier than usual. It was clear each advisor was equally stressed by Alexander's latest absence. He hadn't left his room since they returned from Adamant, nearly three days ago.
Dorian sighed yet again and looked down at the war table. The amount of little markers there made him realize just how busy and hectic Alex's life really was. It made him feel guilty somehow. "I don't know what you expect me to do about it," Dorian said. "I've already tried my hand at clearing his mind. It's not working."
"Something has to be done," Leliana said. "We cannot sit here inactive for much longer. You must have advice."
"I've tried talking to him," Dorian said again. "It's not very easy. I either get waved away, argued with, or rolled over on."
"Rolled over?" Cullen asked.
"Yes," said Dorian, casting the confused Commander a look of annoyance. "He physically rolls away from me. Putting his back to me. It's not very endearing."
Josephine sighed. "He still sends reports, and he still gives orders to messengers and scouts. But he refuses to come to our meetings, or even discuss them at his leisure. We must do something."
"Have you thought at all that maybe what he needs is some time?" Dorian mused. "We put enough on his shoulders, maybe we owe him this."
"We do not have the luxury," said Leliana. "If it were earlier on in the game, perhaps we could see fit to give him time to think. But we are too far gone now to take such breaks. There is much to be planned."
"But not to be done," Dorian argued. "We have crippled, have we not, both of Corypheus's master plans. While he tries to decide what his next move will be, should we not take some time? I'm sure you have spies or whatever you have running errands and checking in on things. If anything truly nasty is approaching, I'm sure Alex will rise to the call."
"We're not so sure," Cullen said sadly.
"He seems very shaken," Leliana agreed. "His faith has been tested."
Dorian pursed his lips a moment. Standing on the one side of the table, all the advisors facing him, he wondered how Alex could do this without feeling perpetually nauseated. "I think it's more than that," Dorian said. "Alex is too devout for his faith to be so shaken by a simple little discovery like this."
"Simple?" Josephine said in surprise.
"So Andraste didn't choose him," Dorian shrugged. "So he wasn't saved by her eternal grace and charm. So what? What would make any other man thrilled is making our Inquisitor feel deflated. Any normal warrior would be ecstatic to know that his normal self had done such impossible things, without the support of a higher power. For Alex, that's what made him feel important. Never mind that he runs an entire military operation. Forget that he is blessed or cursed with a mark on his hand that connects him to the fade. Forget, in fact, that he is the first man in a thousand years to physically walk in the fade. None of that matters. What matters to him, I think, is that he was not chosen by the Maker to do this. That he is a man, a normal man, who was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time."
Dorian's speech seemed to ring through the war room, and he watched as each advisor shared a glance that said they agreed. His own words seemed to surprise him as well. Dorian hadn't really realized that this was the cause for Alexander's defeated attitude. While Dorian spent hours upon hours trying to learn more, trying to understand, using the information he received in order to better himself, Alex was just broken.
"What do you propose?" Cullen finally asked. "We can't just leave him to wallow. We can't hope that he will eventually come around."
"I assume Cassandra is speaking to him, hence her absence here," Dorian noted. He received a nod here and there. "If she can't sway his faith, what makes you think I have any power?" He wasn't wrong, but no one wanted to agree. Dorian wasn't exactly the picture of Andrastian faith.
"You may not be as devout," Leliana said at lasy, "but you are absolutely one of the only people he will listen to. Truly."
"Perhaps it would help to speak to him, talk him through what he experienced," Josephine said. "After all, though you do not go physically into the fade on a regular basis, you know it better than he does. Walking through it could help him come to terms with what he learned. What he saw. All that occurred"
Dorian sighed and drooped his head, crossing his arms over his chest. He'd been afraid of that. The truth of the matter was, and he would absolutely not share this, but Dorian had zero desire to relive that experience. He didn't want to talk it through, he wanted to bury it and forget it and pretend the entire ordeal never took place. And it wasn't so much the Fade, or the horrible realization that once again a Tevinter mage had broken the rules and ended up physically present in a dream-world...It was the fact that Alex almost died.
Again.
He was so sick of feeling so sick at the thought of losing Alexander to the war, to the battle, to an injury. Even to a sickness! The man could sneeze or cough and Dorian would be up all night. He wasn't used to feeling this way, to being so concerned for someone other than himself. And trying to speak to Alex the past few days didn't make it any better. The sorrow, the helplessness Dorian felt, made him feel angry. And Alex didn't deserve his anger. It was easy for Dorian to get snappy and frustrated when he was annoyed, even if the issue was something else entirely. He'd been known to start a full on screaming match with someone over a bad night's sleep.
But Alex needed help. And if Dorian was the best candidate, apparently...
"I'll do what I can," Dorian said, turning away and making for the door. "But don't hold your breath. If there's anything I'm sure hasn't left Alex, it's his stubbornness."
***
And Dorian was right.
When he made his way up to Alexander's room, he found Cassandra standing by the desk, looking over papers, as Alex lay huddled under blankets in bed. It was pathetic, but if Dorian wanted to feel ashamed he couldn't muster it. All he had in his chest was sadness, and a little bit of fear. Seeing Alexander so cut off this way, so repressed, made him wonder if his own repression could be this bad. Dorian kept things internal by external showmanship. But Alexander, even when softly shy, was always external. He was the extrovert Dorian pretended to be, and seeing him so constricted, so small huddled up in bed that way...It wasn't right.
Cassandra looked up as Dorian came in, leaving the desk and walking to the top of the stairs. They met there like conspirators. "He is not asleep," she told Dorian softly. "But he won't listen to anything I say." She paused and frowned as they both looked at Alex's back. "It is hard for me to understand what happened at Adamant. Not being present, I fear I'm no use in this matter." She looked back at Dorian with clear hesitance. She wasn't exactly Dorian's fan, not that many people were, but at least she knew him well enough to trust him. "Do what you can," she said. "We need him."
"So I've been told," Dorian mumbled as she made her way out.
When the sound of the door closing echoed back up to Dorian's ears, he decided that instead of being soft and understanding, as he'd tried before, he'd take a different route. The loud bang seemed to be the push that he needed, cutting off any responsibility to pussy foot around. Even if he too wanted to avoid the situation, even if Dorian also wanted to curl up in bed and just stay there for a while. He'd wanted to do that for longer than he planned to admit.
Walking over the the bed, Dorian sat roughly down on the edge of it and leaned back against the headboard. Alex barely shuffled, but his movement was enough to tell Dorian that he was wide awake.
"The library here has remarkably little on early Tevinter history," Dorian stated easily. It was something that had been bothering him as of late, something that he would have approached Alex about angrily in any other circumstance. He clasped his hands together in his lap and stared across to the balcony. Alex's head barely turned in his direction. "All these gifts for the Inquisition and the best you can do is the Malefica Imperio. Trite propaganda."
He paused. Alex sighed.
"But if you want twenty volumes on whether on not Divine Galatea took a shit on Sunday, this is evidently the place to find it," Dorian said. He let his tone be sharp, forcing it in there only a little bit to try and rouse something in his broken lover. If there was anything Alex was capable of, it was arguing. Even as a people pleaser, even as someone who disliked conflict, Alex and Dorian could have some of the best fights. And usually they began this way, with Dorian pushing or snapping just a little too hard.
But all Alex did was sigh. "That's the Dorian I know," he mumbled glumly. "Critiquing every book in my library."
"I wouldn't have to," Dorian chastised. "If you could find some rebellious heretic archivists to join the cause. I ask really so little of you, you know."
Alex scoffed. "Are there rebellious archivists?" he asked, barely turning over. "Other than you, that is," he added icily.
"If Corypheus ever starts burning masterworks of literature," Dorian said saucily, "I'm sure a few will pop up. I thought I saw something by Genitivi there once. I could have sworn..."
"Look again then," Alexander said, curling in on himself a little further.
Dorian rolled his eyes. "The amount of times I've roamed that little library searching for something more interesting than your tastefully polite choices...I may get dizzy circling the room one more time."
Alexander sighed. "What is this about, Dorian?"
"I think you know," Dorian finally said. "Have I coaxed out enough annoyance for you to actually speak to me?"
"I'm not in the speaking mood," Alex said, rolling back away from Dorian. That was the move he hated, the full body block Alex kept giving him. His anger, his annoyance, was false at first, but Alex's attitude left Dorian's already iffy mood plummeting downwards.
"Well I am in the speaking mood, and I think we need to talk about this," Dorian said. It wasn't a characteristic phrase of his, and in fact, just saying it out loud felt wrong. But it was true nonetheless. "Still not willing? Alright, I'll speak for you. You feel lesser than you did before, am I right? As if somehow, just because you weren't hand picked to serve the Maker and his Bride, that everything you've done or will do means nothing."
Alex flinched slightly and sighed again.
"The Divine, that spirit, or whatever it was," Dorian went on, "told you the truth for a reason. You regained your memories for a reason, don't you think? So that you could realize the true gravity of what you're doing here."
"And what am I doing here?" Alex grumbled.
"Making a difference," Dorian said, "as a singular man with no extra, magical support. Are you truly going to dismiss everything you've accomplished simply because you turned out to not be the Maker's little errand boy? Honestly, I would think that was a weight off your shoulders. So Andraste didn't bless you, so that mark on your hand is there for another reason. Was that really all you thought of? Was that really the only reason you were so confident? I can't imagine this man only being happy with himself because he thought he was blessed."
"What am I now that I know I'm not?" Alex said, his back still turned, his voice still glum. "All the things I've said. The faith I've had. I've lied to everyone."
"You didn't know."
"I do now," Alex snapped, "and people still want me to pretend. They still want me to act as if this was divine intervention."
"Well maybe it was," Dorian shrugged.
"It wasn't!" Alex yelled suddenly. He threw back the covers and got up, displaying only a pair of trousers on his body. Running his hands through his hair, he walked slowly towards the wide window and stared out across the sunny landscape. It wasn't the reaction Dorian wanted, but it was a reaction. That was something.
"It wasn't," Alex said again. "Everything I've believed in...I feel foolish, Dorian, like an idiot! Like a child! Why did I think anything so fantastic could happen to me? Me?! What have I ever been in my life to deserve the kind of honour this brought me? I'm questioning everything now, Dorian. Not just my place here, not just what I'm supposed to do with this information. But we walked in the Fade! And nothing happened! No one was there, Dorian. No one."
Dorian looked at Alex as he continued to keep his blue eyes away. All this talk, all this breakdown ranting, and Dorian still couldn't see his face.
"Corypheus told me," Alex mumbled, "that he'd seen the seat of the gods. And that it was empty. Maybe...Maybe the Maker did leave us, and we're here struggling alone. I have to finish this, I have to fight this, alone."
"You are far from alone," Dorian said softly.
Alex sighed. "You know what I mean."
Dorian stared at Alex's bare back for a moment before looking down. How was he supposed to make this better? How was he supposed to give a religious, motivational speech to someone suddenly convinced that there was no hope. No higher power. Dorian would classify himself as confused most of the time over the spoutings of the Chantry, but he believed in more. Didn't he? In a world falling apart with a darkspawn magister trying to be a god, didn't that mean there must be more?
"Where did the darkspawn come from then?" Dorian finally mumbled. "Something must have happened, something must have occurred for those first magisters to be cursed, Blighted. I don't think entering the Fade had to do with it, because we were there. Maybe it has to do with the way they first entered it, but I'm still not so sure."
Alex's head was still hanging low, his fingers in his hair.
"Just because Andraste wasn't the one to actually give you the mark," he said, "and just because you didn't see her, doesn't mean this wasn't a plan. Maybe you were at the wrong place at the wrong time, or maybe you were at the right place at the right time. Maybe this was always the plan for you, but it just didn't unfold the way you thought."
Alex's head tilted just slightly around.
Dorian got up. "Look, I'm not devout enough to say whether it was or wasn't the Maker's plan for you to grab that orb," he said, coming towards Alex. "And in truth, I don't care. Neither will anyone else. The things you have done, the headway you've made, are all the more impressive now knowing that it came solely from you. Don't you think that's better? Don't you think it's more amazing that someone normal yet far from average managed all this on their own? Without any intervention?"
Alex sighed. "I wanted to be special," he admitted, almost embarrassed.
"And you needed the Maker or Andraste for that?" Dorian wondered. "Alex, you have been touched by an ancient magic no one truly understands. You are fighting an all powerful enemy, and succeeding thus far. You walked in the Fade, Alex. Physically. Do you know what that means? The severity of it?"
"Of course I do," Alex said, and at last he turned around. Meeting Dorian's eyes for the first time in days seemed to trigger something in him, and his broad shoulders seemed to relax slightly. "I know what it means, Dorian. I'm sorry...I know it must be...I'm making this all about myself."
"You're entitled every now and then," Dorian smiled, but then his expression softened when Alex's face remained miserable. "Are you alright?" he finally asked.
Alex took a slow breath in. For all his sighing, he still sounded as if breathing were difficult. "It was like...walking in a nightmare," Alex said quietly. "But everything was real. I couldn't..." He stopped, closing his eyes, and turning his head away.
Dorian frowned. He didn't like this conversation to begin with, but now it hurt all the more. He stepped closer. "It's as I thought," he said gently. "The Fade is an ordeal under normal circumstances. To be the only real thing there...beyond description. That any of us made it out alive is difficult to believe. That you made it out...a miracle."
Alex almost smirked. "Why am I the miracle?"
"Because you stayed behind," said Dorian severely, and suddenly the conversation became about him. All his whimsy, all his forced chatter to make Alex burst from his shell, seemed to fade away as he stood before this man. The truth bubbled in Dorian's throat, and it burned and filled him up more than he wanted it to. The words were already there, he just had to find a way to say them...
"When we fell into the chasm, into the fade," Dorian said, turning away. "I thought you were done for. And since then, I've wondered if I can forgive you for that moment."
It was selfish of him to say it, but it was the truth, and he couldn't fight it now.
Alex looked pained, and guilty. It seemed to only dawn on him now that he may not be the only one struggling. "I'm sorry you had to go through it with me," said Alex. "When I think about it now...it feels clearer. What you must have felt being there..."
Dorian looked back, his brows knit together, the words gripping, tightening in his throat. "I'm not sorry I was there with you," Dorian explained. "I'd thought I'd lost you."
Alex blinked. Any coldness, any sadness that he'd apparently felt at his own situation seemed to flood over to Dorian's side.
"You sent me ahead," Dorian went on. "And then you didn't follow. For just a moment I was certain you wouldn't. I thought, 'This is it. This is where I lose him forever.' I never want to feel like that again, Alex. I've felt it already, and I was so hoping never to--"
Alex grabbed Dorian to him, his arms encircling him, his head on Dorian's shoulder. To Dorian's surprise, he didn't hesitate to hug Alexander back, tightly, letting out the tension and stress in his arms. He realized now that they'd been tight with keeping back this exact confession, this exact moment. He hugged Alex harder than he thought was safe, than he thought he should.
"I'm so sorry I caused you fear," Alex said stiffly into Dorian's neck. "I never want to hear your voice waver like that."
Had it wavered? Dorian continued to hold Alex tightly, wondering how his emotions got the better of him, wondering how this man, whom he'd flirted with and treated like a little toy at first, had gotten hold of his heart. Of his mind. Of every part of him. It wasn't something he could fight any longer. It wasn't even something he could pretend would pass like a little fancy. From the moment Alex had told Dorian he wanted more than a fling, Dorian knew this moment was coming. In hindsight, he should have prepared himself for this exact conversation, this exact kind of desperate hug.
Hadn't he come up here with a different purpose? Hadn't the past few days found him angry and annoyed that Alex would turn away from him so easily? Why was it so simple now, standing here in Alex's muscled arms, holding him tight and having no desire to let go, feeling no awkwardness or weakness...
Finally, after Dorian's arms actually began to grow tired, he pulled back slightly and looked the slight bit down at Alex. He really wasn't that much shorter than him, but right now, Alex felt a thousand feet taller. Dorian lifted his hands to Alex's cheeks, cupping his jaw in his palms, and he sighed. "Don't let me lose you," he said sternly, as if Alex had any choice in the matter. "I won't let it happen, but you be careful and cautious. Eat your greens, watch for flying mauls."
Alex chuckled softly and looked down. Maker he was stunning.
"I don't know what I'd do," Dorian said quietly, "if you left me here without you. I don't think I'd ever feel this kind of love again."
Alex's eyes shot back up from the floor, and even as Dorian still held his face, Alex's jaw was loose. "What did you say?" he breathed.
Dorian almost smiled, though he felt as if he might vomit right here and now in Alex's bedroom. "I won't be able to say it all the time, I'm warning you now," he said softly, watching as Alex's face turned slowly from surprise to joy. His heart was beating so hard against his ribs it almost hurt. "Alex...I love you."
The little exhale Alexander gave Dorian was enough to spark that smile he'd been holding back. Dorian dropped his hands, nervous, shaking, feeling absolutely foolish, but Alexander was smiling so wide, his eyes shining, and that was the face Dorian knew and...loved.
"You love me," Alex repeated, both as a statement and a question.
"I do," Dorian said with his characteristic smirk. "Against my better judgement, of cou--mmf."
Alex's lips were pressed to Dorian's so roughly, so suddenly, that their noses actually bumped together. It hurt, but neither one of them cared, and Alex's arms came back around Dorian in an instant. Dorian let one of his arms snake around Alex's waist, and the other come up between his bare shoulder blades. It felt like bliss, like a drug, like every kind of fancy alcohol Dorian could ever get his hands on, without the negative side effects. Oh he still felt nauseous, nervous, with his heart hammering much too quickly in his chest, but to Dorian that all now seemed perfectly adequate.
When Alex released Dorian's lips, he was still somehow grinning. "I love you too," he said. "In case you had any doubts."
Dorian grinned so wide that his cheeks ached, the skin unused to folding back that far. "Not for a moment."