Chapter Text
“Next, there is the matter of-”
Josephine was a consummate professional. Rowan knew this. She was the only member of the Inquisition who could possibly hope to pull off the next sentence without a twitch of an eyelid out of place.
“- the consummation of the marriage, and future conjugal relations.”
The Orlesian diplomat waved a hand dismissively, already scanning ahead down the document. “All as standard, I presume?”
(“No,” Rowan had said firmly.
“It is expected,” Josephine had protested, but without much real energy in it - she could guilt Rowan into anything, they both knew, but her heart wasn’t in this one.
“No. There must be an alternative, or precedent.”
“Not even on the wedding night?” Rowan firmly shook her head, and Josephine gave a little sigh of defeat. “Very well, I will see what has been done in the past.”)
“Quite to the contrary.” The diplomat paused her reading, eyes flicking up to meet Josephine’s, whose own face remained a perfect calm mask. Rowan managed to keep her own expression neutral, hopefully keeping anyone from looking too closely at a hint of blush on her cheeks, a touch of sweat on her brow. Josephine continued smoothly, “A condition of this marriage will be that relations between Gaspard and the Inquisitor shall be purely political, and chaste. Both are free to conduct affairs with discretion, naturally, but there will be no expectations or obligations on either side.”
Josephine’s opposite number, an older woman with dark hair drawn tightly back, in a simple fitted gown of deep plum and a delicate filigree mask twisting over her eyes and brow, frowned as she made a note on her own papers. “This is highly irregular for unions of this type. What are your expectations regarding the bearing of heirs?”
“The heir to the throne is to be selected from without, and formally adopted into the imperial family to begin training for their new role.” Josephine somehow delivered the demand without twitching. You’d never guess she’d had palpitations when Rowan had first suggested it over several glasses of Nevarran red.
Her counterpart raised an eyebrow as she made another delicate mark on her notes. “You truly are expecting us to abandon a lot of tradition, aren’t you?”
“As the ones who first made the offer of your emperor’s hand in marriage to an elf,” replied Josephine calmly, “I’d point out that the shucking of tradition began with you, not us.”
The Orlesian smirked a little at that - not unkindly, but that of a seasoned competitor noting a worthy contender. Like Cullen had over chess that one time, Rowan remembered with a pang of fondness. Their last game felt like it had been forever ago. With a pang of unease, she realised they hadn't played since they'd defeated Corypheus. Since - well, now wasn't the time for that.
The diplomat rolled up the notes and stood, giving a little bow to both Josephine and the Inquisitor. “I will discuss these modifications with Gaspard, and return with his response as soon as my duties allow.” With the final ceremonial politenesses - bows, hands clasped, wishes of safe travels and good health - she finally swept from Josephine’s office.
Rowan counted to five as the footsteps receded, then slumped in her chair. “Did that go well? I honestly have no idea.”.
“Smoother than expected,” allowed Josephine, already scribbling away on several sheets of parchment, “He must be even more eager for this match than we anticipated. You must have made quite the formidable impression at the Winter Palace.”
Rowan kept a perfectly straight face even as several mental images played in her head. “I suppose I did. When will she be back?”
“Several weeks at least. These things take considerable time even between neighbours, and between the two greatest powers of Orlais…” Josephine trailed off, looking up helplessly over the stacks of paper she was already amassing. “We shall be fortunate to get it wrapped up before the new year.”
“Do you need anything more from me right now?”
“I would like to go over my notes from the meeting with you in the morning with fresh eyes and discuss responses to his possible replies - but not for now, no.” She looked up at the Inquisitor with a knowing smile. “You can go.”
Rowan didn’t even try to pretend. “Thank you,” she said rapidly, leaped to her feet and rushed from Josephine’s office. A quick detour to the wine cellar got her a friend for the evening. Courtiers politely scattered out of her path as she swept through the castle, somehow keeping the movements as smooth as ripples from a swan’s glide across a pond, bowing their heads and murmuring greetings, but she didn’t look left or right as she headed out of the main doors, trotted down the steps, and all but jogged through the doors of the Herald’s Rest.
The Chargers were all gathered, to her relief. Krem was in the middle of cards with Dalish, but he still looked up with that precious half-grin when he saw her approach. “Your Worship,” he called in greeting, kicking out a chair for her as well, “you joining us?”
“The Chargers? I wish.” She sat heavily into the chair. “Your card party, though, I’m in.”
His eyes lit up even brighter at the sight of the bottle she slammed onto the table. “And you brought a friend. What’s the occasion?”
She poured the table a round of very full glasses. “I’m engaged. Drinks are on me.”
She knocked her glass back in several deep swigs so that she didn’t have to pay attention to the silence that fell over the table. “Shit,” observed Dalish, then reached for her own glass and joined her.
“Boss,” began Bull, but she held up a finger.
“It’s ceremonial. It’s politics. It’s with Emperor Gaspard. It was his idea. We will not be fucking. And that’s question time over. Deal me in.”
Dalish and Skinner glanced to Bull, but Krem took only a microsecond to nod, take a swig of his own glass and throw some cards her way. No-one said another word on the subject until her dear friend Antivan Brandy was quite finished for the night, and everything was a lot more blurry.
“Gaspard, though, boss?” Bull was shaking his head. “Didn’t you already screw him at the Winter Palace?”
“Not the way he wanted,” snorted Rowan.
“Boss,” said Iron Bull, sounding torn somewhere between appalled and impressed.
Sera cackled loudly from a perch she’d taken on top of Skinner’s chair back. “These noble pricks. All fucked here to sideways, you ask me. Can buy everything they want so want everything else.”
“Haunted, hidden, hollow,” chimed in Cole from his own perch across the way. “Surrounded and stifled but his hands are empty. Look at me, look at me. Hurt me, hate me, just see me.”
Uncomfortable silence. Iron Bull coughed loudly. Sera chose to persist bravely on. “So what was he like, Mrs Poncypants-to-be? Did he cry? What noise does he make when he-”
“Skinner!” cut in Krem loudly over her, waving a drink such that it splashed on those next to him, to their vocal disgust, “Put your money on the table or put your arse out the door, you buying in or not?”
Rowan gratefully grabbed at her cards and focussed on them as conversation turned back to the game, the bets, and Skinner’s arse. She briefly caught Krem’s eye, and he winked at her.
***
The grand hall was blessedly empty as the Iron Bull steered her gently towards the door to her chambers. “Hey,” she remarked, “are you and Dorian exclusive?”
“Why do you ask?” he said easily, his hand on her shoulder still resting lightly but firmly.
“I was just remembering a while back you offering, what was it, for me to ‘ride the bull’?”
“Oh yeah.” He chuckled. “I’m still shocked that one works.”
“Didyou mean it?” They had reached the door, and she turned, trying to look him straight in the face but needing to lean on the doorframe more than she was willing to let on, trying to look casual and not like she was toppling over.
He didn’t look fooled, and smiled at her. “I did, boss. And it would have been fun, but it wasn’t the time.”
“Well-” She put a hand on her hip, beamed sunnily up at him, well aware sultriness was a step too complicated right this moment. “I’m still technically single, so…”
Bull sighed a little, shaking his head, and stepped in close. She just had a moment to appreciate how very broad his shoulders were and how she could feel the warmth radiating off his chest just from the proximity when he leaned in, and pressed a little kiss to her forehead.
“You’re also very drunk, boss. Go upstairs, drink some water and get some sleep.”
He opened the door behind her and gave her a little guiding nudge. She pulled a grumpy face at him, but allowed herself to be nudged, and headed upstairs, collapsing face first into her bed and blissful oblivion.
***
The next day was a parade of well-wishers and concern-mongers. Some, she expected: Cassandra, a little pale, asking in her own stilted fashion about whether she didn’t dream she might marry for love, one day; Dorian, quietly hinting that if she ever needed help escaping this arrangement, he’d have her on a ship to Tevinter in a Minrathous minute; Varric, even, though he did hide his worries behind fear that his readers would riot if he just ‘married off’ his heroine.
“Just because the Hero of Fereldan married King Alistair doesn’t mean you have to find the nearest despot and settle down,” he grinned wryly over a drink in the Herald’s Rest. She hadn’t meant to find her way back here so soon, but Varric had taken one look at her groaning in the sunlight and dragged her off for some hair of the mabari.
“I know that,” she grinned back, swatting playfully at his shoulder, “Or you’d have written the Champion sailing off into the sunset with Prince Sebastian.”
“Fenris would have killed me first,” he said, entirely straight-faced, and as she laughed, continued, “No. Really. The printers wouldn’t be able to make out the words through my blood all over the pages.”
His straight face slipped into something a little more serious as her laughing quieted, and it was downright solemn by the time she cracked. “Are you going to talk me out of it as well?”
“Have others already done that?” he asked, all innocence.
“Cassandra wants me to find my true love, Dorian wants me to run away to Tevinter with him-”
“Tevinter is a hot mess, and love even moreso.” Varric heaved out a breath, looking profoundly uncomfortable. “Look, I - I wouldn’t even care if you were shacking up with Sebastian, if I thought for a moment it was because it would make you happy.” He watched her face closely, even as she tried to avoid his gaze. “But you’re not, and it won’t.”
She shrugged one shoulder. “Nope.”
“So, why-”
She shrugged it again. “Because you all made me Inquisitor. Corypheus might have put the mark on one hand but you all put the sword in the other. So my choices aren’t about happy, they’re about best.” Varric looked to interrupt, but she steamed on, unplanned words falling out like she’d been drunk on them the night before rather than booze. “Orlais isn’t going to tolerate our independent presence much longer, nor is Fereldan. Leliana’s got rumblings of some, some kind of Council to deal with us, and she’s pretty sure they want us to know about it. So this is our play. Orlais gets to feel like they’re in control with Gaspard at my side, and Fereldan can’t do a damn thing about it.”
It all sounded even more reasonable when she said it out loud, but Varric didn’t look convinced. “I’m pretty sure Ruffles coulda thought of something that didn’t involve you marrying a guy - who, I might add, was so busy plotting a coup he didn’t even notice his own sister going off to party with ancient Darkspawn Magisters.”
“This was quickest, easiest, and didn’t involve me running around doing a hundred petty favours for the Du Paraquettes.”
He didn’t reply. Words seemed to be on the tip of his tongue, but he hesitated. She suddenly knew what he was going to ask and couldn’t bear to hear it.
“It’s not about him,” she insisted in a voice so calm yet firm it sounded like a stranger’s. He didn’t reply, just raised an eyebrow. “It’s really not. Yeah, him fucking off like that was - horrible - but, that’s not why you go and marry Orlesian emperors. Weird kind of rebound,” she attempted to joke. Varric smiled obligingly, but the concerned frown between his brows didn’t shift.
She reached out and grabbed his hand. “Please don’t worry about me, Varric, I’m a big girl. I know what I’m doing.”
“I’m sure you do,” said Varric wearily, squeezing it back, “Probably better than anyone else.” He looked lost in thought for a moment, then brightened. “Hey, Vivienne’s single now - if a political match is needed-”
“Uh, I think you can suggest that to her, not me,” said Rowan, laughing at the very idea of the indignant expression which might cross Vivienne’s face at the thought.
“Then what about Curly? That hair, those shoulders, and think of all the war stories he and Gaspard would get to go on and on about…”
The evening wore on, suggesting wilder and wilder pairings for Gaspard rather than Rowan. Varric remained stubbornly insistent that marrying him off to Sebastian would kill two birds with one stone, whilst Rowan’s suggestion at offering him Bianca - the crossbow, naturally, not the dwarf - had Varric gasping in horror and clutching her to his chest. “I could go off you, Inquisitor, don’t you get comfortable,” he warned as she fell about laughing.
A flailing hand caught someone, and she heard a startled “Your worship” before turning to see she’d accidentally slapped Krem up the side of the face. “Oh shit, Krem, sorry,” she said, though her giggles hadn’t faded enough to sound entirely sincere. “I didn’t see you there.”
“No worries, your Worship,” he said again, quickly recovering his composure and the smile springing back into place. “If you’re looking for another hand of Wicked Grace, I’m afraid the others are a bit scattered.”
“Krem!” said Varric, eyes lighting up, “Come join us for a drink. There’s a story behind you and I want to know what it is.”
“Is your friend Antivan Brandy joining us as well?” asked Krem, already sliding onto the bench beside Rowan.
“No, but you must meet my old buddy from Kirkwall, Darktown Rotgut…”
I have to stop getting this drunk, thought Rowan to herself even as she poured herself another glass. It was just easier than being hungover, and it was far, far easier than sitting in her room feeling sorry for herself all night. Standing out on her balcony over the mountains and wondering where he was, where he’d gotten to, why he hadn’t even - She knocked the drink back and poured another. It really was pathetic, the way her head went round and round like a moth to a flame where thoughts of him were involved. Drinking gave her a fucking break, at least.
“Alas, I hear my sweet mistress mattress calling,” announced Varric, breaking her out of her fugue as he got to his feet. “You kids have fun. If another ancient darkspawn magister tries to start something, don’t wake me up.”
“Not it,” said Rowan quickly, sticking her finger to her nose.
“There we go. Your problem now, Krem.” Varric clapped him on the shoulder and headed out, calling over his shoulder, “Stay out of trouble!”
“I will if you will!” shouted Rowan after him, but the door closed with no reply. She let out a tired groan and let her forehead fall forward onto her arms.
“You all right, your Worship?” she heard Krem ask. Not, thank the Creators, with the same pitying edge of concern everyone else had when they talked to her. Just one drinker watching out for another.
She didn’t quite know how to reply, though. She just gave a thumbs up.
“Want some water? Or fresh air?”
She flipped back to sitting upright, forcing her eyes wide and taking an inhale. “Yes. Outside. Good idea.”
They headed outside and Rowan let her feet wander as her mind already was, finding her way up the stairs up to the battlements. She knew these steps so well now, she knew the slight difference in sounds each bare footstep slapping on the worn stone made, which steps were a little more mossy, which were a little more dry - she could probably navigate the castle blindfolded, she mused, going by foot feel. Maybe that was a thing to try on a quiet day.
It was a cold night, and her breath misted in front of her as she gazed upwards at the stars, gleaming as clear-cut diamonds against the frost-black sky. One night like this, just after Solas had left, she remembered she’d climbed onto a roof and lain flat on her back, so all she could see was the night sky stretching endlessly across her vision. She’d started to feel like she was looking down, not up, and barely clinging to the roof by her fingertips - that if she just let go, she’d fall, endlessly, into the black.
“Did you want to?” asked Krem.
She realised with an abrupt jolt that she’d said all that last part out loud. Varric’s friend Darktown Rotgut was chatty, apparently. She tried to pass it off with a shrug. “Who knows. Everyone gets loopy looking at the stars for too long.”
“Yeah,” agreed Krem, also glancing up. They were silent for a moment, and then he went on, “They are something though, aren’t they?”
“Yeah.” She looked away, looking out across the mountains and down the frozen river instead. She didn’t really want to look at stars. That let her mind go quiet, and when it was quiet- “Brrr, it is fucking freezing though,” she added, shoving her fingers into her armpits. “Should probably head inside. Maybe Dorian’s still up in the library, we can cut along here.”
“Through the Commander’s office? Won’t he mind?”
“He knows it’s an easy shortcut, he doesn’t lock his doors. Probably also wants people to be able to bother him whenever with whatever needs doing,” she added with an affectionate eyeroll.
“More fool him, it must let all the heat out everytime someone comes through,” muttered Krem as they pushed open the door.
“More fool you, he’s already got a hole in his roof. Right Cullen?”
Cullen was still sat at his desk, staring at a pile of reports and already halfway asleep judging by the way his head jerked up from resting propped on a fist as they came in. He started to scramble to standing, saying “Inquisitor-”
“Please sit down, Cullen,” smiled Rowan as she walked on through, not breaking her stride, “Actually, make that lie down. Go to bed!”
“I - yes, Inquisitor.”
“Don’t make us have the Bedtime chat again!”
“No, Inquisitor!”
“Have you noticed,” said Krem slowly, as they shut the second door behind them and crossed the walkway to the main castle, “that everyone who works for you has, um…”
“Problems?” observed Rowan.
“I was going to say ‘quirks’, but sure.”
“Yes,” she shrugged. “Who else would give their all for a cause? Well-adjusted people don’t join Inquisitions.”
He pulled a face, feigning deep confusion. “Who are these well-adjusted people you speak of?”
“Point well made. I’ve certainly never met one.” She was still grinning when they walked through the door into the rotunda, and for that second she must have forgotten about Solas - about everything - because seeing the murals again felt like a punch to the chest.
She stopped in her tracks, suddenly struggling to take in a breath like she was winded, mind in absolute disarray. This was stupid, was all she could think - she’d come through here a hundred times since he left, with no real problems, but now -
“So you’re saving that last spot for when we defeat Corypheus, right?” she’d asked one sunny afternoon all those months ago, perching on the ladder as he added detail to his mural for the events at the Well of Sorrows. “So sure we’re so close?”
“Certain,” Solas had replied, with a calm that at the time she had found comforting but looking back she found - unnerving. “He is out of options, out of allies, and has been out of luck since the orb rolled into your hands rather than his. I think we can expect one last ditch effort, which will inevitably reveal him - at which point we will destroy him.”
“Just like that?” she’d teased.
Just as she’d hoped, his calm facade had cracked, just that little, to allow a small smile to slip through. She was the only one who could make him do that, and it thrilled her every time. “Just like that,” he agreed, meeting her eyes.
She held his stare for a moment, and tried not to let her face break completely into a big stupid smile, regardless of how light and happy she felt inside. She just looked back up to the paintings, swinging her legs where they dangled, like she didn’t care at all. “All sounds pretty boring, really. I don’t know why you’ll bother to paint it at all.”
“You’re quite right,” observed Solas, copying her airy, uncaring tone, looking up at the blank space with an unimpressed sneer. “I’d be better off commemorating something more worthwhile.”
“Like when Cullen lost all his clothes during Wicked Grace,” grinned Rowan, “I think that definitely deserves to be immortalised for the ages. Or when Sera put that bucket over Josephine’s door-”
“Or your face.” Solas looked from his paints to her. He’d said the words so matter-of-factly, she struggled to keep her face calm, composed, even as her heart gave an embarrassing FLOP. He had gazed at her so openly, and said again, softly, “Your face is certainly worth commemorating.”
“You all right, your Worship?” asked Krem, and fuck, there was the tone of pity and concern he’d successfully not used all evening, and now she just wanted to be away and never see him again.
She shook her head once to banish the ghosts, so hard she thought she could feel her brain rattle inside her skull, and huffed out a forceful breath like she’d just run up a hill. There was no denying that she’d just had a reaction so she went for shrugging it off. “It’s much harder to get over an ex when you still see them everywhere, right?” She even thought she’d managed that in quite a cheery, breezy tone, but the uneasy look on Krem’s face suggested she might have strayed slightly too close to manic.
He glanced round at the murals, and she saw his face harden as he understood. She honestly just wanted to move on - literally, she wanted to keep walking and go see if Dorian was still awake and up for late night bad decisions - but she waited and braced herself for whatever condolence or commiseration was coming her way for daring to slip up and show an emotion in public.
Finally, Krem just turned back to her. “Where now?” he asked, simply.
Rowan felt a strong surge of relief and gratitude. “Let’s go say hi to Dorian.”