Chapter Text
She walks with her arms wrapped tightly around herself. Her shoulders tremble despite the warmth in the air. It is the rain, cold and bitter as her tears, that makes her shake. Her clothes are soaked. Strands of hair cling to her neck and chest in wet ribbons. Miles. Miles until home.
She mounts the horse they left tied to the post on the outskirts of the trail. It turns before she’s fully taken the reins, as if it knows her heart. Without encouragement it breaks off in a run toward the stronghold.
-
Too far. Always, you go too far.
He finds himself in Old Crestwood by the time he is able to stop. The scent of rain mingles with the dust of wooden ruins and spirits long forgotten. No one would come here. He could wait, at least for a moment. Wait among the dead. It seems fitting. Perhaps if he had told her what he intended, she would agree.
You belong dead, my heart.
He imagines her saying the words, as if she stands just beside him, watching rain batter a broken hearth in the ruins of a nearby home. He had expected her to say something of the like, after he had done it.
“I’m sorry. I can’t.”
Sorry. Yes. He is sorry. For far more than she knows. He had wanted her to be angry in that moment. Anger, and then that easy, familiar look of hate. One he knows all too well. One he sees so often on the faces of the People when they speak of him. The Great Adversary of her kind.
An adversary. Yes. He can be that. Anger is easy. But she had not been angry. She had looked at him the same way she has always looked at him. Even then she did not see an adversary. She had only seen him.
“In another world...”
The rain has soaked through his undershirt by the time he finds shelter in a nearby home. He feels wrong entering the place without permission. Perhaps its previous occupants still linger here, still call these ruins home. But he cannot bear to return. Not yet. He needs…a moment.
He finds himself standing in what must have once been a kitchen. The top of a table is propped sideways against a broken window and glassware litters the floor. He searches for a dry spot in the dirt and goes to it, sinking down amongst the dust and broken trinkets; mementos of a life long since lost.
He leans his head back against the damp wood. The smells of moss and wet soot envelope him like a cold blanket, and his shoulders tremble. For a moment, he longs for the warmth of a fire. The smell of embrium and snow beside an opened door. Soft silk and warm hands against his skin.
“I love you.”
He sniffs, letting out an unsteady breath.
You are a selfish fool, he tells himself. Like a child chasing a butterfly off the edge of a cliff.
Colors dart in front of him, rain caught in the lights of passing spirits. Some linger, prodding at the layers of emotion around him, while others keep away, as if made uneasy by his presence. Perhaps they are spirits of wisdom.
Stray lightning flashes across the sky. He closes his eyes, silently wishing for the familiar rush of willpower that often accompanies it. The soft exhale of her breath as she lifts her hand and brings the sky down around them.
Indomitable.
That’s what he had told her. Her focus was indomitable. Before he could regret saying so, she had smiled. Such a cunning look on her. How easily he had lost himself then.
He will have to mourn that part himself. It will stay with her now, he knows that. Old Crestwood seems the only proper place for what remains of him.
He isn’t sure how much time has passed before he drifts off. It is not a restful sleep. He never loses the sound of rain drumming on the sunken roof. The cold trickle of water on his ears lingers in the corner of his mind. When he opens his eyes again, he finds himself curled on the ground, the first light of morning scattering the earth like a shattered mosaic.
He stays for a moment. The aching in his chest makes him feel heavy. He watches the light turn from pink to gold, remembering how the dawn had looked from the balcony at Skyhold the first morning they had returned from the Exalted Plains.
Thousands of dawns. You have seen hundreds of thousands of dawns, yet that’s the one you should remember the most. You’re a –
“Fool!”
He does not need to sit up. Cole is standing over him, a lithe, pale figure pointing, sharp as a dagger.
“You are a fool! How could you?”
“Cole.” His voice is rough and dry when he speaks. He sits up, squinting against sharp daylight. “You know better than to follow us when we-”
“That doesn’t matter! Nothing matters now. How can it? How can you just leave your heart?”
Cole’s voice wavers at the end, as it so often does. Always so full of feeling. His hair is soaked, sticking to his cheeks and neck, his hands knotted into fists as he begins to pace the floor.
“Your own heart! You have to go back. You have to take it back. Wrong, wrong, this is all wrong. I can fix this. I just need to think. No, no not again. Leaving, always losing, always alone. You’ll fall for anything, stupid girl. Blood on my cheeks, my chin, my nose. The face of a slave. How could he love the face of a slave. Stupid, stupid…”
The words make his heart ache. Solas winces, turning his face away. “That is not appropriate, Cole. Please leave her thoughts as her own.”
The boy’s hastened words fall away. He stops, turning to face him in a forward stance. “I did follow you.”
Solas rises to his feet. His fingers run across his forehead as he lets out a weighted sigh. He knows Cole says the words to hurt him. The attempt is childish, but the boy is in pain. He does not understand. He knows he will not.
“I’m glad I did! Someone had to follow the Inquisitor. You left her. Alone. You hurt her. But you can fix it. You have to go back and fix it. Now.”
“I’m sorry, Cole. I cannot.”
The words crawl their way out of him like a villain. He wants to shake himself. To sob, and to forget the past. But he can think of nothing more selfish than that.
“No! She is hurting. You are hurting. It doesn’t have to be this way. Please.”
Cole’s words twist inside of him, a plea he also begs himself. Fix this. He wants to, by any god who might truly be out there, he wants to. But he cannot. He must do what is right.
“It is for the best, Cole. I am sorry.”
He gives the young spirit a stern look, folding his hands behind his back. Cole opens his mouth to speak, tears running down onto his pale cheeks. Before he gets the chance, Solas turns, exiting through what had once been a doorway. Daylight spreads like a warm palm against the side of his cheek.
“We should return to Skyhold,” he says, turning his head without looking back. “There is much to prepare for.”