Chapter Text
Lathbora viran: Roughly translated as "the path to a place of lost love," a longing for a thing one can never really know. (Timestamp for chapter 20 of Inclined to Do the Forbidden.)
Solas was pleased when they made camp by the river on the way back to Skyhold. He could feel a place just far enough to be out of sight of camp where the Veil was very thin. He could hear it singing under the strain of holding back the Fade. He helps with the tents, listening to the chatter. He’s still trying to see what this Inquisition will be. The Inquisitor is strange to him, a being he has never seen the like of. A Qunari unlike any other. He reminded Solas of Mythal when they were younger. Before...
He goes back to helping unpack supplies. The Inquisitor is building a fire. They’re talking about cooking, and Solas can feel his eyebrows go up. He wonders if either the mage Inquisitor or his warrior companion have cooked very much. He has doubts. Solas moves closer to the fire. Adaar sees him and smiles. “Hey Solas,” he puts a warm hand on Solas’s shoulder and guides him to sit by the fire that is now crackling.
Solas sits, smiling. “Inquisitor,” he greets Adaar, and turns to the Iron Bull as he comes from splitting logs to stack the wood nearer to the fire, “the Iron Bull.” He inclines his head in greeting.
Bull is clearly intent on continuing the discussion about food. “So you've had that sort of spicy dathrasi thing with the noodles and the smoky sauce?”
The Inquisitor nods, lifting one shoulder in that strange estimation of a shrug. “Could probably fake it with snoufleur. Dorian, do we have flour?” He raises his voice.
The Tevinter mage steps out from behind the carts with a crate. “We do, Amatus.” He leans in to kiss the Inquisitor, leaving the crate by his feet.
Bull catches the slender man around the waist and pulls him up. Dorian laughs and tilts his head back to kiss Bull’s chin. Solas frowns a little. Letting himself be approached and even grabbed from behind without resistance doesn’t speak well of the mage’s awareness. “I’m going to get a snoufleur so His Worship here can make us some dinner. Wanna come with?”
“I think I might go for a swim,” Dorian answers.
Solas steals away without anyone noticing. He seeks out the weak place he felt earlier. He can hear the hum of the spirits on the other side. He closes his eyes and listens.
The spirits are excited, both by the thinness of the veil in this place and the presence of so many mages. Solas recognizes an old friend in the crowd and drops further into meditation to reach across and greet her.
"You have changed, ma vhenan." She murmurs and drifts closer to inspect him.
Solas shakes his head. "You are as aware of the impossibility of that as I am."
"Your interactions with the short-lived always change you, Wolf. Much as you always deny it." She's glowing softly with pleasure at his presence in spite of the seriousness of the conversation. "I hear Compassion found a way to embody without possession. Is that true?"
He nods. "It is."
"What is he like?" Curiosity curls around him like a pampered cat.
"Not markedly different from any other human boy," Solas replies, knowing she'll find the truth more interesting than he does.
She hums with satisfaction. "Is that him now?" she purrs.
Solas is confused, as Cole had elected to stay in Skyhold this trip. Then Dorian comes into view, removing his robes and laying them over a branch before wading into the water. Solas watches, as curious as his friend for once. What had made her mistake the Tevinter mage for a fellow spirit? He feels her leave him distantly. Solas is something she's familiar with. Dorian is unknown and holds many secrets.
He drops deeper into meditation. "He's just a human." Solas chides her. "How did you mistake him for one of you?"
"I assumed only Compassion would be concerned about the welfare of the tree he hung his clothes on." She circles Dorian. "All your companions are unusual, Wolf, but even among them, this one is strange."
Solas looks dubiously at the Tevinter. "He's just a mage. Irritating and ignorant but just a human."
The sun has gone down, and the veil flies come out from hiding to blink lazily around Dorian's peacefully floating form as if to highlight Solas’s mistake. Curiosity laughs."Such a foolish Wolf. Wanting to know everything, but ignoring what's laid before him. If you want to know your Inquisitor, observe this one. His heart is glass. He hides nothing. Compassion trusts him. Which means Compassion can see his reflection. If this one had any hardness to his heart, Compassion would avoid him."
Curiosity is right. Perhaps what the Inquisitor sees in the Tevinter mage does go beyond the physical. Dorian finally seems to notice that he isn't alone and stands. He's alarmed by the veil flies. Solas watches Dorian observe them warily, but the mage makes no move to harm the bugs.
It occurs to Solas that Dorian might never have encountered the glowing green insects before. "They’re veil flies," he offers, raising his voice somewhat, to be heard over the quiet burbling of the stream.
Dorian startles, finally noticing Solas. He tries to dislodge a veil fly from his nose, waving his hands near his face. Solas realizes he doesn't want to injure the bug. Curious. Most humans would simply swat it. "Do you not have them in Tevinter?"
Dorian, shakes his head, watching the insects with more wonder than wariness now that he knows what they are. “No,” he replies, his voice gone dreamy, his concentration on the veil flies. “Tevinter is more rocks and sand than trees and rivers. The rivers there tend to be fast and deep. They cut away the rock into deep canyons. It’s beautiful but less... hospitable?”
Solas wonders at the truth revealed by the unguarded words. Inhospitable to Dorian, who quite literally at this moment is refusing to hurt a fly. Solas wonders how Tevinter bore a man motivated by gentleness. He can feel Curiosity’s vibration like a hum of agreement with the thought.
“He wants you to approve of him,” the spirit murmurs at the edges of his consciousness.
Solas smiles. He’d known that and took some pleasure in using it to knock the Tevinter down a peg or two. He hadn’t been sure of the motivation, but it would appear that Doran truly thought of them as brothers-in-arms. Heart of glass, indeed. He smile gets deeper as Dorian continues to attract glowing bugs. Solas is glad they don’t sting, or the mage would be in trouble. “They like you. They tend to be attracted to mages attuned to fire. Hence their name.”
This is probably the friendliest they’ve ever been. Solas can feel Dorian sizing him up out of the corner of his eye. “It’s not really veilfire that lights them up?”
Curiosity purrs with pleasure at the question, and Solas isn’t sure which one of them he’s chuckling at. He shakes his head. “No, though you aren’t the first to think so.”
Dorian’s voice is soft and far away again. “They’re beautiful,” he observes.
Solas chides himself for ever thinking this human uninteresting. “There’s much beauty to be found in the forest, if you look.” He’s vaguely aware that he’s echoing some otherwise long forgotten teacher.
Dorian hasn’t been tutored in the proper responses, so the conversation lulls. The human seems loath to break the strange truce they’ve found in the magic and beauty of this place. Solas finds his heart softened by that respect. He watches the human go from awkward quietude to wariness in a blink. “Is there something wrong back at camp?”
Solas shakes his head. “No, everything is fine. The Inquisitor and the Iron Bull are cooking... something Qunari. They have assured me it will be delicious.”
Dorian’s relief is palpable. The spirits beyond the Fade calm momentarily with the force of it. He chuckles. “I’ve eaten Adaar’s cooking before. He’s better than the cooks at Skyhold. I make no promises about Bull, on the other hand.”
Solas is charmed by the attempt to put him at his ease. Curiosity’s laughter is closer as she examines his reactions. “You like this human,” she crows.
He acknowledges the truth of the statement. It’s not usual for him to appreciate humans. Most of them seemed to prefer ignorance and brutality. He watches as a veil fly lands on Dorian’s nose, and the mage tries to wave it away without injuring it. Solas laughs when he finally huffs in frustration and the fly buzzes off.
The mage comes closer, sitting on a root that arches out into the water. “I’m not trying to run you off,” he starts, conversationally, “but I’m not usually the person you seek out for company. Is there something... I can help you with?”
Solas shakes his head. He falls into the mode of teacher again. “The Veil is thin here. I was drawn to the spot just as you were.”
The mage appears to take that as a dismissal, standing and carefully climbing the bank, headed for his robes, “I’ll... let you have a moment, then.”
Solas feels strangely reluctant to let the misunderstanding stand. “There’s no need for you to leave,” Solas interrupts, looking out over the water. He waits for Dorian to finish dressing. “We’ve had our differences, but the Inquisitor has chosen you to be among his closest companions. He’s a good man. I’m sure he’s capable of mistakes, but I do not believe you are one of them.”
Solas tries very hard not to grin as Dorian stands with his hands frozen in the act of straightening his robes, his mouth open. He stares at Solas. He stutters when he does try to speak.
Solas is shocked himself when the first intelligible thing the mage says is thanks. Years of verbal sparring with Mythal mean that the response that comes first to his lips is acerbic. “I’ve made you speechless, I see. One of my greater accomplishments.”
The mage’s responding laughter makes him feel warm. The peculiarity of the feeling brings Curiosity humming closer, but Solas’s attention is fully on the material plane for once. Dorian comes close enough to be seen in the gloom, and they sit in companionable silence until Bull’s voice rings through the trees.
Solas walks with Dorian back to camp. He wonders to himself if there’s a path other than the one he’d set forth on. There is definitely more to consider than he had thought before.