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Neve crossed her arms over her chest, glaring over at where Rook was being patched up by Emmrich. The bright, hot anger burning under her skin as she watched their resident necromancer and anatomist reset a dislocated shoulder wasn’t foreign in and of itself, but it was the first time she had felt it so intensely directed at Rook.
He seemed to sense her temper, glancing around at everything but her in Emmrich’s room.
Nice try, Trouble.
“Right. That should be settled. Can you test your range of motion for me, please?” Emmrich instructed. Rook acquiesced, putting his right arm through its paces.
“Yep! Got it in perfectly,” Rook said.
Emmrich, like Neve herself, was watching him closely. “And the pain?” Emmrich asked.
Rook smiled genially and hopped down from Emmrich’s work table to go pick up his shirt. “What pain?”
Liar.
Neve didn’t think Emmrich was buying what Rook was selling either. After the Necropolis incident, most of them had stopped taking Rook’s word as to his physical condition at face value. But Emmrich didn’t press, even if his lips thinned a bit in annoyed concern. “If you are quite certain…”
“Positive,” Rook asserted. He patted Emmrich’s shoulder. “Thanks for this. I gotta admit, that one healer at the Necropolis is…intense. And mildly terrifying. You have a much nicer bedside manner.”
Neve snorted.
“Of course, Rook, it was no trouble. Do let me know if you notice anything amiss with the joint as time progresses,” Emmrich instructed.
“You got it! Alright, I’m going to go clean up. I’m pretty sure I smell like lava. Does lava have a smell?” Rook mused, still carefully avoiding meeting Neve’s eyes as he attempted to extract himself.
Not a chance, Rook.
She followed, and noticed him flinch slightly as he heard her footsteps follow him to his door. He finally turned to face her once they reached his doors, swallowing and twitching his hands nervously.
Good.
“Heeeey Neve, did you, uh…” He trailed off as her eyes narrowed on him.
“Inside.”
He wisely didn’t argue, instead pushing open the heavy doors, and gesturing for her to enter. Rook closed the doors with a loud thud, and then signed resignedly. With an air of defeat, he walked over to the large sofa and cautiously — whether due to his shoulder or to Neve’s obvious displeasure, she couldn’t be sure — sat down. He couldn’t quite hide the wince as his shoulder hit the cushions, and she felt her rage grow.
“What happened?” She demanded, standing over him.
She knew what she had seen, in the Dragon King’s lair. Getting there, and in, had been business as usual for a job like this. Rook had fought hard, they all had, but he hadn’t been in any more danger than was usual for him.
And then something had happened — what Neve couldn’t have said — and it all changed. For perhaps the first time, she’d seen Rook’s fighting turn truly, and indisputably, reckless.
He had all but thrown himself at the Antaam. Whirling blades, fury, and a complete and total disregard for any defense or the perilous geography. His fighting had been brutal, but dangerous, his guard dropped in favor of forward offensive momentum. He’d gone through four healing potions like they were water.
They’d had to revive him once.
Neve’s heart had gone through so many twists and stops that it felt as battered as Rook had been by the end of it.
And for what ? They could have handled the situation. They were not desperate. But despite that he had treated his safety and his life like they could be tossed away on a whim.
She was so furious she felt like she might spontaneously combust. “Why?”
Rook’s face was set, the muscles tense in his jaw as though bracing for an uppercut as he stared at a point on the floor. His leg bounced up and down, one of his tells when he was stressed or overwhelmed. “It all worked out okay,” he finally said.
“You couldn’t have known it would, and that’s not the point!” Neve spun on her heel, pacing as her hands clenched into fists by her sides. She took several short, angry breaths to regain her composure. Once her temper had cooled by a degree or two, she stopped and glared at him again.
“Neve-“
“And that wasn’t an answer.” He sighed, his eyes skittering away from her, but he didn’t object. He knew he’d been caught.
Still stone-faced, he looked idly at the fish. What Solas had kept them there for, other than ambiance, none of them had managed to discern yet. Rook had joked that they might be Solas’ spies; although that was unlikely, Neve supposed they couldn’t put it to rest entirely.
“The Antaam took Taash’s mom,” Rook finally said.
True, but Neve didn’t see how it connected to what she had witnessed today. Aelia had taken innocent non-mage Tevinters. Zara had taken more from Lucanis than they could probably catalogue. Elgar’nan had kidnapped the Dalish. He’d been deadly in those battles, but he’d never put himself at risk like this.
“And?” Neve prompted, crossing her arms again.
He frowned, a muscle in his jaw jumping as though he were clenching his teeth. “Always the fucking Antaam,” he muttered softly, probably to himself, and she raised an eyebrow at the vitriol in his voice.
“I needed to stop them,” he continued, at a more normal volume. “Taash is even younger than I was, and….I needed to stop them.”
He chuckled bitterly. “Which worked out spectacularly, of course.”
“There’s always someone else we need to stop. You can’t just…risk yourself like that, Rook! Your tactics were beyond reckless….” Neve told him, managing not to shout, but only just. Her pulse pounded in her ears.
He finally faced her, his own expression frustrated and body strung tight with tension. “My tactics were efficient. To get us to Shathann as quickly as possible.” Rook’s leg bobbed faster. “Dangerous, maybe, but calculated.”
“Calculated to what? Leave you dead on the ground while Taash got their mum back?” Neve asked coldly.
“If necessary.”
Neve huffed, frustrated, and began pacing again. It was the only thing keeping her from losing her temper completely and screaming. “That’s idiotic. They had kidnapped her specifically to lure Taash there. Time may have been of the essence, but they had no reason to kill Shathann. They needed her.”
He breathed heavily through his nose and closed his eyes for a moment. She managed to stop her course around the room, and faced him.
“We need you alive, Rook.” I need you alive, her heart whispered, and Neve could have almost believed he heard it as he slumped guiltily. “You can’t go off half-cocked.”
“It wasn’t…” he stopped himself, and shook his head a little. “I’m sorry, Neve. For worrying you. And for putting the team in danger.”
And the rage was back. Rook didn’t typically seem to dislike himself in the least, but he was treating himself as a tool , not a man whose existence had meaning and value. To all of them. To her.
She wanted to stamp her feet and shake him.
“Your life has value, you big idiot!” Neve nearly shouted. “You are not just some weapon that can be replaced! Venhedis!”
She paused and breathed for a minute, still glaring at him as he sat in a now stupefied silence.
“You are worth more than that. And you would never treat any of us that way.” That, she was confident of. “Maker, Rook, what we do is dangerous but you don’t need to go out of your way to make it worse.”
Rook fidgeted, though Neve couldn’t have said if it was due to discomfort or him using the movement to help himself think. The room filled with a tense silence, so palpable Neve felt she could have reached out and touched it.
“I promise, I have every intention of living a long life,” Rook finally said. He met her eyes steadily, and that earnestness he seemed to reserve for her was in them.
It was a start.
“And I’m sorry. You’re right. I…let my emotions get the best of me. It was stupid.”
Neve sighed softly as she began to calm down. She felt her muscles slowly begin to unknot, and she let her arms fall from their protective place over her heart before walking over to where he sat. Rook gave her a small, apologetic smile and gestured for her to join him.
She did, and some of the thick tension in the room began to dissipate. He leaned back against the couch.
“There’s something about the Antaam, isn’t there?” Neve asked.
His leg bounced and, after a moment of consideration, she placed a hand on his thigh to help ground him. “Yeah. I…do you remember when Ventus fell?”
She nodded. Every Tevinter remembered the fall of Ventus. Neve couldn’t have said how trustworthy the reports of the destruction, enslavement, and slaughter there had been. The Imperium loved propaganda against the Qun. Still, she knew it had been brutal. Rook swallowed, as though trying to draw up his courage, and his eyes rested on the map labeled Qarinus that was hung on his wall.
“I’m from Ventus. My parents fought there,” he finally said. Neve’s heart sank. “They died there, too.”
He would have been a few years older at the time than Taash was now, but not significantly so. It wasn’t just that it was the Antaam — though given what she knew of what had happened in Ventus, that could have been enough on its own — it was that the Antaam had taken a parent.
He was right, his emotions undoubtedly had gotten the best of him, and Neve could see why. He didn’t want Taash to experience what he had.
It didn’t make any of this okay , but at least there was an explanation.
“I’m sorry, Rook.” She squeezed his thigh and he let out a long breath.
“It was a long time ago. But yeah. Me too.”
Rook lay his hand over hers where it rested on his leg, his gaze returned to the floor, and Neve let him gather himself for a moment. Now that her anger had largely burned off, the deep and abiding fear that had powered it was making itself known. This had been another close call. And not because of the Evanuris, not because of his peculiar brand of luck, but because of his choices.
What happens the next time he’s desperate? What happens if you aren’t able to save him from himself?
When the strained buzzing energy seemed to nearly be gone, Neve sighed and admitted, “You scared me today, Trouble. I can’t—” she froze, hopefully not noticeably, before correcting, “we can’t lose you.”
His eyes met hers, and she knew he’d heard what she meant anyway. “I had the best watching my back. I had you. Together, we can survive anything. Even me being a ‘big idiot.’”
Rook gave her a sweet smile, apologetic, “if you can stand my personal brand of idiocy.”
I want to stand it forever, that’s the problem. What if next time my being there isn’t enough?
Neve sighed, but brought up her free hand to cup his cheek. “For now. But you need to treat yourself like you matter. You could have…”
He turned his head to kiss the inside of her wrist, and Neve blinked back tears. “I didn’t. But you’re right. I’ll be more careful.” He kissed that spot again, and she shivered.
“C’mere,” Rook said, and gestured for her to rest against him.
You can’t get too used to this. It will only be harder if….
Resting against his chest stopped the thought before its completion. His heartbeat thumped softly below her ear, proof positive that this time he’d made it. Was here. Was still hers.
Warm fingers combed through her hair, and Neve let herself relax a fraction. She knew he couldn’t guarantee forever, and Neve wouldn’t believe him if he did, but he was right. They’d all survived today.
Neve supposed she would take that victory, for now. After all, who knew if she’d be able to say the same next time?