Chapter Text
6. being annoying on purpose
Tahmina groaned and blinked in an attempt to clear her vision.
Old Tevene, when written, was a giant block of text all blurred together that made it impossible to distinguish one word from another, one sentence from the next. She couldn't write in the ancient book, either, forcing her to mark places with her finger. But the sentences ran forever, sometimes for pages, and she only had 5 fingers to work with.
The door opened and closed. Felassan greeted her.
She grunted, unwilling to break her concentration.
He puttered around their suite, dropping his equipment with a clang. Water splashed as he washed his face at the basin. She shushed him and for a moment it was quiet.
Suddenly a cold, wet hand grasped her chin.
"Careful," she gasped, knocking his hand away before it dripped onto the book. "Dorian will kill me if I get this wet, it's thousands of years old!"
He pulled his hand back but it was too late; she'd lost her place. She sighed heavily and returned to the top of the page, blinking and squinting as she refocused.
"You're going to ruin your eyes like that," Felassan warned.
She mumbled some assurance and kept reading.
"You've been on this same page since last night."
"Because I can't get a moment's peace to focus," she groused. "Please, Felassan."
He lingered for a moment then disappeared from the corner of her eye.
This part of the page she could read a little more quickly, having read it at least twelve times. She found it absurd that this was a text the Tevinter Circles used as fundamentals for magic. It required knowing mathematics she didn't understand, half-expressed in poetry that referenced false gods and long-forgotten rituals. How was she supposed to--
More clanging from the other room.
Tahmina growled and lowered the book. She stood, legs stiff from having been in the same position for hours, and stomped into the sitting room.
"Felassan," she huffed.
He didn't look up from his pile of armor. "Yes?"
"Do you have to do this now?"
"Urgently," he drawled.
"No, you don't. Please."
"If my armor isn't in peak condition, how shall we withstand all these assassination attempts?" He finally glanced up and nodded towards the book in her hand. "Are we hoping the book will catch the blade meant for your heart?"
Tahmina rubbed her tired eyes with the back of her wrist. At both twenty and at ten-thousand, elven men seemed to all be the same, irritable little pots of basil that wilted without precisely the right amount of light and water and cooing. Still, it was unusual for Felassan. He was patient, understanding, open, prone to humor but not to passive-aggressive antics like this.
"Could you do it more quietly?" she asked, trying to keep an even tone.
"Why, am I bothering you?" he asked innocently, leaning back on his hands, long hair slipping from his shoulder down his back.
"Yes!" she finally snapped. "Why are you being so..." She pressed her lips together.
"So what?"
"Annoying!"
He laughed. "I'm always like this. You just don't notice because you usually agree with me. I say things you fear you can't."
Tahmina frowned and pulled the book closer to her stomach. That couldn't be. "What is it, then?" she demanded.
The smirk fell from his face and his brow curled in concern. "You're being consumed by this place."
She sighed and knelt beside him. "I'm not studying this for fun, Felassan, I'm trying to blend in. These magisters need to take me seriously if I'm to--"
"They will never take you seriously. You will never blend in." He reached up to touch her chin again, fingers already warm again. "You could know all their laws, all their magic, all their customs, and they will reject you. It is not a matter of knowing, it's because of what you are."
Her chin jutted out proudly, knocking his hand away again. "Orlais bent to me eventually." And then had bent away again; the tree of approval swayed in the winds of politics and self-interest.
"Hm."
"You're being judgemental for someone who's snuck around and deceived."
"But I never played their games for clout." He paused. "Solas did, from time to time. He loved court and intrigue."
She shook her head. "I'm not like him. I don't do this out of enjoyment."
"Why do it at all? You'll gain nothing. They'll give you a quaint nickname. You'll leverage it as a threat for a while. And then what?"
"This is only for as long as it takes to find him. I'm buying myself time," she insisted. "Time and opportunity, that's all."
"That's short-sighted," he said sharply. "What happens after, Tahmina?"
Her gaze dropped from his and skirted around the room. "I hadn't thought about that." She never did.
She was not equipped to upend Tevinter or change the course of Thedas. Her only goal was to give the world an after, and what it did with it was out of her hands.
Wasn't it?
He tucked her hair behind her ear and was silent as he studied her bare face. His inspection was the only one she could tolerate for so long. After a moment, he ran a thumb under her eye where the weary hollow had established itself over the years.
"I miss you," he finally admitted.
"Is that what this is about?" she asked with a small smile.
"One of many things." He wasn't smiling. "Solas was also consumed and I didn't realize he needed to be stopped until it was too late. Nor did I realize I was steering Briala in the same direction. I won't let that happen to you."
Let.
She grimaced. "You don't hold a leash, Felassan."
His smirk was forced. "My guidance to you will be better," he amended.
She tipped her head against his hand. "I don't understand. Solas wasn't trying to become them. I'm not trying to become the magisters." As for Briala -- who could truly know?
"One doesn't try for it but once you have enough power, the cloak it wears doesn't much matter, niradahn. As soon as you start chasing it, intention is not enough. Just a little for this, just enough for that, and then..." Felassan shrugged. "You've heard him. A little is all it takes."
"And you think I'm following in his footsteps?" she asked, incredulous.
He stared at her, lilac eyes determined, yet he was unwilling to say the words. It was quiet enough to hear the maid humming in the hallway and the birds in the courtyard beneath their windows. Something churned in her stomach.
"That wasn't what you said when I was rallying the Dalish," she hissed, the tremor in her voice accusatory.
Without waiting for an answer, she shoved the book into his chest hard enough that he let out a small oof. She pushed herself onto her feet, then yanked it back.
"I'm going to read in the library. If you'll let me." She scoffed and stomped out.
He watched her go without trying to stop her. Petulant, she let the door slam shut behind her, startling the maid.
17. bitching about their ex
The Dalish camp grew ever-sprawling with a clan or two arriving every week, forcing Felassan to search longer and longer for Tahmina every time he wanted to speak to her. He could not find her with Lavellan's Keeper, with her cousin, with her mother, nor at her own tent.
He turned out of the camp and towards the abandoned estate gardens. At their center, the dried up fountain surrounded by orange trees. And on its ledge, Tahmina sat, orange squished between her knees, picking at the rind.
"Another fight?" he asked.
She had spent the last two months arguing, on and off, with Athim. He loved her, she couldn't find the feeling in herself. He threatened to leave, she begged him to stay. By now the whole camp knew of their dramatics. Inadas took every opportunity to give unsolicited advice; Tahmina's mother opted for passive-aggressive commentary. Gossip thrived.
Felassan had given up trying to advise her. She didn't want to end things. His opinion was not needed. For the moment.
Tahmina looked up, half-smile flickering across her face. "No. Not this time. Though I suppose the day is still young."
He invited himself to sit, stretching his legs out and crossing them at the ankles. Wordlessly, she dropped the fruit into his hands so he could peel the rind, as he always did. It already had punctures where she had struggled to do it herself... as it always did.
The bright scent of citrus burst in the air as he pierced the rind with a nail and pushed it back. His motions were restrained, careful to keep the fruit inside intact.
"Have you ever been in love, Felassan?" she asked suddenly.
He stopped peeling only briefly to consider the question. "I have."
"What did it feel like?"
He let out a small laugh. "I know you're not in love with Athim --"
"I never said that," she objected, though they both knew it was true.
"--but surely you've been in love before? No?"
When he glanced over at her, she was staring at the dusty cobblestones unseeing, mind someplace far away.
"I don't know," she concluded. "I felt something. I go back and forth on whether it was love. I'm told this means it wasn't -- that if it was really love, I'd know it."
This time he laughed fully. "Hardly."
Tahmina gave him a questioning look.
"The poets may disagree, but love is not one constant feeling any more than happiness is, or sadness. It is an act, an opportunity." He shrugged. "Some days are harder than others. Some weeks. Months, even."
Or years, or decades, or centuries. If you were a spirit made flesh, sustained by the power of the Fade, the insignificance of time distorted how long one could tolerate the intolerable, even for him.
She considered his words as he flicked the last of the rind to the ground and presented her with the orange. She frowned at it.
"The pith..." she said tentatively, brow furrowing. "Please?"
He grinned. "As you wish."
She did not like the pith, so he peeled that, too, carefully plucking the white away.
"He left me," she continued. "The last man that I..." Loved. "He promised to help me during a very difficult time, and then he left when I needed him the most."
Felassan nodded. That felt familiar. Just when the world changed, irreparable, Felassan, too, had been abandoned.
"When I saw him again, he'd become someone else, I thought, and then realized..." She let out disappointed sigh. "He'd always been that way. I just didn't want to see it."
Again he felt sympathy well up in him. Solas had become someone else, only for Felassan to think on it and realize nothing had really changed; Felassan had just wound up in Solas' way.
"What was he like?"
She puffed her cheeks out in frustration until the pressure burst through her lips. "Irritating."
He laughed and split the orange and held it out to her so she could pluck a segment.
"I thought he was an asshole at first," she admitted. "He picked on me, he judged my people."
"A human?" Felassan asked, surprised. He plucked his own orange segment and bit into it. It was fresh, bright, like the sun in his mouth, a reprieve from the chill grey this time of year.
"No, no, an elf, but... different." She rolled her eyes. "He loved to be different and clever and special. He took... pride in it." Her mouth twisted wryly.
"Ah. Maybe he didn't have any friends growing up," Felassan suggested.
"I... don't think he did."
No one else seemed to enjoy the oranges, leaving most of them to him and Tahmina to enjoy. She seemed to like them the most; even now, in her bitterness, her cheeks widened in a big smile and her eyes closed in delight. He wanted to give her the entire rest of the orange and watch her eat it, but she never allowed it, insisting that they shared.
"He was smart," she acknowledged. "But he loved to rub it in everyone's face, and it was impossible to change his mind, not really. He'd play along to get what he wanted, but I don't think he ever really meant it."
"And you loved this man?" Felassan asked.
"Don't judge me!" she protested.
"I am the last person who could judge you. The person I loved left me with a terrible scar." That he was still alive was prescience on Felassan's part alone; Solas had shown not a speck of mercy.
Tahmina stared at him, wide-eyed, and laid her hand on his wrist. "I'm so sorry."
He gently patted her fingers. "As I said -- love is more complicated than many wish to admit. People are complicated. Some show us only parts of themselves, and we are tasked with the decision of whether we are willing to love them whole with only partial information."
She frowned, eyes welling up, and nodded. "It's unfair. I never hid anything from him."
There was nothing her face didn't show. He wasn't sure she could hide anything from anyone. That someone would take advantage of that instead of treasuring it was an unfortunate part of how the world functioned.
That didn't mean it was right.
His pat turned into a squeeze of her fingers. "The error was his, not yours." He let her hand go. "Have more of the orange."
Obediently, she took another piece.
"I did learn a lot from him--" she began.
"No," Felassan cut in sharply. "We can be nuanced later. What else was terrible about him? Tell me."
She laughed. "Well... He lectured me all the time. He kept secrets. He sometimes spoke to me like I was stupid. He..." Something solemn passed through her abruptly. "He doesn't care for people. Not the way he should."
"Have you seen him recently?"
"Not for a while." She chewed on her orange, deep in thought, then looked at him curiously. "What about yours?"
"Mine?" He chuckled. "Much the same. Private, yet needy. Commanding, but did not heed advice. Demanded loyalty, yet returned none."
Something was cathartic about this conversation. Gossip was a time-honored tradition among spirits and subsequently in Elvhenan. But it was more than that; commiseration was soothing to the soul, at least in small doses.
"She sounds like a fool." Tahmina reached over for another piece of orange.
"She..." Felassan hesitated. "I suppose she was."
"You loved her?" she asked, returning the question.
"I did. I... sometimes fear I still do," he found himself admitting. Her earnestness was getting to him.
Tahmina nodded. "Me, too." She slumped. "How do you know if any of it was real?"
Felassan blinked. "If what was real?"
"Do you think she loved you? Truly?"
He distracted himself with another orange segment, buying himself time to think and an opportunity to chew away any emotions. "We can only understand what people say and do. We can't read emotions or minds. But for a while, things were easy and gentle. I must believe that, at least for a time, there was love."
A few heavier drops fell from the sky but again it failed to commit to true rain.
Tahmina nodded again, slowly. "I suppose so." She paused. "Do you regret it?"
A question he'd asked himself thousands of times but couldn't find an answer to. He shrugged.
She didn't seem to have any answer for herself, either.
"I can't keep doing this to Athim, can I?" she asked.
Felassan blinked. He'd forgotten entirely about her current lover. A decent enough fellow. Dramatic. Needy. "Probably not."
"This is embarrassing to admit," she said slowly, "but I'm not brave enough to be alone. Not again."
Alone. She would never be quite as alone as he was; she had friends and family, a nation. No one even knew, truly, who he was.
But what would it help her to compare wounds?
"Athim seems tougher than both you and I. He may not tolerate this for much longer, and then you'll lose him anyway."
She pressed her hand to her face and sighed. "So I should end it while I still have control over the situation."
"And while you still have your dignity."
"Oh, I don't know that there's much of that left. Tent fabric is thin. People can hear us yelling and crying."
He grimaced. "Every so often."
She barked out a laugh.
"So will you? End it?" he asked. It was better to be alone and one's full self than folding and hiding to accommodate another -- but that was not a lesson learned through lecture.
"I'm too afraid." She avoided his eyes, embarrassed. "This must seem silly to you when there's so many other things on the line."
"These are the details that make all the higher stakes worth fighting for." He carefully tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and patted her shoulder. "But if you ask me -- I doubt you'd be on your own for too long."
She gave a small, amused huff from her nose and shifted awkwardly, extending her own legs, mirroring him as she crossed them at the ankles. She gave his boots a light kick. "I appreciate the sentiment."
He nudged her back and they quietly finished their orange.
22. "would you love me if [i was a worm]"
"You're awfully quiet," Tahmina said, turning her head to glance at him.
The bath was large enough to fit five or six people comfortably, but the two of them had piled into the corner by the window, wrapped together like a lover's letter in an envelope. The luxurious oils poured into the water made her smell like vanilla and lilies. All of Tevinter was obsessed with rose, but she ensured none of their products contained the scent, for his benefit. In place of rose petals, even, were magnolia petals; Felassan would not suffer roses under her watch.
He dug his chin into her shoulder. "Am I not entertaining you?" he asked.
"I'm just wondering what you're scheming."
"Oh, I'm scheming?" he asked, grinning. He tightened his arms around her, squeezing until she laughed. "I'm only... pondering."
Her nails scraped his thigh gently under the water. "Anything interesting?"
He continued contemplating in silence for a moment, trying to decide if this was worth the conversation, and bit thoughtfully onto her earlobe. She shuddered.
These were the things he liked: her scents, her textures, her warmth, her skin pressed upon his.
What if he had never become real? Would she have ever appeared? Would they have ever found each other?
"Niradahn," he said, tentative.
She picked herself up off of him, long hair sweeping off his back as she turned to frown at him. "What's that tone? What happened?"
He laughed and put his wet hands around her face. "Nothing happened."
Everything happened. Not only because Elgar'nan and Mythal had taken the stone, but also because he had, too.
Tahmina was unconvinced. She laid a hand on his chest. "What is it?"
He grinned, aware of how ridiculous the question was. "Would you still love me if I were not a man?"
Her brow furrowed in confusion. "If you were a woman?"
"Ah-- interesting question, and we ought to come back to that," he said, "but no. If I were not flesh and blood."
"What would you be instead?"
"A spirit."
"What kind of spirit?"
He laughed and squeezed her thighs. "Does that matter?"
A look of horror passed over her face. "It does."
"What kind do you think I would be?" he returned.
"Why are you asking me this?" Her laugh was nervous.
"Let's call it a thought experiment," he suggested.
They both made eye contact and froze, the same thought occurring to them: he sounds like Solas right now. They both shook it away.
Tahmina took a deep breath and loosened her shoulders, as if she were preparing for combat. Then she studied him, hand moving from his chest to his chin to tilt his head this way and that. She touched his hair, careful not to tangle her wet fingers in it. Finally, she laced her fingers with his.
"You're too complex," she said. "How could I whittle you down to a single trait?"
Again, the specter of Solas passed through the room.
"Not whittling; emphasizing." He jostled their entwined hands. "Come, what do you think?"
She continued staring at him. "Freedom," she said finally, but frowned. "Not exactly. But there is something unrestricted and joyous about you, and you find it in everyone else, as well." She pressed her hand to her heart to emphasize where she felt this.
It was not exactly correct, but it was close. Surprisingly close. He took her hand and pressed it to his lips.
"And so? Would you love me, niradahn?" he prompted again.
"If you were a spirit of freedom?" She laughed again. "What do spirits of freedom look like?"
"I'm only a handsome plaything to you, is that it?" he teased.
She nodded emphatically. "Of course. All this time, I've kept you on my arm as a prize." She turned and leaned against him again, careful to put her hair over his shoulder once more. She had goosebumps, chilly from the window's breeze, resolved only by pressing against his warm chest. "What would you look like?"
Felassan wiggled his fingers ambiguously. "The most raw form, not one created for mortal comfort. Many eyes. Many colors. Tendrils. Sparkles."
"Mmhm, the sparkles really help. And am I also a spirit in this scenario?"
"And here I thought my question was simple. This is what I get for asking the Inquisitor. Would you want to be a spirit?"
"No," Tahmina said plainly. "I've thought about it a lot since I learned to dream, and again when I learned of Solas' plans. I decided I like what I am, even if it's finite. But in this scenario, if it would make it easier to be with you... I wouldn't mind so much."
Felassan sighed deeply, inhaling the vanilla scent, and squeezed her into a hug again. "You would be a many-eyed, many-tendriled being of magic and light, just for me?"
"Yes. Would you love me?" she asked, grinning ear to ear.
"I would."
He kissed her cheek over and over. The sound turned from light kisses to obnoxious suction and echoed in the large, tiled room until she dissolved into giggles.
"But," he said, once he was done, "I am glad we are what we are. I would never change anything."
She sank deeper into his arms and in his heart, he swore again and again that he would not waste what he had.